Last Updated on November 9, 2019 at 11:59 am
Holding international stocks in a portfolio can help lower risk, in particular, hold it together when Indian equities fail. However, it is not easy for retail to do this – both in terms of investment size, expenses and tax. The simplest way is to invest in Indian equity mutual funds. That is funds that hold a minimum of 65% of Indian stocks. Here is a list of such funds holding international stocks.
Readers may recall yesterday’s back-testing study on different allocations to the S&P 500 index in an equity portfolio of Nifty 50 and Nifty Next 50: How much US stocks should your portfolio hold?
In this list, we shall not consider international funds or fund of funds. It is perhaps unfortunate that we have only four equity mutual funds with more than 10% exposure to foreign stocks.
List of Equity Mutual Funds Holding International Stocks
| Scheme Name | Allocation (%) |
| Templeton India Equity Income Fund | 22.35 |
| Parag Parikh Long Term Equity Fund | 21.57 |
| Franklin India Technology Fund | 16.83 |
| Axis Growth Opp Fund | 15.70 |
| Aditya Birla SL Dividend Yield Fund | 8.54 |
| DSP Natural Res & New Energy Fund | 6.80 |
| DSP Healthcare Fund | 6.37 |
| SBI Technology Opp Fund | 5.50 |
| Aditya Birla SL Digital India Fund | 5.2 |
| SBI Focused Equity Fund | 3.94 |
| Franklin India Focused Equity Fund | 2.56 |
| Franklin India Bluechip Fund | 2.23 |
| IDFC Multi Cap Fund | 1.86 |
| ICICI Pru FMCG Fund | 1.24 |
| Franklin India Equity Advantage Fund | 0.97 |
| Franklin India Prima Fund | 0.30 |
The percentages are as on Oct 31st 2019 except the funds marked in red which are dated Sep 30th 2019.
🔥Secure your future with our Robo-advisory tool trusted by over 3,500 investors and advisors. From effortless retirement planning to funding your children’s biggest dreams, turn your financial goals into reality. 🔥
Subscribe for money management solutions via email! (Link takes you to our email sign-up form) Join 32,000+ readers in our community.
👉 New Tool Alert! NaviPlan: A Privacy-Focused Multi-asset Tracker and Goal Planner 👈
That is just 16 funds in total! Out of these Parag Parikh Long Term Equity Fund and Axis Growth Opportunities Fund (with significantly lower exposure) are the only non-thematic diversified equity funds.
There are two dividend yield funds in the top five including Templeton India Equity Income Fund. Beyond the top five, the exposure is too small to make a difference.
The lack of choices here is baffling and hope it will change in future. The ideal scenario would be a hybrid equity index fund tracking say Nifty and the S&P 500 or the MSCI World Index or the S & P Global 1200 (see for details: Will you choose a risky mutual fund if it has a chance of beating the index?) etc.