Axis Mutual Fund launches ‘Axis Consumption ETF’.

Axis Mutual Fund, one of the fastest-growing fund houses in India, today announced the launch of their new fund– ‘Axis Consumption ETF’. The new fund offers (NFO), which will open on Monday, August 30, will allow exposure to the consumption theme in a neatly packed bite sized exchange traded fund.

The new fund offers long-term wealth creation solutions and targets to achieve returns by investing in a basket of NIFTY India Consumption Index stocks.

India's economy already had strong growth prospects for the next ten years. The trend line in India's annual GDP growth has been accelerating from 5.8% in the 1990s to 6.9% in the first 2 decades of the new millennium (source: Morgan Stanley). We believe this trend will likely continue for the next decade given the following structural factors:

• Favourable demographics: Over the next 10 years, 122 million individuals are likely to enter the work force, which is equivalent to about 20% of India's current work force. (source: Morgan Stanley)

• Globalization: This provides the enabling factors of external demand and financing that can be used to boost growth.

• Reforms: The government is continuing the reforms that India started in the early 1990s, which relate to the ease of doing business, FDI, government finances, taxation, infrastructure and greater autonomy for states.

Digitization adds an incremental fillip to this growth in our view. Digitization is integral to two changes: a) policy initiatives that are boosting financial inclusion and b) technology changes that are reducing the cost of delivering financial services to the masses and small enterprises. These, along with the government's focus on employment for all, will make growth more inclusive, which in turn makes us more confident about India's growth outlook.