Ladies and gentlemen, good day and welcome to the Nippon Life India Asset Management Limited Q2 and H1 FY 2027 earnings conference call. As a reminder, all participant lines will be in a listen-only mode, and there will be an opportunity for you to ask questions after the presentation concludes. Should you need assistance during the conference call, please signal an operator by pressing star then zero on your touchtone phone. Please note that this conference is being recorded. I now hand the conference over to Mr. Prayesh Jain from Motilal Oswal Financial Services Limited. Thank you, and over to you.
Thank you, Steve. Good evening, everyone. On behalf of Motilal Oswal, I welcome you all to the Nippon Life India Asset Management 2Q FY 2027 earnings conference call. We have along with us Mr. Sundeep Sikka, Managing Director and CEO, and the senior management team. We are thankful to the management for allowing us this opportunity. Just to inform, Mr. Sundeep will be there on the call until 4:40 P.M., post which the other senior members of the management will take the Q&A. I would now like to hand it over to Mr. Sundeep for his opening remarks. Over to you, sir.
Thanks, Prayesh. Good afternoon. Welcome to our Q2 FY 2027 earnings conference call. We have with us President and Deputy CEO, Saugata Chatterjee; CFO, Parag Joglekar; Deputy CFO, Amol Bilagi; Chief Digital Officer, Arpan Saha; CEO of our AIF subsidiary, Aashwin Dugal; Matsui-san, the nominee of Nippon Life; and Head of our alternate, Andrew Holland. I would first like to share key highlights of our performance, and post that, I will hand over to Parag to speak in greater detail on the recent industry trends as well as our performance, post which we will move to Q&A. Coming to the key highlights, I would like to start by mentioning NAM India was the fastest-growing AMC in the top 10 AMCs in H1 FY 2027 on overall and equity AUM.
We also had the highest increase in overall AUM market share as well as equity AUM market share amongst the top 10 AMCs in H1 FY 2027. Our market share stood at 9.02%, relatively flat quarter-on-quarter. Importantly, both equity net market share and SIP market share remained well above our equity market share, both in high single digits. Moving to our financial performance, NAM India achieved its highest-ever quarterly operating profit of INR 5.23 billion, a growth of 25% year-on-year. Also, happy to share the board of directors have declared an interim dividend of INR 9.50 per share along with Q2 FY 2027 results. Now, I would like to hand over the call to Parag for further details on industry trends and our performance.
Thank you, Sundeep. Let me start off with the markets. Equity market in Q2 FY 2027 witnessed a correction from prior quarter levels. The Nifty was down 5% quarter-on-quarter. The Nifty Midcap index was down 2% quarter-on-quarter, while the Nifty Smallcap index was relatively flat quarter on. The repo rate was flat quarter-on-quarter at 5.25%, while the 10-year G-Sec yield increased by 44 basis points quarter-on-quarter to 7.19%. Gold prices were flat, up 2.5%, while silver prices were down 1% quarter-on-quarter. Now moving to industry AUM and flows. Industry quarterly average AUM grew by 13% year-on-year and 5% quarter-on-quarter in Q2 FY 2027 to INR 87.2 trillion. The share of equity in overall AUM increased by 1% quarter-on-quarter, ending at 58.2% for Q2 FY 2027.
The equity ex of index and arbitrage witnessed a gross inflow of INR 2.69 trillion, higher by 9% quarter-on-quarter, and a net inflow of INR 1.08 trillion, lower by 5% quarter-on-quarter. Categories with the highest inflows were small cap, mid cap, and flexi cap funds. The fixed income category witnessed a net outflow of INR 59 billion in the quarter after an inflow in the previous quarter. The ETF category had a net inflow of INR 367 billion, higher on quarter-on-quarter basis. Quarter-end unique investors in the mutual fund industry increased 11% year-on-year to 63.1 million. Moving on to SIP. Industry SIP flows for the quarter stood at INR 967 billion, up 12% year-on-year and 3% quarter-on-quarter. Monthly SIP flows in September 2026 stood at INR 325 billion, another all-time high.
Contributing SIP folios for September 2026 increased 9% year-on-year and 3% quarter-on-quarter to 100.6 million. Now moving to our business performance. We closed the quarter with total assets under management of INR 8.68 trillion. This includes mutual funds, managed accounts, offshore funds, and GIFT City. Our mutual fund quarterly average AUM grew 19.9% year-on-year and 4.7% quarter-on-quarter to reach INR 7.87 trillion.
We were the fastest growing AMC in the top 10 in H1 FY 2027 on overall and equity AUM, and had the highest increase in overall and the equity quarterly average AUM market share among the top 10 AMCs in H1 FY 2027. I would like now to share a few key highlights for the quarter. Our mutual fund market share increased 51 basis points year-on-year to 9.02%. On quarter-on-quarter basis, it was relatively flat. Our equity market share increased 27 basis points year-on-year and 2 basis points quarter-on-quarter to 7.4%. We achieved a high single-digit market share in equity segment, ex of index and arbitrage. We continue to have the largest investor base in the mutual fund industry with 24.3 million unique investors. We are humbled to have over one in three mutual fund investors invest with us.
During the quarter, we also completed the NFO of the Nippon India Income Plus Arbitrage Omni Fund of Fund, raising INR 1.8 billion. I would also like to touch upon some of the important aspects of our systematic book. Our monthly systematic book rose by 2% year-on-year to INR 37 billion for September 2026. This resulted in an annualized systematic book of INR 445 billion. Excluding STP, SIP book growth was 9% year-on-year. SIP market share stood at 9.84% for September 2026, similar to June 2026. Moving on briefly to the ETF segment. We continue to be one of the largest ETF players with AUM of INR 2.49 trillion and a market share of 21.12%, which increased by 135 basis year-on-year. Our share of industry ETF folios and volumes remains strong at around 45%.
Our ETF average daily volume across key funds remain far higher than the rest of the industry. For gold and silver ETFs, combined closing AUM for NIMF was INR 82 billion, up 6.6% quarter-on-quarter. In quarterly average AUM terms, our gold and silver ETFs represent 32% of the ETF AUM and 12% of the NIMF AUM. Moving on to our digital franchise. Digital purchase transaction and new SIP registration rose to 9 million in H1 FY 2027, up 15% year-on-year. Digital business contributed 78% of the total new purchase transaction in H1 FY 2027. NIMF's digital business continues to strengthen its focus on long-term investor behavior, driving initiatives to scale business and deepen SIP adoption, while reinforcing confidence in the disciplined investing and market volatility. Now I would like to briefly update you on the subsidiary and the GIFT City. Starting out with AIF.
Under Nippon India AIF, we offer Category II and Category III AIF and have raised cumulative commitment of INR 99.8 billion across various schemes, up 14% year-on-year. In Q2 FY 2027, we raised INR 4 billion of commitment across various asset classes. Fundraising is currently underway for our listed equity fund, private credit fund, and direct leasing fund. During Q2 FY 2027, we launched our second mid-category fund, Undiscovered India Opportunity Fund 2. Nippon India Credit Opportunities AIF Scheme 2, NICO 2, with the third capital call in Q2 FY 2027, is drawn down to the extent of 55%.
On offshore funds, our managed AUM stood at INR 135 billion, while our GIFT City AUM stood at $ 45 million. Now on to our financial performance. For Q2 FY 2027, revenue stood at INR 7.96 billion, up 21% year-on-year and 4% quarter-on-quarter. Operating expenses stood at INR 2.72 billion, up 14% year-on-year and flat quarter-on-quarter.
Operating profit stood at INR 5.23 billion, up 25% year-on-year and 6% quarter-on-quarter. Profit after tax stood at INR 3.24 billion, down both YoY and QoQ. However, this is mainly related to the exceptional item, which I will speak about shortly. For H1 FY 2027, operating profit grew by 28% year-on-year. Profit after tax grew by 12% year-on-year. Further, the board of directors has declared an interim dividend of INR 9.5 per share, along with the Q2 FY 2027 results. Lastly, I would like to speak about the exceptional item recognized in the financial. During the quarter, SEBI accorded its in-principle acceptance of the settlement applications filed by the company and its certain officials in respect of an ongoing regulatory matter relating to the past investment made by certain NIMF schemes in Yes Bank AT-1 Bonds.
This relates to the show cause notice received by the company from SEBI dated August 30th, 2024 and subsequent settlement proceedings. Considering the time and the cost and uncertainty that is potentially associated with the generally prolonged legal proceeding, the board has decided to pursue the settlement process in the best interest of the company since it brings the matter to quietus, which in turn allows the management to remain focused on its core business. As a part of agreed settlement terms, an amount of INR 96.76 crore has been paid, comprising of INR 89.08 crore as a reversal of management fee earned by the company over the said investment, including interest, and INR 7.68 crore as a regulatory cost in respect of the company and certain company officials.
The settlement amount of INR 96.76 crore has been fully paid and recognized in the financial reserve for the quarter and half year ended September 30, 2026, as an exceptional item. However, further communication from SEBI is awaited. With this, I would like to conclude my remarks and open the floor for questions.
Thank you, sir. We will now begin the question and answer session. Anyone who wishes to ask a question may press star and one on their touchtone telephone. If you wish to remove yourself from the question queue, you may press star and two. Participants are requested to use handset while asking a question. Ladies and gentlemen, we will wait for a moment while the question queue assembles. The first question comes from the line of Shreyas with Nomura. Please go ahead.
Hi. Thank you so much for the opportunity. First question was on yields. We have seen a slight deterioration in yields as compared to last quarter, while other AMCs and peers have seen quarter-on-quarter increase in yields. Can you explain why is this so?
Yeah. Hi, Shreyas, Amol here. The compression yield was mainly on account of the increase in the equity AUM and due to telescopic pricing. That was the main reason for that.
Sure. What we have seen in peers is that the equity mix has changed and hence the equity yields have improved. In that relation, has our equity yield, the mix in equity AUM, has it changed or has it been similar?
If you look at our equity growth, that has been the highest in the industry and that is why you see the compression in the yield, basically.
Sure. Understood. Can you throw some light on the AT-1 bond case and what exactly it was? That was the second question.
No, Shreyas, Parag here . I think I have covered in my opening remarks what the details of the case that the settlement which we have paid. We don't have anything to add at this point further on that.
What was the non-compliance that SEBI alleged regarding certain provisions of securities law? If you can explain that a little bit, please.
Shreyas, there is a lot to add on that, where at appropriate point we may come back and disclose on the sheet. But currently we have covered in the financial and the opening remarks whatever we have to submit currently.
Sure. My third question was on SIFs. How has been the process that we are taking? When we can see SIFs being launched by the company? Because peers have said, and we have seen in the industry as well that it has been a very important product and has been garnering a lot of flows. What's the strategy there?
Yeah. So hi, Shreyas. Saugata here. Of course, as we have spoken in the past, we definitely have started working at the drawing board as to what will be our SIF launch strategy. We of course are waiting for the SIF clearance to come in from SEBI. Once we get that, of course we will be in the market to launch our ideas. As we have also spoken, we have Andrew Holland and team who have been working on this space for the last now one year. This particular category requires experience. We feel that we have enough experience in the system to exhibit the two SIF strategies in the market. At the right time, we will come and of course explain and launch our ideas.
Sure. Thank you so much. Those were my questions.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you. Participants, if you wish to ask a question, you may press star and one. The next question comes from the line of Sunil with Diamond Asia. Please go ahead.
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Okay. Thank you for the opportunity. I just wanted to ask you again on the yields part. Sir, if we look at the yields for other AMCs as well, while they have also seen a mixed improvement, the decline over here looks sharp because this quarter we also have an additional day. So adjusted for that, the yields decline looks sharp. Now, is it just because of telescopic or maybe because of the commission to distributors that may not have been passed on because of the regulatory change? If you can throw some highlight there, because the drop seems a little high if you compare.
No, Sunil. Parag here.
Yeah.
Just to tell you that our growth in the equity AUM is one of the highest in the industry, and it is purely on the telescopic pricing. Any changes due to regulatory change has already happened in the first quarter, so there is nothing on that in this quarter.
This is purely due to the growth of our AUM and the flows which we are garnering, which have resulted in, due to telescopic pricing, in lower equity yields.
Okay. Thank you, sir. Secondly, if you see the current market trends, a lot of our flows are coming in the small cap and the flexi cap and the mid-cap kind of schemes. But recently, a lot of correction has happened in the small cap recently. A lot of MTF book has seen some drawdown over here. So how are we seeing investor thought process over here? Because the flows in this category, if they, let's say, see a sharp decline or redemption. So what kind of investor psyche we are seeing over here? If this correction continues, then what are the mitigants do we have? Because these technically are one of the biggest schemes. So how do we look at this category going ahead?
Okay. Sunil. If you typically see the Nippon India Mutual Fund flows, we have had flows in our traditional funds like multi-cap, large cap, mid cap, small cap, and our hybrid funds. The industry flows in small cap and flexi cap may be higher, but as you know that we have stopped taking any lump sum flows in our small cap fund for the last three years. What is happening is the money flow which is coming to us is more dispersed, coming into more multi-cap and large-cap opportunities. Yes, market volatility does impact the investor sentiment. We are seeing now HNI investors slowly taking exits from large caps. Till about last month, the large cap category had seen some negative net sales, though our fund has not seen any negative net sales. But at an industry level, the net sales has been negative.
We have to wait and watch. As we progress from here, if the downside is going to be sharper from here on, then maybe some of the fund houses who have got flows in small cap and the other sector funds, et cetera, might see some higher redemption. But from our perspective, we have a very strong SIP book which actually protects us in these circumstances, as we know that we have almost close to INR 3,200 crore of inflows coming in every month, which is more structural in nature, more fragmented, coming from deeper part of India. So we definitely have protection around net sales across our equity funds.
Okay, sir. Thank you. This was very helpful. And just lastly, if I may ask, in this current situation, what is the communication do you have to the distributor network you have? What is the communication right now to all the distributors? What strategies are you using or anything, if you can throw some light on that?
As I mentioned, for the last now one year, we have been propagating hybrid funds. We have been speaking about multi-asset allocation products. We have been speaking about our, again, large cap, multi-caps, and more broad-based strategies. We are also bringing in a lot of fixed income focus into our distributors. As we all know, this industry is very lowly penetrated when it comes to fixed income funds, typically in the retail and HNI space. We as a fund house have taken a lead much earlier. And the asset diversification along with lesser risk-oriented products is what we are trying to communicate. We do a lot of activities and communication with our distributors and investors around why should the SIPs not stop in these markets because the SIPs become more fragile if the long-term returns start becoming negative.
We are doing a lot of proactive stuff digitally as well as face-to-face with our distributors to arrest these investor behavior and volatility in the flows.
Okay. Thank you, sir. This was really helpful. Thank you for answering the questions, and all the best for your future and headquarters.
Thank you.
Thank you. The next question comes from the line of Madhukar Ladha with JP Morgan. Please go ahead.
Hi. Good evening. Thank you for taking my questions. First, I am not sure whether you gave this out or not. Can you give me the asset class-wise yield that you have got? Second, can you comment on how your net inflow market share is trending? You can give a comparison between 1Q and 2Q, and whether you are seeing an improvement, decline, and some sense of there. Third, I noticed that in the equity mix, we have seen a little dip in the direct share. What is really driving that? Is there anything that we should read into it? Those would be my three questions. Thanks.
Hi, Madhukar. Amol here. On the yield part, the equity yield is 52 basis points as of last month. Debt is 25 basis points, liquid is 12 basis points, and ETF is 25 basis points. On the net inflow market share, we can get it also.
Yeah. Hi, Madhukar. With regard to the flows, if you compare Q1 and Q2, we are still in the higher single digit, basically touching around 10%. That is the net flows when it comes to equity. There has not been any major deviation from a flow point of view. The color of the money which is coming to us, as I mentioned, is coming into more diversified funds as well as hybrids which is where we would like the investors to participate and not get into NFOs and smaller cap products which are there in the market. We will continue to be in that camp, and that is probably helping us to maintain our net sales growth. When it comes to ratio of direct versus regular, maybe these are temporary quarterly phenomena.
Nothing to read into those numbers because we continue our effort to. For us, it is flows which come into our funds and typically HNIs try to exit when there are market volatility. It might skew the percentile of direct AUM in certain quarters.
Madhukar, just to add on the yield part, the blended yield stood at 37 basis points.
Right. Sorry, just on the yields. Can you split the equity yield between arbitrage and the balance equity and hybrid funds, that part?
Generally we don't provide that kind of data, Madhukar.
We are not very significant in arbitrage. We don't focus on that category.
Okay. Understood. Got it.
Thank you.
Thanks. That will be all. Thanks.
The next question comes from the line of Mahek with Emkay Global. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Hi. Thank you for the opportunity. I have two questions. First is on the employee costs. Employee expenses have been largely flat on a sequential basis. Just wanted to understand how should we look at it from the balance year point of view and going forward for the next, maybe over the medium-term. Secondly, my question is on the ETFs. Our ETF market share has been largely stable sequentially. However, we have seen some contraction in the volumes market share. If you could just help us with some of your comments on the same. Yeah.
I will take the ETF part first. I think if you see the entire ETF market space in the last one year, if you dissect last one year into two halves. First six months was run by because of the entire momentum in the commodity ETFs. The flows were very strong. Then the last six months, the flows have sort of slowed down on the commodity side, and hence the volumes look to be lesser. Of course, equity market being volatile, the inflows into the equity funds have sort of slowed down. But when it comes to us as an asset management company, the net flows into our ETF products continues to be strong. Rather, our net flows are higher than our market share. That is how we are pegged in the system.
The good part is the reason why our volumes are higher than competition and in industry we stand out is because of, like we have been historically talking about, we believe in volumes. We have enough volumes in the exchange because of the strong retail base which we have built in all our equity ETF products. We have very strong tracking error. Our tracking errors are very competitive and we have the least impact cost when it comes to ETFs. Investors do prefer us as a go-to category as well as the multiple options which we provide to the investors. From ETF standpoint, we continue to remain relevant in the market.
Actually, on the employee cost front, probably the employers should bring in the similar range, except for the new hires that we may do to strengthen our teams and also it depends on training and investments on that front. As guided in the quarter one, on the overall cost front, we continue to maintain our guidance of 18%-20% growth over the next two to three quarters.
I would just like to add more on this. While on the mutual fund side, AMC, it will be almost flat. But AIF business, when you look at the consolidated, that is where we plan to expand. And I think we are in the process of some new senior team members have joined, and we are in the process of adding more professionals. So you may see incremental cost in our AIF subsidiary.
Over the next six-
Over next three to six quarters.
Got it, sir. Thank you so much.
Thank you. The next question comes from the line of Prayesh Jain with Motilal Oswal. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Hi, thanks for the opportunity. Sir, personally, while this is kind of a very small decline, but on your unique investors count as well as your total folios, we are seeing marginal declines in this quarter sequentially. Anything to read into it? Any challenges that you're looking, especially towards the exit rate of the quarter? We have also seen some bit of fund performance kind of weakening. So have you faced any challenges towards the end of the quarter in terms of client addition as well as flows in any sense?
No, I think good observation. See, what is happening is, if you see the market, because of the volatility in the market, the investor flows into the mutual fund industry has also started slowing down. The investor growth has been flattish. That's what is also reflective in the SIP industry, AUM book as well as the SIP inflows are also sort of flattening. When it comes to us, we have not launched any NFOs also in the last two quarters. NFOs do have a tendency to bring in new investors. We stay away from that. Second part is what we measure. We measure ourselves on the control levels. Our number of SIP folio growth continues to be positive, as well as our total investor acquisition is also positive.
Some bit of moderation can happen because of market dynamics, but we are not looking at that as a major concern area, because we still feel that there is a lot of opportunity for investor growth. But yes, there is a slowdown in the industry, for sure.
Got that. Secondly, sir, while we attribute it to slowdown in the industry, have you seen any divergent trends between a direct customer and an assisted customer? Wherein direct, the channel check what you have done is kind of indicating that direct customer seems to be churning far more than the advised customer. Are you seeing that trend changing? What would be your thought on the new PMS product of mutual funds that has been allowed by SEBI?
From an investor, see the direct investor and the HNI investor, of course, like I mentioned earlier also, HNI investors do tend to have short cycles. When it comes to volatility and one-year, two-year performance not reflecting in their portfolios. As you have seen, there has been a sort of a migration of investors to SIF. There has been some migration of investors into alternate assets as well as the direct bond and other categories where definitely investors are getting positive returns. Of course, in any market cycle, there will be investor behavior which can change. We are also experiencing that behavior.
I think regarding this MF-only PMS, I think it is a very good new initiative by the regulator. It will help in expanding the market on ground zero. Also it gets more and more advisors who have been advising, gives them a formal route to help their investors to invest. While it is very early to comment on it, how things will play out, but since this is supposed to invest in mutual fund schemes, I think at Nippon, we believe, I think because of the long-term track record of the schemes which we have, I think we will benefit from that. Even more, because of a very substantial position or a strong position in ETF, a lot of this money indirectly can flow into us. But like I said, we need to evaluate how investors respond to it.
I think it will be good for the industry, and we also believe it will be good for established mutual funds, and especially mutual funds which are very established in ETFs.
Got that. Thank you so much.
Thank you. The next question comes from the line of Mohit Mangal with Centrum Broking. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Good evening, everyone, and thanks for the opportunity. My first question is on employee expenses. So I was looking at your press release and it said that the ESOP expenses was about INR 16 odd crore for H1. You have guided for about INR 60 crore to INR 80 crore for the entire year. So should we assume that your ESOP expenses will be higher for H2?
Sorry. When you looked at the INR 60 crore that we mentioned, that was for the new ESOPs granted. That expense would come over the period of four years. What we have mentioned in the financial results is basically about only the new ESOP grant. So if you look at the overall ESOP expense, for the quarter it was around INR 4.55 crore and for the half year it was around INR 28 crore.
Okay. I was looking at your press release of slide 12. Basically, it said that your ESOP expenses were about INR 15.93 crore for the half year ended 30th of September . The non-cash component of the employee benefit expenses.
Okay. For the year, the expense is expected to be around INR 58 crore for the entire year.
Okay. For the first half it was INR 28 odd crore, right?
INR 28 crore, yeah.
Okay, understood. That's helpful. Second is basically on the offshore business. We understand that due to a lot of macroeconomic issues, the AUM has kind of declined. Are we doing something wherein we can increase the growth? Any particular strategy towards that?
No, I think the reasons for offshore AUM overall has been that owing to the rupee INR equation, rupee depreciation over the last one year or so, there has been declining flows from expats into India. What we have seen though is that we are seeing money come in real assets, but I think we will have to improve. That is just the global macros have to improve and once we see the West Asian crisis possibly nearing some resolution, we could see the rupee coming back strongly. I think that is one of the main reasons that we are seeing both institutional as well as retail flows from overseas. We continue to engage with important investors and our placement agents overseas. That continuous engagement is happening.
Okay. Any particular newer schemes that you will launch in the next three to six months?
You are talking about offshore or onshore?
Offshore.
We would be looking at a couple of ideas, maybe feeders into one or two, or through GIFT City into our master funds in India. There is also possibly a chance of a strategy of outbound funds with one of our strategic partners. It is at formative stage right now, so we will not be able to really share too many details about it.
Understood. Not a problem. Lastly, in terms of the yield. You said that equity yield has been around 52 odd basis points excluding arbitrage. If I look that in Q1, that number was around 54 basis points. Just wanted to know that 2 basis points was primarily on account of just telescopic pricing or there is another element to that as well?
Nothing to add upon here. It is mainly on telescopic pricing and the new flows which keep on coming, we are garnering. That is the only reason. Obviously, between the various scheme across the equity, there may be some shifts. Otherwise, there is nothing other than that.
Understood. That is very helpful. Thanks and wish you all the best.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you. The next question comes from the line of Meghna Luthra with InCred Equities. Please go ahead.
Hi. Thank you for the opportunity. I just had a few questions. One around gold ETFs. I wanted to just understand what proportion of our SIP comes from gold FOF?
Meghna, we don't share scheme level SIP book, but this will be a small portion of our SIP book because mostly it is equity oriented.
Got it. This comes in context of the recent restrictions on flow on FOF funds. Do we see any impact? If yes, what sort of an impact are we assessing on this front?
Actually, if you just go back to three months back, the entire industry had stopped taking lump sum and large ticket flows into commodity ETFs. It did not impact the flows at all because in ETFs there's a buying and selling which happens. So even if there are investors who are coming in to build a gold or a silver portfolio, there's always a counterparty to create a market. So the net growth in gold tonnage is very insignificant. When it comes to current phases which we have undertaken in the fund of fund, it doesn't impact the ETF business because ETF still continues to be open for investors to come in and do their buying and selling. So actually, ETF is more prominent when it comes to gold and silver rather than the fund of fund.
There the buying and selling continues irrespective of flows being restricted in funds.
Got it. Thank you. I just wanted to understand regarding the expense or the one-time exceptional item on AT-1 bonds. We did not have any sort of provisions for it, right?
We booked that as an expense in the current quarter.
Got it. That is it from my side. Thank you.
Thank you. The next question comes from the line of Abhijit with Kotak Securities. Please go ahead.
Hi. Thanks. Good evening, everyone. My first question is, I wanted to clarify the point on OpEx. If I heard it right, you mentioned 18%-20% growth for the full year OpEx. Just a clarification there, given how we are heading into the current quarter as well in terms of the top-line momentum, just wanted to clarify, you are still kind of sticking to that guidance of 18%-20% growth. Second question was on the flows, but more broadly for the industry and then specifically for Nippon. 2Q flows were weaker than the first quarter. If you could highlight across all the channels, where have you seen flow pressure to be maximum for Nippon specifically? Third question is on AT-1. Just wanted to again check what was really the trigger that we had to take this particular action in the current quarter.
Was it regulatory-driven? Was it more discretion? If you can provide any color on that.
Yeah. Coming to the first part, from the flows point of view, as I mentioned, between the two quarters, our net flows has been more or less similar. What is happening in the industry, if you are tracking the entire industry flows on the equity side, the pegging order of the fund houses are changing every quarter. There are a few new fund houses who have come in and started garnering assets because of the new strategies they have launched in the market. Some of the older fund houses have started losing market share there. It is a very interesting trend which we are seeing in the marketplace. Fund houses like us who have been trying to be in the traditional space, advocating large cap, mid cap, multi-cap, the multi-asset strategies. We continue to get flows which are normal.
We are not getting any abnormal flows, and we are happy with that. There are AMCs who are getting flows in certain categories because of the, as I mentioned, either it is a new fund or some existing fund has been repositioned. That is how the trend line is shifting. We are clear that we will continue to do what we think is the right from an investor standpoint, and we will continue to talk about our traditional products.
Abhijit, on the expense side, I think we have been mentioning that we will keep on investing for long term, and that thought process remains. Obviously, we are watchful on the moment market cycles and all. But the idea is that it is important to keep on investing on technology brand, on digital, on people, on various segment of business that is critical, and we will keep on doing it. But we will be mindful of the overall environment in the market. What was your third question, Abhijit? I just missed it.
On the AT-1, sir. What triggered the provision this quarter?
Abhijit, we got the in-principle settlement from SEBI, and that is why we paid the amount and made the necessary provision as we mentioned in our opening remarks.
Understood, sir. Just one follow-up for Chatterjee sir on the first point. If you can give some color on whether Nippon compared to rest of the large listed space in terms of the flow market share from the digital to self-directed channel, if it is higher than the broader peer set or is it lower, which is kind of leading into more stable flow behavior.
Yeah. So I think that part of your question I could not answer. The flows which are coming to us, the digital, the fintech flows continue to be steady. We being more of a retail fund house, we continue to get higher share from our MFDs and both the digital channel and the MFDs continue to be the higher contribution from these two channels. Then we have the other channels contributing to our flows. Because these two channels are more retail-oriented, we haven't seen any sort of large impact when it comes to flows, which I think is slightly different from the other AMCs' behavior of inflows.
All right. Thank you so much.
Thank you. The next question comes from the line of Shobhit Sharma with Elara Securities. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Hi, sir. Thank you for the opportunity. Sir, just to continue on the earlier participant question on the unique customers. If I look at the incremental unique customer count or the market share on the incremental unique customers, I think it has been significantly lower than what it used to be in the previous 10 to 12 quarters. So any channel where we have seen moderation in our market share, which is leading to this? Secondly, is it right to assume that because our flagship schemes, both small cap and mid cap, has grown faster than the overall equity AUM growth, is actually leading into the yield dilution?
I will answer the first question, then maybe Parag can take the other question. See, the investor count behavior, as I mentioned to the previous participant, the NFO. NFOs when they come in the market, still as an Indian investor, the INR 10 is an attraction. Whenever any NFOs which have been launched by the new AMCs who are coming in the industry, as well as some of the existing AMCs having launched some new ideas, that definitely attracts volumes, both digitally as well as through channels. We definitely are away from that space because we do not want to, in a market which is very volatile, we would not like investors to come in with an experience which in funds which do not have a track record. So we stay away from that. Hence, maybe you are finding us flattening on the investor count growth.
But let me also say, which has also been communicated in the opening remarks, that we crossed the 40 million folio count in this quarter. So 40 million folio count and 2.5 crore unique investors pegs us at 37% of the total unique investors in the MF industry, which itself is a very large number, and that is incrementally growing for us. So few lakhs here and there should not probably worry us because we are definitely growing our investor base.
Shobhit, basically the overall yield has been dropped mainly due to the use of equity with the growth of AUM and the new flows which we are getting that has impacted the yield overall and the mix between the various scheme across the equity. Nothing specifically on the distributor or the investor side to read into it. It is generally a growth and the flows which are coming.
Just a small follow-up, Saugata. If you can give us some color on if there is an NFO launch which happens. So which is the channel which actually helps in garnering most of the flows? Because I believe you are pretty large on the fintech side and the MFD side. So if you can give some color around that would be helpful.
Yeah. We have stopped launching NFO. I can talk about the industry because the behavior is similar. See, whenever a new idea is launched in the market, the retail comes in. The retail comes in through the MFDs and the fintechs. These two channels are the go-to channels for any asset management company. Then the remaining channels like banks and the direct investors or the wealth managers, they come in. It is definitely skewed towards the two retail channels. See today, mutual funds are coming in from 300 locations in India. Getting investors from any part of India becomes convenient because the fintech reach is very large and the MFD distribution network is also very strong. These two are the go-to channels for any fund to be launched.
Okay, understood. Thank you and all the best.
Yes.
Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, that was the last question for today. I now hand the conference over to the management for closing comments.
Thank you all for taking out the time to join us on the call today. If you have any further queries, we will be happy to address the same post the call. You can get in touch with Arash for those. Thank you, thank you very much.
Thank you.
Thank you very much.
Yes.
Thank you. On behalf of Motilal Oswal Financial Services Limited, that concludes this conference. Thank you for joining us and you may now disconnect your lines. Thank you.