How PPFAS’s Raunak Onkar makes his investments

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₹8,000 per month as stipend. Onkar, who has since moved up the corporate ladder, is now a co-fund manager and heads the research team at PPFAS Mutual Fund. The pandemic was a blessing in disguise for both PPFAS and Onkar.

Assets managed by their flagship PPFAS flexi cap fund skyrocketed from a mere ₹3,500 crore to about ₹40,000 crore. During this time, Onkar’s annual remuneration also more than doubled. “I recently bought a new house but I consider that more of a liability.

And a huge chunk of my portfolio is in illiquid assets and I want to hold on to it," says Onkar in an interaction with Mint for the Guru Portfolio series. In this series, leaders in the financial services industry share how they manage their own money. Edited excerpts from the interview: How is your portfolio divided? The house I live in is my only real estate portfolio.

I recently bought a new house but I consider that more of a liability. That’s because I pay interest every month on the home loan. As for financial assets, roughly 90% of it is made of equities and the rest is allocated towards debt instruments.

Of the total equity portion, 75% is in private unlisted shares of PPFAS that I got through the employee stock option plan. The rest of it is in the PPFAS flexi cap and the tax saver fund. I don’t invest directly in stocks as we are discouraged from investing in individual stocks.

The remaining 10% debt allocation is split between employee provident fund, public provident fund, our conservative hybrid fund, and our liquid fund. I also have some allocation to liquid funds managed by other asset management companies. That’s because we are not allowed to exit frequently from our own funds.