Buoyed by the surge in equity markets, the Employees Provident Fund Organisation (EPFO) will consider increasing its investments in Exchange Traded Funds (ETFs) 15 per cent of investible deposits in 2017-18, from the current 10 per cent. The EPFO trustees will meet on March 30 to discuss the option.
Labour Minister Bandaru Dattatreya had already indicated that EPFO are proposing to invest up to 15 per cent during the next year and for which they will seek opinion in its meeting. He had also pointed that the organisation is getting good yield from such investments. So far, it has invested Rs 18,069 crore in the market.
The EPFO had entered the stock market by investing 5 per cent in August 2015, which was raised to 10 per cent last year. In the current year, the PF body invested the amount in the two index-linked ETFs- the BSE's Sensex and the NSE's Nifty, which yielded a return of 18.13 per cent.