At the Moneycontrol Dezerv Wealth Summit 2025 in Mumbai, leading voices from India’s mutual fund industry shared their investment outlook for 2026, flagging investor behaviour as the biggest risk factor for long-term wealth creation. As Indian equity markets mature and alternative assets like gold gain prominence, experts stressed that discipline will matter more than tactical moves in the year ahead.
Amid discussions on fund flows and India’s evolving wealth ecosystem, panelists highlighted that emotional investing and short-term thinking continue to erode returns, even in structurally strong markets.
Recency Bias Remains a Major Wealth Destroyer
A key concern raised during the session was recency bias, where investors chase sectors and mutual funds that have delivered strong recent returns, often entering at unfavourable valuations.
Kalpen Parekh, MD & CEO, DSP Mutual Fund, warned that successful investing is rarely linear. He emphasised that timing mistakes usually occur when investors enter markets purely based on recent performance trends. According to him, understanding when not to invest is as important as identifying opportunities, especially in late-cycle phases.
Rising Trend of Investors ‘Managing the Managers’
Swarup Mohanty, Vice Chairman & CEO, Mirae Asset Investment Managers India, pointed to a growing behavioural issue where investors constantly switch funds in an attempt to outsmart professional managers.
He noted that this trend has intensified in recent years, with investors increasingly behaving like portfolio managers themselves. Frequent churn, he said, often leads to higher costs, poor timing, and diluted long-term returns, defeating the core purpose of mutual fund investing.
Investment Strategy Takeaways for 2026
With equity markets becoming more efficient and valuation gaps narrowing, mutual fund leaders believe that long-term investing discipline, portfolio diversification, and behavioural control will be decisive in 2026. Instead of chasing past outperformers, investors will need to align investments with financial goals, risk tolerance, and time horizons to navigate the next market phase effectively.
Keywords: Investment outlook 2026, mutual fund outlook India, investor behaviour 2026, recency bias investing, Moneycontrol Dezerv Wealth Summit, DSP Mutual Fund outlook, Mirae Asset India, long-term investment strategy
