Vidya Bala

Founding Partner & Head, Research and Product

About Vidya

Vidya helped build one of the country’s earliest robo-advisory solutions in the country in her earlier role at FundsIndia. She believes in not just providing the right solutions for investors but also taking ownership for the same and following up or changing course when the situation warrants.

Vidya was the head of mutual fund research at FundsIndia where she did some path-breaking work in analysing funds and offering researched portfolios. Her recommendations had a sound track record of beating markets and showcasing consistency. They were followed widely by investors, advisors and media.

A Chartered Accountant by qualification, Vidya began her career as a Senior Internal Auditor for Ashok Leyland. She then went on to work for The Hindu Business Line’s Research Bureau, tracking mutual funds, stock markets, sectors and the macro economy for eight years. She has more than 18 years of experience, of which over 15 were spent analyzing the markets.

Vidya is known in the media for her straight talk and, calling out bad products.

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Vidya's recent articles

4 easy steps to picking good mutual fund schemes
Mutual funds & ETFs
Vidya Bala

4 easy steps to picking good mutual fund schemes

The top-used product at PrimeInvestor, our MF Review Tool, is good for anyone who wants to know our call on your fund (buy/hold/sell) and the reason for the same. It also helps you pick the funds we have a buy on, if you want to go beyond Prime Funds.
But for those of you who want to see the evidence backed by data or wish to do your own filtering, then Prime MF Screener is the only tool available today in town for you to do this evidence-based investing. If you are a subscriber – well, what’s stopping you from empowering yourself using our MF Screener to pick good mutual fund schemes?

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Prime recommendation: Commodity and the rise of the old economy
Recommendations
Vidya Bala

Prime Recommendation: Commodity and the rise of the old economy

In March 2021, our call on the commodities fund we added panned out well. But we decided to issue a book profit call in June 2022, as we wanted to preserve some of the profits given the cool off that was visible then in commodity prices.
And as anticipated, commodities cooled off a fair bit globally. Triggered by inflation-driven rate hikes and recession fears, pre-emptive physical destocking (reducing inventories anticipating higher cost of holding inventories) resulted in lower prices. The traded Goldman Sachs Commodity index graph below will tell you that our call was largely in line with this index’s move.

Premium article available only to subscribers.

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Is the Budget 2023 disincentivizing savings?
Taxes
Vidya Bala

Is the Budget 2023 disincentivizing savings?

The trending narrative post the Budget 2023 proposal is that the Budget is disincentivizing savings. The argument goes like this: if the Budget is nudging individuals to move to the New Tax Regime, it likely means that it may eventually phase out many of the deductions available under the Old Tax Regime. Tax incentive is a major consideration for Indians to save.

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A new approach to gauge market mood - The Nifty VMI tool
Markets
Vidya Bala

A new approach to gauge market mood – The Nifty VMI tool

“Is this a good time to invest in the market?” This is a question that many of you ask us when you want to deploy additional money. Gauging market mood is never easy and this is often done mostly by short-term traders. When investing for the long term, we typically tell you that it is best to invest in phases and avoid trying to time the market. Investing in phases (or call it SIP) and holding for the long term can help contain downsides and it is a proven strategy.

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2023 - The year of the DIY investor
General
Vidya Bala

2023 – The year of the DIY investor

Wish you all a happy, healthy and prosperous 2023 from all of us at PrimeInvestor!
The first month of 2023 marks the completion of three years for us at PrimeInvestor. Thank you all for coming along with us on this journey! We couldn’t have entered the investment marketplace at a better time, and here’s why!

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Stock review : An under-researched, niche, small-cap play
Stocks
Vidya Bala

Stock review : An under-researched, niche, small-cap play

A lot goes into making that piece of gold jewellery you see at your jewellers’. Or even the copper that goes into your two-and four-wheelers. The first step starts with mining these metal and mineral ores. The next is to crush the ore lumps into desired sizes and processing them in mills to extract the metal or mineral. This involves a lot of machinery such as crushers, screens and other mineral processing equipment. In mill equipment, there’s a critical component that protects the equipment to ensure longer life, reduce noise as well as downtime, and improve safety. 

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