I-Pru MF to launch India’s first silver ETF

Mumbai:

Retail investors

will have another asset class in the new year to invest in at a low cost — with a minimum initial corpus of just Rs 100.

ICICI Prudential

Mutual Fund (I-Pru MF) on Friday said it was launching India’s first

silver

exchange traded fund (

ETF

), a new investment scheme for which

markets

regulator

Sebi

had given the green signal about two months ago.

After the regulator announced the operational guidelines for silver ETFs in late November, several fund houses had filed a draft prospectus with Sebi to launch these schemes. I-Pru MF’s

silver ETF

is slotted to open on January 5 and close on January 19, the fund house said.

According to I-Pru MF head (product & strategy) Chintan Haria, silver ETFs could become one of the preferred ways for investors to take exposure to the precious metal since the ETF route eliminates the need for buyers to ensure purity, quality or liquidity. “Silver is among the preferred options globally when it comes to investing in precious metals. This is because silver is considered as a store of value, a hedge against inflation and has very limited correlation with other asset classes,” Haria said.