Many funds open stocks at a loss

In the first half of this year, stocks experienced many fluctuations, once falling deeply to below 1,600 points due to concerns about Middle East tensions, but then recovered and reached a record high of 1,927 points in mid-May. In total, VN-Index improved from 1,784 points to 1,860 points, equivalent to an increase of 4.26%.

Taking the above index as a reference, most open-stock funds on the market are “following” VN-Index. Data from the Fmarket fund certificate trading platform on 28 units shows that only VNDAF achieved performance exceeding the market average with an increase of 6.38%. The fund managed by the VnDirect group invests in stocks of businesses with the largest capitalization on the market, with good business performance, serving long-term goals.

However, the increase in VN-Index had a large contribution from Vingroup stocks. If excluding 4 stocks VIC, VHM, VRE and VPL, the overall index decreased by about 2.07% compared to the end of last year.

If considered according to this reference, the market still has 16 more open stock funds with higher performance. In particular, MB Capital’s BMFF recorded an increase of more than 4% in the first half of the year. The group increasing over 3% includes EVESG of Prudential Group (UK) and MBVF of MB Capital. The remaining VDEF of VinaCapital, LHCDF of Lighthouse Capital and TBLF of SGI Capital increased by over 2%.

A noteworthy point is that 17 out of 28 funds (accounting for about 60%) recorded negative performance in the first half of this year. Among them, the funds with the worst performance include KDEF of Korea Investment Management (KIM), DCDE and DCDS of Dragon Capital. In addition, the group of funds with a decrease of 3-5% is also quite large such as VLGF (belonging to SSI), UVEEF (belonging to UOB), GDEGF (belonging to HD Capital), SSISCA (belonging to SSI), MAFEQI (belonging to Manulife)…

Share with VnExpressMr. Huynh Hoang Phuong – independent economic expert – said that the fact that many open stock funds have lower performance than VN-Index reflects the characteristics of the market more than the capacity of investment funds.

The HoSE representative index increased, but that does not mean that the majority of stocks on the market have improved their market prices. In the first 6 months of the year, VN-Index increased about 75.72 points (4.23%), but VIC and VHM alone contributed about 107.75 points to this increase. That means the rest of the market actually dragged the overall index down by about 32.23 points. If converted relative to volatility and capitalization size, it can be imagined that the majority of the market is still down about 2-3% compared to the beginning of the year.

“In other words, this is a period when the index increased thanks to the leadership of a very few stocks with large capitalization, instead of the uniform improvement of the entire market. In such a context, it is not too unusual for many open-end funds to not keep up with the VN-Index,” Mr. Phuong commented.

In addition, open funds operate according to the principles of risk management, portfolio diversification and often have a weight limit for each stock. Therefore, it is difficult for them to allocate a large proportion to a few stocks to closely follow the movements of the index during periods of “centralized” market growth.

However, that does not mean that the performance of all funds is completely explained by market factors. According to Mr. Phuong’s observations, some funds’ performance is significantly lower than the average after removing the impact of VIC and VHM. This shows that stock selection, portfolio allocation or disbursement time also have a certain impact on investment results.

Based on portfolio structure, most open funds, despite good growth and negative performance, prefer to hold bank stocks. Typical representatives appear many in the portfolios of funds such as ACB, TCB, CTG, MBB, VCB… Although they own the same group of blue-chip stocks, the performance difference of the units is quite high when the best and lowest profitable funds are up to 15 percentage points apart.

According to Mr. Vu Thanh Huy – Head of FinSuccess Portfolio Management Department, the above difference comes from the specific context of the market in the first half of the year. From the fourth quarter of 2025 until now, the market is in a large-scale correction trend. This is reflected in two important indicators: VN-Index’s P/E valuation (excluding the Vingroup group) has dropped sharply to historical lows and the proportion of stocks remaining above MA 200 – a measure of long-term trend – is at a very low level.

“More than 80% of stocks on the exchange are in a downtrend, it is understandable that most funds have not performed as expected,” Mr. Huy said.

At the same time, the difference in investment results between funds also comes from portfolio management ability. Outperforming funds are often those that maintain a high cash ratio or allocate their portfolios to groups of stocks with their own growth stories, instead of just chasing the general index.

FinSuccess experts believe that the rate of return is also an important factor to evaluate the fund’s capacity. However, investors should look at the fund’s performance over a long enough period, at least one market cycle (3-5 years), to evaluate. Furthermore, each fund will have a different investment strategy, so in the short term, outstanding performance may only come from the “luck” factor, when a group of stocks increases in the short term.

“Investing in open funds is essentially entrusting assets to fund management experts. Therefore, I always advise investors to look more comprehensively, instead of just sticking to short-term profits,” Mr. Huy emphasized.

In addition to tracking long-term returns, it is also important to learn about risk appetite and investment style (mandate). Experts say that there is no best fund, only the most suitable fund. Investors need to clearly determine their risk appetite, profit expectations and investment time to compare with the investment principles stipulated in the fund charter.

Besides profits, investors also need to observe risk indicators such as standard deviation, maximum drawdown and Sharpe index. These are measures that reflect the quality of returns, indicating whether the fund achieves that level of return with an adequate or too high level of risk.

The reputation and capacity of the fund management company is considered one of the most important factors. Investors should learn deeply about the management team, their experience, investment philosophy and professional ethics.

Net return, the investor’s actual performance, is the ultimate measure. Investors also need to carefully consider management fees (usually 1-3%) and other buying and selling fees. A fund with good performance must ensure outstanding returns after deducting all operating costs.

Similarly, expert Huynh Hoang Phuong believes that 6 months is still too short a time to evaluate the capacity of a proactive investment fund. Investors should observe more performance in the coming quarters, especially if cash flow begins to spread to more industry groups. At the same time, the evaluation should be based on achievements over a longer period, such as 3 years or more, instead of just looking at a period with specific market developments like the first half of this year.