Oct 30, 2024 10 min read

Active vs. Passive Investing: Which is Best for Portfolio?

Do you want to get a higher return from the portfolio or plan for sustainable and continuous growth in the long run?

Here are the active and passive management approaches, which present two road maps for constructing wealth. Genuine hard-core active investing, with high turnover, is attractive to people wanting to make significant gains quickly.

In contrast, passive investing involves holding investments and experiencing moderate gains at low risk and expense.

Here, you’ll discover how each strategy works and weigh its advantages and disadvantages to know which one suits your financial and risk profile.

Don’t forget to check out the list of Best Mutual Funds for SIP in 2024.

Are you willing to earn a high income quickly? If yes, then here is a solution to actively investing.

What is the Meaning of Active Investing?

The Buy-and-Sell Approach is an Active Investment that aims for higher returns but does so at the cost of risk. As it involves the timing factor of investing in sectors, themes, or stocks. Funds suited to such a strategy are small and midcap, Business Cycles, or Thematic or Sector Funds, in which active management makes changes in response to market conditions but holds on to core positions long enough to achieve growth.

Let's have a look at the benefits of this investing strategy.

Advantages of Active Investing

The benefits that give chances to investors can involve them more in investing actively:

  1. Risk Management: You can manage the risk of losses by making them less severe through hedging against unfavorable market conditions.
  2. Exploring underperforming sectors: Fund managers have exposure to the less-known sectors within the market that might provide them with high returns.
  3. Flexibility to invest: Investors have the opportunity they invest according to their financial goals, time horizons, and market performance.
  4. Upgrading Portfolios: Active fund managers can improve their portfolios by understanding the market traits and taking advantage of opportunities for capitalization, moving for secure investments.

A coin has two sides which means having good points and also has some points that need to be focused.

What are the Cons of Active Investing?

The points that need to be focused on this investing strategy are:

  1. Higher Cost: Due to the constant buying and selling process, transaction fees, and pay for the analyst or researcher become higher.
  2. Underperforming Risk: Investors have the choice to buy stocks that meet their goals but might have risks of underperformance or losses if not reach the expected criteria and lead to a market downturn.

Don't miss to check out the top-performing that will help you plan for your long-term goals.

5 Best Mutual Funds for Active Investing Style

Here are the 5 top-performing funds for investors ready to go with an active investment style:

Fund NameLaunch DateAUM (Cr)CAGR (%)
Franklin India Opportunities Fund 05.02.2002 5,610 14.09
Nippon India Innovation Fund 29.08.23 2,275 30.52
Bandhan Small Cap Fund 01.02.2020 8,489 38.29
ICICI Pru Manufacturing Fund 07.10.2018 7,041 22.32
HSBC Business Cycles Fund 20.08.2014 1,003 15.38

 Are you a low-risk tolerance investor who wishes to have long-term high returns? If you are one of them then you can opt for Passive Investing.

What is the Meaning of Passive Investing?

The first approach, referred to as the buy-and-hold strategy, is an investment format that invests in high-quality companies. It gives long-term earnings growth potential over long periods with a lower likelihood of failure but presents market fluctuation risk. Large Cap Funds or diversified Multi or Flexi Cap Funds that practice this strategy are available to investors. Still, simple long-term investments through index funds – Nifty 50 or Nifty 500 Funds are also available.

Let us know how this strategy benefits you.

What are the Benefits that Passive Strategy Holds?

There are following benefits that this long-term investing strategy holds:

  • Simple Execution: This is a simple investing strategy with transparency of investing in the assets for the long-term where you can have more gains.
  • Consistent Performance: This investing strategy has the advantage of making a position in the market for a long time as it wishes to match the market returns.
  • Low-Cost: Due to the less frequent buying and selling process, the investors have the advantage of low-cost fees and taxes.
  • Low Risk: Investors have the opportunity to avoid risk by expanding their profits through investing in a wider range of assets.

If there are good facts then there will be cons as well, Let's have a look at them.

What are the Cons Related to Passive Investing?

There are some disadvantages mentioned below that you should know about:

  1. Tight Flexibility: Due to less frequent buying and selling of investments, you can't make adjustments and may experience losses when the market faces downturns.
  2. Loss of Gains: Because of having a major focus on hitting the same profit as the market has instead of trying to beat that market return makes excess loss in your gains.
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Let's explore the top-performing mutual funds that follow an active based style of investing.

5 Best Mutual Funds for Passive Investing Style

Here are the top-performing mutual funds for investors wanting to adopt a passive style of investing:

Fund NameLaunch DateAUM (Cr)CAGR (%)
ICICI Pru Nifty Next 50 Index 05.06.2010 7,183 13.55
Nippon India Nifty Small Cap 250 Index 03.10.2020 1,873 34.77
UTI Nifty 500 Value 50 Index Fund 10.05.2023 499 58.63
ICICI Pru Nifty 200 Momentum 30 Index Fund 05.05.2022 304 34.39
HDFC NIFTY Next 50 Index Fund 05.11.2021 1,808 17.86

Next stop will land you towards choosing one style of investing and know which suits you the best.

Which is Better, Active or Passive Investing?

When it comes to making money in the market by investing in funds, investors can choose different strategies. Here are the two types of investing strategies:

  • Passive Investing
  • Active Investing

Both strategies have their objectives, advantages, disadvantages, and time horizon. The investing strategy you follow also depends on your financial goals as well as your risk-taking capacity, even the time horizon.

Now, what you need is to know which one works for you. And for that, you can check out the table below drawing a parallel comparison of the two.

Difference Between Active vs Passive Investing

Here is a side-by-side comparison of the two kinds of investment techniques in mutual funds:

AspectsActive InvestingPassive Investing
Working Frequent buying and selling of stocks. Not frequently buying and selling of stocks is done.
Monitoring Requires less time but more monitoring of economic traits. Requires more time but less monitoring of economic traits.
Cost High-cost Low-cost
Risk-tolerance High-risk tolerance Low-risk tolerance
Gains Short-term gains Long-term gains

Conclusion

In short, both strategies offer you an amazing opportunity to make a solid portfolio with high returns. If you are someone willing to bet high risk for high returns go for an active style of investing. Likewise, if you have more of a long-term goal, go with SIP by following a passive style of investing. 

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