The battle for the top spot in India’s mutual fund industry is entering its most competitive phase yet—and it is no longer a one-horse race.
Over the past two years, ICICI Prudential Mutual Fund has closed the gap sharply with industry leader SBI Mutual Fund, turning what once looked like a settled hierarchy into a genuine contest. Based on average assets under management (AAUM), ICICI Prudential is now just ₹1.7 lakh crore behind SBI MF.
As of December 2025, SBI MF managed ₹12.48 lakh crore, while ICICI Prudential MF stood at ₹10.76 lakh crore, according to data from Association of Mutual Funds in India. What makes this shift more striking is what is happening behind them: the gap between ICICI Prudential and third-placed HDFC Mutual Fund has widened dramatically. From about ₹70,000 crore in March 2024, it has more than doubled to ₹1.5 lakh crore.
A large part of SBI MF’s lead, however, comes from a structural advantage. Nearly 27% of its AUM is concentrated in just two exchange-traded funds—the Nifty 50 and Sensex ETFs—driven by long-term allocations from the Employees’ Provident Fund Organisation. Excluding these flows, ICICI Prudential and HDFC MF would effectively rank first and second on a purely competitive basis.
Tracing SBI’s advantage
This advantage dates back to 2015, when EPFO selected SBI MF to manage benchmark ETFs under its investment framework, with smaller allocations to other fund houses. While perfectly legitimate, these flows are not the result of ongoing market competition.
That distinction matters. “ICICI Prudential is already the market leader in any meaningful competitive sense,” said Dhirendra Kumar, CEO of Value Research. “If you set aside SBI’s “privileged” AUM of roughly Rs 3.43 lakh crore in Nifty and Sensex ETFs, much of which comes from EPFO rather than regular market competition, ICICI’s leadership has been built the hard way – through performance, product discipline, and steady execution across categories.”
The numbers back that up. In 2025, ICICI Prudential featured among the top five performers in 13 out of 15 equity categories tracked by Value Research, spanning large-and-midcap, focused, value and aggressive hybrid funds. SBI MF, by comparison, had five schemes in the top five—and one in the bottom five. Over three- and five-year periods, ICICI’s large-cap funds delivered average returns of about 27.5% and 30%, far ahead of SBI’s roughly 15%.
Momentum has clearly shifted since late 2024. In September that year, the AAUM gap between SBI MF and ICICI Prudential was at its widest—₹2.57 lakh crore. Since then, ICICI Prudential’s assets have grown 44%, HDFC MF’s 37.7%, while SBI MF’s growth has been a more modest 28%.
Importantly, ICICI Prudential’s rise has been broad-based rather than dependent on a few blockbuster schemes. Mohit Mangal, vice president, research at Centrum believes that this rapid growth was diversified across all equity schemes and noted that five largest equity-oriented schemes accounted for 53% of the ICICI’s AUM as of September end compared to 58.6% of the top 10 AMCs and no single scheme constitutes more than 7% of AUM.
He also noted that the individual investor category constituted around 60% of the AUM consistent over the last few years.
What did Gaurav Jani say?
Gaurav Jani, financials analyst at PL Capital had noted at the time of the AMC’s listing it had the highest market share in net equity flow and superior equity yield of 67 basis points due to lowest distributor payout and the firm have 9.2% of revenue coming from non-mutual fund business,higher than many peers.
He added that ICICI Pru AMC may eventually command a premium to HDFC AMC due to better distribution and diversification.
Nimesh Shah, CEO of ICICI Prudential AMC had told reporters at the IPO press meet that out of 10 new AMCs that have come only two and three have grown because they gave superb performance.
The broader message is clear. India’s AMC industry is no longer about scale alone. Performance, diversification and distribution strength now determine leadership. SBI MF still holds the crown—but the chase is on. And if current trends hold, the race for number one may well go down to the wire.