The value of combined assets of all Collective Investment Schemes (CIS), such as Money Market Funds and fixed income funds, operating in Kenya has crossed the 250 billion mark for the first time in the period ended June 2024.

• According to data from the Capital Markets Authority, funds’ assets under management increased by 13 percent to KSh254.06 billion in June from KSh 225.36 billion in March.
• Money Market Funds (MMFs) remained the most popular vehicle, accounting for KSh 171.2 billion – 67.4 percent of all funds under management.
• The other funds took up the remaining 32.6 percent share – Fixed Income Fund (52.1 billion), Equity Fund (2.6 billion), Balanced Fund (1.4 billion), Other Funds (26.8 billion).

CIC Unit Trust Scheme remained a leader by assets in the overall Unit Trust fund, taking up 26.3 percent of overall market share with assets totalling KSh 66.8 billion – a 7.9 percent increase from KSh 61.9 billion in the first quarter of 2024. Sanlam Unit Trust was the second largest collective investment scheme, with assets growing 26.7 percent to KSh 37.6 billion, taking up 14.8 percent of total market share.

Etica Capital more than doubled Assets Under Management, recording the highest growth of 149.2 percent to KSh 2.6 billion in June 2024 from KSh 1.02 billion in March 2024.

The British American Unit Trust Scheme saw the largest decline in Assets Under Management to KSh 28.5 billion in June 2024 from KSh 30.03 billion in March Etic2024. Orient CIS, Equity Investment bank and Amana Unit Trust Funds similarly experienced mild declines in assets under management by 0.6 percent, 4.4 percent and 0.6 percent respectively.

New Entrants and Investments

During the 2nd quarter of 2024, 2 new Unit Trust Schemes joined the pact, bringing the total number of active funds to 31 out of the total 51 approved collective investment schemes. Faulu Unit Trust Scheme and MyXeno Unit Trust Scheme each pooling KSh 50.7 million and KSh 16.1 million in assets under management.

In the period under review, the largest chunk of assets under management was invested in government securities at 39.2 percent with fixed deposits taking up 33.4 percent. The rest was invested in cash and demand deposits(13.9%), Listed securities (9.3%), Unlisted securities (3.3%), Immovable property (0.4%), other CIS (0.3%) and Off-shore investments (0.2%).

Investment in listed securities saw the sharpest increase of 523 percent to KSh 23.7 billion invested in the same during the review period. However, Unit trust funds reduced their investments in government securities by 7 percent to KSh 99.7 billion from KSh 107.6 billion in March 2024.

A Collective Investment Scheme (CIS) is an investment vehicle where money is pooled together from investors and invested in a wide range of assets and the portfolio collectively managed by a professional fund manager.