Mint Newspaper, led by Neil Borate, does a wonderful job reporting and educating about private finance and investing. In March 2024, Mint featured my retirement portfolio: You solely want a fund the place returns stay constant: Freefincal’s Pattabiraman.
In June 2025, they printed an replace on the portfolio: Why Freefincal’s Pattabiraman doesn’t consider in beating the market. Each articles are by Anil Poste. Observe that these articles require a subscription. That is an infographic from the piece.
There have been some questions and “observations” about my retirement portfolio, and I assumed I might tackle them right here.
Why are you not practising what you preach? Why are you investing in lively funds whereas recommending index funds?
On this article, I clarify ‘why’ intimately with footage: Why are you recommending index funds when your portfolio has crushed the market?
I’ve not constructed this retirement corpus based mostly on intelligence. I’ve behaved the other more often than not. Solely round 2018 or so did I say, “I’m going to cease making foolish fund purchases and consolidate my portfolio.”
So the portfolio you see at the moment is the residue of all my previous errors. Switching from lively to passive funds will solely incur tax now. If I change recent investments to passive, it is going to take 13 years (calculated once I wrote the above article) for the passive fund to outweigh the lively fund. Including a passive fund is simply litter for me now.
I’m solely suggesting that younger earners use passive funds and never repeat the errors I made. If you wish to select lively funds, be prepared for prolonged intervals of outperformance. No matter you employ, have a correct monetary plan first.
That is the evolution of the fairness mutual fund a part of the retirement portfolio from June 2008 to Could 2025. This was created with the freefincal Google Sheets Mutual Fund and Inventory Portfolio Tracker.
What is that this 13.9% return? Is that this return not low for a portfolio that’s 17 years outdated?
That is my retirement portfolio (as of Could twenty fourth 2025)
| Asset | Weight | XIRR |
| Shares | 5.72% | 7.44% |
| Fairness MF | 59.08% | 16.92% |
| NPS | 20.28% | 9.42% |
| PPF | 3.72% | ~ 7.5% |
| Debt MF | 9.99% | 8.28% |
| Money | 1.21% | ~ 5 to six% |
Portfolio XIRR since inception, excluding PPF and money and direct fairness (that’s for 89% of the overall portfolio), is 13.90%
A virtually 14% return for 90% of your entire portfolio (which, for a number of years, was dominated by debt by way of NPS) after 17 years is suitable to me any day.
Mutual Fund Holdings (as of Could twenty fourth 2025)
| Fund Identify | Asset Class | XIRR | Weight |
| Parag Parikh FlexiCap (Since NFO investor. ‘fortunate’ it labored) | Fairness | 20.75% | 58.22% |
| HDFC Hybrid Fairness (Since Sept 2011) | Fairness | 14.56% | 16.91% |
| Quantum Lengthy Time period Fairness (Since Feb 2013) | Fairness | 13.90% | 11.56% |
| UTI Low Volatility (Since NFO investor) | Fairness | 14.90% | 13.31% |
| ICICI Gilt Fund | Debt | 7.67% | 14.56% |
| Parag Parikh CHF (Feb 2021 Rebalance proceeds) | Debt | 12.99% | 3.93% |
| Parag Parikh DAF (Switched from CHF to DAF for tax effectivity; Since NFO investor) | “Debt” | 8.57% | 9.88% |
Do you remorse not investing in gold?
No. I’ve defined why I don’t spend money on gold right here – What you must learn about gold earlier than investing in it.
Additionally, Siddhanta Pinto, host of the Get Wealthy with Pattu podcast, talked about a quote by Rakesh Jhunjhunwala (in response to why he didn’t spend money on crypto) – “You don’t have to go to each get together”.
I’m content material with the place issues stand. After all, readers might imagine it’s sub-optimal or unremarkable, which is ok. On the finish of the day, self-discipline with unwavering focus is the important thing.
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About The Creator
Dr M. Pattabiraman(PhD) is the founder, managing editor and first writer of freefincal. He’s an affiliate professor on the Indian Institute of Know-how, Madras. He has over ten years of expertise publishing information evaluation, analysis and monetary product growth. Join with him by way of Twitter(X), Linkedin, or YouTube. Pattabiraman has co-authored three print books: (1) You will be wealthy too with goal-based investing (CNBC TV18) for DIY buyers. (2) Gamechanger for younger earners. (3) Chinchu Will get a Superpower! for teenagers. He has additionally written seven different free e-books on varied cash administration matters. He’s a patron and co-founder of “Charge-only India,” an organisation selling unbiased, commission-free funding recommendation.
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