The Association of Mutual Funds in India (AMFI) on 12 October 2026 announced that a record Rs 32,490 crore in monthly A SIP is a method of investing a fixed amount in a mutual fund scheme at regular intervals, usually monthly, by automatic bank debit. Read the full meaning of SIP inflows was recorded in September, even though the mutual fund industry saw a dip. The total assets under management (AUM) fell about 5.1%, ending at Rs 82.64 lakh crore.
By the end of August, the industry’s AUM had stood at Rs 87.08 lakh crore. The cut in a single month is therefore visible in those numbers and many investors checking the AMFI release will find the two figures hard to read together.
The SIP inflow was also higher than the Rs 32,297 crore collected in August, a rise of about 0.6%. Looking at September 2025, when SIP collections were Rs 29,361 crore, the inflow has gone up by 11%.
After the monthly drop, the AUM was still 9.3% higher than the Rs 75.61 lakh crore figure recorded on 30 September 2025. So the year‑on‑year position of the industry remains positive, while the month‑on‑month stance has turned negative.
Families who invest every month through SIPs are now witnessing headlines that announce record contributions alongside a falling industry valuation, many people are questioning whether the money flowing into mutual funds is getting lost, or whether investors are withdrawing funds.
The two numbers measure different things. The SIP inflow is the amount collected in one month, whereas the AUM is the total value of everything held in all schemes on the last day of that month.
What rose in September
Equity mutual funds saw an increase in money from investors in September as compared with the previous month. Net inflows into equity schemes rose by about 31% to Rs 38,306.55 crore from Rs 29,328.62 crore collected in August.
Net inflow refers to money that investors have put into equity funds after the amounts withdrawn by other investors have been subtracted out. This rise shows that even in a month when market was falling, a larger number of people were still adding money into their equity investments.
During the month, small‑cap funds attracted a record Rs 9,038 crore, and they were again the leading equity category for a third consecutive month, meaning that investors keep choosing these funds over the others.
Many families investing through SIPs are now checking the category-wise figures each month, and the small‑cap number has become one of the item getting the most attention in the AMFI release.
The movement in the number of SIP accounts followed a similar trend. According to the data, there was 63.26 lakh new SIP registrations in September, whereas 49.68 lakh SIPs were either discontinued or had completed their tenure.
The two figures are different in nature. A discontinued SIP is one that an investor has stopped before the planned end, while a completed SIP has reached the date fixed at the time of registration. The AMFI figure combines both, so it does not show how many investors stopped on their own.
In the month the number of new SIP registrations exceeded the number of closures by around 13.6 lakh, which means the total count of active SIPs has risen. At the end of September, the contributing SIP accounts stood at about 10.06 crore.
Each account transfers a fixed sum to a mutual fund on a particular day of every month. The banks automatically debit those instalments and the money reaches the fund houses, no matter if the Nifty is climbing or dropping on that day.
Along with this, the equity inflow data suggests that investors who were already in the market have been continuing to add money. Both fresh lump‑sum purchases and the regular SIP instalments together have pushed up the equity inflow figure for September.
For the normal individual investor, the monthly bank statement shows only the instalment amount that has been debited. The inflow numbers released by AMFI are the total of such instalments from crores of accounts, added together for the whole industry.
These are the numbers that increased in September. The value of the assets held in the schemes, however, moved in the opposite direction during same month.
Where the value went
The Nifty went down by about 6% in September, and the assets held in equity mutual funds dropped roughly 4.25% in the same month. The value of the units that investors already have moves along with market, so when the index falls the total assets decline even though new money may still be pouring in.
ICRA Analytics has traced the drop from the record high in August mainly to the negative mark‑to‑market effect of the market correction. Simply put, the schemes were priced lower on the last day of the month compared to a month earlier, and no investor had to sell for this reduction to show up in the AUM figure.
Experts have named a second cause as well. Large institutional investors withdrew money from debt funds during the month, and these withdrawals reduced the industry AUM further, since debt schemes hold a big share of the total assets.
Feroze Azeez, the Joint CEO of Anand Rathi Wealth Limited, told Zee Business that “This happened because the Nifty did not perform in September, not because of outflows”. His remarks fit the equity inflow data, showing that investors were adding money even though the market was falling.
The value of assets owned through systematic investment plans (SIPs) also fell. By the end of September, the total assets under management (AUM) in SIPs were Rs 17.86 lakh crore, which is down from Rs 18.62 lakh crore in August. This amounted to 21.6% of the AUM in the whole industry.
The money collected through instalments in a month is added to a much larger pool of units bought in earlier years and the value of that pool changes every day with the market prices. When the prices come down, the value of the whole pool comes down, even though fresh instalments have been added on top of it.
People who started SIPs few years back hold units bought over many months, and the value of their portfolio on any given day depends on that day’s NAV. The AMFI figure for SIP assets is a total of all those holdings, so it reflects September’s market moves much more than just the instalments of that month alone.
The debt fund withdrawals by institutions have no direct link to the SIP accounts of individual families. Those withdrawals reduced the industry total, whereas the SIP assets are counted separately and the SIP share of 21.6% shows how much of the industry value is held through this route.
Many investors are now reading the SIP asset figure along with the inflow figure, and the two are telling different things about the same month.
For the families that have been investing every month, the September statement might show a lower portfolio value than the one seen in August. The number of units in the account, however, will have climbed with every instalment that was debited during that month.
Why a SIP can show a loss and still add units
The SIP contributions reported by AMFI are gross collections. They show the money that came in through instalments during the month, and they do not show what happened to the value of the units after the money was invested.
Because of this, a decline in the total SIP assets does not indicate that every SIP investor has lost the same proportion of value. An investor who began a SIP few months ago and one who began many years ago will see markedly different changes in their own statements, even though both of them are counted in the same industry total.
The NAV, or net asset value, is the price of one unit of a mutual fund on a given day. When the market drops, the NAV of an equity fund normally drops too, and the same instalment will then buy a greater number of units than it did a month ago.
For somebody investing Rs 10,000 every month in an equity fund, the instalment will buy a greater number of units on a day when the NAV is lower. The portfolio value shown in the statement may even display a loss at that point, yet the unit count in the account keeps adding on with every debit.
Those families that have been investing via SIPs are now noticing this trend in their statements: the invested sum is greater than before, the number of units bought is also greater, yet the present value of the portfolio is lower compared to a month ago.
Same reason also shows why the industry figures and the individual figures can be so different. The AMFI release adds all the holdings from crores of accounts, with varying start dates, different funds and different purchase prices. The final number represents a single figure for the entire sector, so it does not represent the return of any one individual investor.
Same principle applies to the record inflow. Rs 32,490 crore is the amount that has been collected, and it will be valued at the NAV of each fund on the day of purchase. Its value on a later date will depend on how the market is performing at that time.
September is a single month of data, and one monthly release does not show how the trend will continue. The next AMFI release will show whether the recovery in the Nifty or further withdrawals by institutions from debt funds move the industry AUM. The SIP AUM share of 21.6% is the figure that many market watchers will be looking at in that release, along with the monthly inflow.
