The tax on LTCG will only cause a marginal dent in returns. An investor who invested Rs 1,000 per month in the systematic investment plan (SIP) of a large-cap fund for 15 years would put in Rs 180,000. His corpus would grow to Rs 608,085 (using the category average return) by the end of 2017, a growth of 3.38 times. Hypothetically, if LTCG tax existed, his return would diminish to 3.15 times. “Despite the tax, equity mutual funds would still retain their position as the best asset class for the long run," says Kunal Bajaj, CEO and founder of Clearfunds.com, a Sebi-registered online investment advisor.
