Small equity component in portfolio will protect principal

I am 57 years old, unmarried and have no liability. I retired in 2016. On retirement I got Rs 68 lakh. I invested Rs 10 lakh in Fixed Deposits, which will mature in July 2018. I will get Rs 11,60,222. I invested Rs 4,50,000 in Monthly Income Scheme and Rs 15 lakh in government senior citizen scheme of Post office. I am getting interest Rs 32,250 quarterly. The interest of the post office schemes is lying in the savings bank. The interest I will get is 7.5%, for two years. Can you suggest some debt funds?
Vinod Meena

It is not clear whether you expect to meet your monthly expenditure from the income from these investments. All investments are in fixed income securities, which will not be able to keep up with inflation. You need to plan till you reach the age of 85 years. Hence, a judicious exposure to equity would be in order specially from the unused interest amount. You could work out a capital protection strategy with an equity sweetener. If you are in the lower tax bracket, you can invest the maturity amount of the FD into a monthly interest paying FD and invest the interest as a monthly SIP into a dynamic equity fund or a balanced fund. If you are in the high tax bracket, you can invest the lumpsum in a short-term income fund (direct growth option) of the same fund house and then do a systematic transfer from such a fund to the equity fund to achieve the same objective.

Harsh Roongta, Sebi-registered investment expert

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