What Is NAV in Mutual Fund
Last Diwali, my cousin's father-in-law, a retired bank clerk from Kanpur named Rajendra ji, called me with a genuinely puzzling question. He had put ₹1 lakh into two different mutual funds — one with a NAV of ₹15 and another with a NAV of ₹850 — and he was convinced the ₹15 fund was the "cheaper, better deal" because he got more units for his money. He wasn't wrong to be curious, but he was completely wrong about what NAV actually tells you. And honestly, I don't blame him — I have met chartered accountants, engineers, and even a few junior bank employees who carry the exact same misunderstanding. NAV, or Net Asset Value, is one of the most misunderstood terms in Indian personal finance, largely because the word "value" makes people assume it works like a stock price or a discount coupon — lower number means cheaper, higher number means expensive. In reality, NAV is simply an accounting figure, and understanding what it does and doesn't tell you can …
