TRI benchmark: judging a fund fairly
To know whether a fund did well, you compare it to a benchmark. But which version of the index you use changes the answer — and a Total Return Index (TRI) is the honest one.
Price index vs total-return index
A price index (like "NIFTY 50") tracks only price movement. A Total Return Index (like "NIFTY 50 TRI") also reinvests the dividends the underlying companies pay. Since a fund receives and reinvests those dividends too, comparing the fund to a price index gives it free credit it didn't earn — making almost any fund look like it beat the market.
The legal benchmark
Every fund declares a specific benchmark in its official documents — its legal benchmark — and regulators require performance to be shown against the total-return version. That exact index, on matched periods, is the only fair yardstick.
Why OmniAsset uses the exact TRI
OmniAsset compares each fund only to its own legally-stated TRI benchmark, over matched periods. If the exact TRI series isn't available, the comparison is withheld rather than swapped for a convenient proxy — because a proxy benchmark quietly changes whether a fund looks good or bad. See how this feeds the health check, and why expense ratio only matters relative to this yardstick.