How much gold and silver multi-asset funds hold

The number

A multi-asset allocation fund must hold at least three asset classes, with at least 10% in each. For most of them the third class, after shares and bonds, is gold and silver. In their portfolios at the end of August 2026, the median fund held 12.18% in gold and 1.85% in silver.

That is close to the legal minimum. But the range is wide: from under 5% in the two metals to more than a third of the fund.

Fund by fund

From each fund's portfolio disclosure for 31 August 2026. Gold and silver include ETF units, physical metal and exchange-traded commodity futures, net of any short positions. One-year returns are Direct-plan Growth NAVs to 1 October 2026.

Seven more multi-asset funds are left out because their disclosures could not be read this way. HSBC, LIC and PGIM India list some fund units only by fund house ("HSBC Mutual Fund"), so gold cannot be told apart from anything else. Tata and Edelweiss hold short metal futures alongside their metal, and the Bandhan and The Wealth Company files did not parse cleanly.

What the table says

Most funds sit just above the floor. 27 of the 29 held at least 10% in the two metals, and the middle half of the table runs from 11.67% to 15.66%. Only two funds held more than a fifth of their money in metals.

Silver is optional. 19 funds held some; 10 held none. Where it appears it is usually a few per cent. Two funds are exceptions: 360 ONE at 11.10%, and Kotak at 9.15%, a little more than its gold.

The low end gets its third asset class elsewhere. WhiteOak Capital's fund held 4.95% in gold but 16.85% in REITs and InvITs, which also count as an asset class.

Did the metal decide the year?

Gold rose 16.7% and silver 39.4% in rupees over the year to 1 October 2026, per our gold and silver price review, while the Nifty 50 fell 9.72%. At the median weights, held all year, the two metals would have added roughly 2.8 points to a fund's return.

Yet the funds that held more metal did not reliably do better. Across the 26 funds with a one-year record, the correlation between their metal share and their one-year return was 0.19, which is weak. Split into thirds by metal share:

Sundaram's fund held 20.64% in gold and returned 1.11%. Quantum's held 15.40% and lost 1.58%. Quant's held 11.42% and returned 12.92%. With half or more of most of these funds in shares, the choice of shares mattered more than the size of the gold slice.

Two caveats: these are August weights set against a year of returns, and funds change their mix as they go. A fund that held more gold in January, when prices peaked, would show it differently.

What to take from it

• Read the portfolio, not the label. Two multi-asset funds can differ threefold in metals. The latest holdings are on each fund page, reached from the multi-asset fund list.
• Count what you already own. If you hold a gold fund separately, a multi-asset fund with 20% in metals adds to it.
• Expect the equity side to dominate. Our October balanced advantage comparison gives multi-asset funds the highest three-year median of the seven categories it compares, 14.00%, with a 10.78% worst fall.

These are disclosed holdings and past returns, not a recommendation.