If you are investing without having in-depth knowledge

If you are planning to invest anywhere and you don't have deep knowledge on the investment, then at least make sure of one of the following.

1. Either it should have a guaranteed future return. [Like Fixed Deposits in Banks or Post Office etc.]

2. If it does not have guaranteed future returns, it should have public data on the returns it gave in the past. [Open Ended Mutual Funds cannot guarantee future returns. But, one can check how much returns it gave in the last past one year, 3 years, 5 years etc. from the respective website of the AMC or in any third party sites like moneycontrol.com or valueresearchonline.com etc.]

If an investment does not have guaranteed future returns or no public data on the past returns, one must avoid that, unless one has full knowledge on the investment.

ULIP, NFO, Closed Ended Mutual Funds etc., cannot guarantee future returns at the same time they do not have public data on the past returns. 

For ULIPs, the insurance agent may say, it gave so and so returns in the last few years. But, you won't find public data on their company website. They may even take a policy of a random person, and show how much they invested and the present value now. 

For example, if anyone had taken a ULIP policy in March 2020, and checked the value in March 2021, the value might have increased by 20%. The agent may say, even if we take the worst case of 15%, in 15 years you would get so and so amount. 

In March 2020, if anyone had invested in any decent mutual fund, the investment value would have increased by 50% in one year. It was because of the crash happened in the stock market in March 2020. But, if you look at over 5 years, one can find that it varied from a negative percentage to 20%. 

If one looks at a single case, any investment can be projected as excellent by taking the investment that is made at the best time. One needs to check the investment over a period and decide whether it is a good investment or not. The agents of ULIP may provide specific cases which show excellent returns. 

If the investment does not have guaranteed future returns, one must insist on the public data of the past returns before investing.