The markets have hit a new normal. Political capital is no more a worry for the Government. Now, the Modi government can be emboldened to hasten reforms, implement GST, come down strongly on tax evaders and clean up the system. But, this sequence will still need time to show good…
“Investing is not supposed to be easy, and anybody who finds it easy is stupid.” These words of Charlie Munger were highlighted by Howard Marks in a recent lecture to India’s value investing community. This set me wondering again about the current narratives that dominate the Indian investing space. Post-2014…
Global factors keep returning again and again to haunt our markets. Just when we believed that we are de-coupled from global markets, we had a sharp dip due to a Trump win in November, 2016. De-monetisation also added to the market’s woes. 2017 started on a low and has seen…
Most people make investments because they want to. They often ignore & overlook whether they actually need to. Investing works very well only if one questions himself on the need. When the need is not clearly identified, the investing is goal-less. Often when we invest without goals, there is a…
There is something about history. It often repeats itself. It has a pattern. Market cycles have a classic repetitive pattern too. Investors make the same mistakes cycle after cycle. Just that a new set of people come around with every cycle to make the same mistakes. Governance too follows the…
There is something about how retail investors measure performance. First, they anchor performance to their own expectations. Secondly, they want their whole portfolio to do as well as the market’s best performing fund. Finally, they believe that their portfolio performance should be independent of the market’s. You will notice that…
The rate hike in US finally happened. As an event that was long expected and widely speculated, it didn’t carry any surprise element. Now that the event is behind, markets will need to focus on how global investors reset their emerging market allocations for 2017. Usually, these allocations start showing in January’s FII…
The Math of Demonetisation is slowly emerging. Money mostly is finding its way to the bank. The banking system seems to be coming under the scanner for helping cash hoarders launder money. This is something we will hear more about. Consumption is slowing. Indirect Tax collections are likely to follow suit. Service tax will…
Demonetisation became the side story on Tuesday evening. The real story was reported in almost invisible columns in the dailies on Wednesday. What are we talking about? We are talking to the most deterrent tax law passed in our nation’s history. The Government amended the taxes related to concealed income.…
The economy is set to slow down on the consumption side. Clearly, the financial results for the third quarter will be nothing to write home about. It is clear that the news flows will be bad in the coming weeks. The markets seem to be taking a stoic view of…
“Sell in December and go away” is a popular slogan among global investors. Seasonality in stock markets may defeat all rationality. Yet, there is no denying its existence.The difference is that FII’s are advancing their selling by a month. The reasons are both local and global. The rate hike in USA…
Equity investors are most unlikely to be keen followers of bond markets. Even when their equity investments benefit greatly from events in the bond market, equity investors tend to not follow the interconnect closely. Bottom-up investing is a convenient excuse to say ” I don’t follow the economic macros”. I…