Blog on Value Investing | Safal Niveshak

Is It Ethical to Invest in Stock Market?

Here is a comment I received on a recent post from a tribeswoman.

Vishal, I have been reading your articles for a while. You come across as an open-minded, sincere and conscientious person. And since you are also spiritually inclined, I have one question for you: Is it ethical to invest in stock markets?

My argument is: The basis of capitalism and the industrial economy are rooted in principles that are often conflicting with all the spiritual ideals that you have presented.

The kind of business monopolies that Buffett and Munger love are often exploitative, psychopathic monsters that intensify the rich-poor gap by creating concentration of wealth.

And how about the harm caused to the ecology because of use-and-throw products, concentration of resources, reckless exploitation of nature and dehumanization of people.

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The Most Important Investment Letter You Must Read Now

One of the few investors Warren Buffett respects a lot is Howard Marks. Marks is the CEO of Oaktree Capital and is one of the most famous investors who manages to keep a low profile, despite managing almost US$ 90 billion.

Marks is also the author of an amazing book – The Most Important Thing: Uncommon Sense for the Thoughtful Investor. In its ultimate praise, Warren Buffett writes, “This is that rarity, a useful book”.

Apart from the investing gems he has shared through this book, Marks also writes regular memos for investors where he outlines his investment philosophy, in line with what Buffett does via his annual letters to shareholders.

Here is what Buffett has to say about Marks’s memos – “When I see memos from Howard Marks in my mail, they’re the first thing I open and read. I always learn something…”

Value Investing, the Chetan Parikh Way – Part 1

I recently had the privilege of meeting one of the highly regarded value investors in India, Mr. Chetan Parikh in his office in Mumbai.

Mr. Parikh is a director of Jeetay Investments Pvt. Ltd., a portfolio management firm. He is also associated with Capitalideasonline.com, a website dedicated to investor education.

He had obtained his MBA from the Wharton School. He had written for ‘Investment Week’ which was a popular weekly financial publication in India and developed a statistical model for them. His writings have been published in Business Standard, Business World, Economic Times and Business India. He has been rated as amongst one of India’s best investors by Business India. He is a visiting faculty member of Jamnalal Bajaj Institute of Management Studies, Mumbai.

Like my meeting with Prof. Sanjay Bakshi, this meeting was also like a dream come true for me, having met a guru who has been a great teacher in my investing pursuits over the past few years.

What follows below is Mr. Parikh’s answer to just a couple of my questions. I will publish the entire interview in parts.

Wit, Wisdom, Charlie: Elementary Worldly Wisdom from Charlie Munger (Issue #6)

This post is authored by Puneet Khurana, a Safal Niveshak tribesman.

Few years back, while buying a book on Amazon, I ended up buying two more books along with the intended purchase.

It was due to a feature of Amazon, which tells you what other buyers have bought along with the book you are trying to purchase. I never heard of these books earlier but after few more clicks, I was convinced enough to buy and hence my purchase.

Little I knew at that time, that psychologists have a special term for the kind of behavior I just displayed. It’s called…

My Stock Market View (and a Prediction) for 2013

Readers who follow me of Facebook or Twitter know that I’ve been sounding a tad bearish in recent times.

Some have ever termed me a permabear* for my thoughts on the near term future of the Indian economy and the stock market.

While I am not into the game of predicting the future of stock prices – near term or long term – I occasionally speak of concerns when I see them.

These are my points of view and not predictions. And this time isn’t any different!

These days, I’m hearing a lot of predictions about a beautiful and steady rise for the Sensex in 2013. I do not want to insult you with another prediction.

My 3 Recommendations to Change Your Life in 2013 and Beyond

I know you opened this post to read about two stock recommendations that can change your life in 2013. Right? 🙂

But sorry, this post isn’t about stock recommendations. It’s about recommendations that are much more important for your life and investing, as you’d soon find out.

But before that…

Whenever I take extended leaves from Safal Niveshak, I get a few emails from tribesmen who are seemingly worried about my whereabouts (maybe they try to ensure that I keep off for a few more days). 🙂

It wasn’t different this time as well, as I took a break starting Christmas. Now if you are wondering where I have been and what I’ve been doing all these days, here’s the short story.

The Best of Safal Niveshak in 2012

What a year it has been!

Starting with 250 readers and a few believers, Safal Niveshak closes 2012 with over 4,000 tribesmen, and a lot of them actually believers in what I’m trying to do here.

It might be too early to say this, but given hundreds of emails I’ve received in this year so far, Safal Niveshak is developing a few traditions as far as sensible investing is concerned.

One of them is “independence of thought”, which I believe will ultimately lead to objectivity and rationality in the way you behave as an investor.

Art of Investing Workshop in Kolkata

So the end of the world passed us by, without troubling us much! 🙂

Now that we are alive and kicking, and making plans for the future, let me announce Safal Niveshak’s first “Art of Investing Workshop” for 2013.

After the amazing feedback from Bangalore, Chennai, Mumbai, New Delhi, Pune and Ahmedabad, here’s your chance to attend the Workshop in Kolkata.

Here are the details of the Workshop…

How to Invest After the End of the World

End of the World “Eternity is really long, especially near the end.” ~ Woody Allen

The world is about to end, once again!

This time, the doomsday scare comes from the ancient Mayans, whose calendar runs out in 2012, as interpreted by some opportunistic authors and film makers.

So just because someone, 1,100 years ago, failed to see days after December 21 2012, the world is supposed to come to an end today (well, exactly at 4.42 AM IST tomorrow morning, because even the apocalypse follows US timings)!

Anyways, whatever the end that’s coming, isn’t that the best news ever? Seriously, think about it.

How to Read Financial Statements – Part 1

How to Read Financial Statements Ever since I wrote posts on the importance of reading annual reports and how to read annual reports, I’ve received a lot of emails from readers on a post on analyzing financial statements.

In a classic case of procrastination, I did not write that post so far.

But my guilt has got the better of me, and the result is this video that will help you with the basics of financial statements and how you can study the inter-linkages between the three – P&L account, balance sheet, and cash flow statement.