Investing

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My Talk at Value Investing Summit, Kuala Lumpur

I recently spoke at the Value Investing Summit in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. My topic was ‘The Path of Successful Investing.’

Click here to download the presentation.

Click here to watch the video of my talk, or watch below.

P.S. In the talk, I quoted Peter Bernstein’s book Against the Gods as containing the story of the hedge fund LTCM. It was a mistake! The book that chronicles the story of LTCM is Roger Lowenstein’s When Genius Failed.

Statutory Warning: Nothing in my talk should be construed as investment advice to buy or sell shares. Please make your own decision, as blindly acting on anyone else’s research and opinions can be injurious to your wealth. My analysis may be biased, and wrong. I have been wrong many times in the past. I am a registered Research Analyst as per SEBI (Research Analyst) Regulations, 2014 (Registration No. INH000000578).

Wall of Ideas

Welcome to Safal Niveshak’s Wall of Ideas, where I present hand-drawn illustrations of a few thoughts on investing, learning, decision-making, and living.

The permanent home of these illustrations lies here, where all my future updates will happen.

If you like what you see below, please share your love in the Comments section of this post. Also, please share your ideas for future such illustrations.

Sharing the illustrations socially – Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, etc. – would also help spread the word. Thank you!
[Read more…] about Wall of Ideas

The Low-Priced Way to Lose Money in the Stock Market

Once upon a time, I used to recommend stocks. I did that for a living.

One of the most common questions I received when I recommended a stock priced in three or four digits was this – “What is the point of buying a stock this expensive? Recommend something under Rs 100, or better, Rs 10, or better, Rs 5.”

The reasoning was simple – “It’s easier for a Rs 10 stock to go Rs 100, than for a Rs 1,000 stock to go to Rs 10,000.”

At the start of my career, this reasoning sounded reasonable. But it turned out to be one of the biggest misconceptions I’ve ever had in my career as a stock analyst and investor. Thankfully, I got over that misconception early.

Of course, a car that sells at Rs 20 lac may be more expensive than one that sells at Rs 5 lac, even when you discount for better features etc. But a stock that sells for Rs 2,000 or even Rs 20,000 is “not” more expensive than a stock that sells for Rs 20 or Rs 200, just because of its price tag.

How to Go from Riches to Rags

Richard Branson is a British business magnate, investor, author, and philanthropist. He’s the founder of the Virgin Group, which controls more than 400 companies.

When someone asked Branson how to be a millionaire, he replied, “Start with a billion dollars and invest in an Airline.”

Vijay Mallya would probably be questioning Branson, “Aisa tha to pehle kyun nahi bataya?” (translation: why didn’t you tell me this earlier?)

So that’s the first way to go from riches to rags — buy an airline. Now, I don’t know of a way to verify if Branson actually said that. So let me tell you another story which is true, verifiable, and recent.
[Read more…] about How to Go from Riches to Rags

The Untold Story of A Self-Made Investing Millionaire

In a world dominated by men, here is a rare untold story of a woman who quietly made it big as a stock market investor.

Anne Scheiber was 51 years old when she retired from her job as a low-level auditor from the American Internal Revenue Service in 1944. She never earned a salary of more than $4,000 per year, and although she was an exemplary worker, she never received a promotion. Maybe, because she was a woman and a Jew, the lots that were discriminated against in the workforce in general in the west during that period.

As per the executor of her Will, Benjamin Clark, Scheiber, who was already investing her small savings in the stock market when she retired in 1944, started here post-retirement life with a portfolio of about $21,000. Adjusted for inflation, that was about $297,000 in today’s money. Not really a large sum to retire in the US.

Seven Big Ideas from Fooled by Randomness

I have been re-reading Nassim Taleb’s Fooled by Randomness. The book is about “luck disguised and perceived as non-luck (that is, skills) and, more generally, randomness disguised and perceived as non-randomness (that is, determinism).”

It’s an enlightening read in its entirety, but here are seven key ideas I have picked up from the book.

2019: My Depth Year

One of the best books on learning I’ve read is Josh Waitzkin’s The Art of Learning. Josh is a champion in two distinct sports – chess and martial arts.

In his book, Josh recounts his experiences and shares his insights and approaches on how you can learn and excel, using examples from his personal life. Through stories of martial arts wars and tense chess face-offs, Josh reveals the inner workings of his everyday methods, cultivating the most powerful techniques in any field, and mastering the psychology of peak performance.

[Read more…] about 2019: My Depth Year

51 Ideas from 2018

Dear Tribe Member,

Trust 2018 treated you well. It certainly was great for Safal Niveshak. The tribe crossed 53,000 members. I conducted seven value investing workshops during the year, including two in the US. Our Mastermind Value Investing Course and premium newsletter Value Investing Almanack continue to receive inspiring reviews from subscribers.

Anyways, right before the year ends, I thought I’d share a handful of ideas I’ve learned, re-learned, and wrote about in the past twelve months. Here are 51 of them categorized under investing, learning, and life. I hope you find these useful, as much as I did. [Read more…] about 51 Ideas from 2018

The Journey

“If all you care about is the mountaintop, the climb is going to be rough.” ~ Anon

“We enjoy the process far more than the proceeds.” ~ Warren Buffett

This is going to be one of the shortest posts I’ve written. One book that I keep by my bedside for frequent reading is Ruskin Bond’s A Book of Simple Living. Here is a passage that I stumbled upon from this book last night, and which resonated perfectly well with how I practice investing and one key idea I try to teach here – the focus on process vs outcome, on the journey vs destination.

[Read more…] about The Journey

Lecture Presentation and Notes: Surviving the Investing Game

I recently spoke at IIM Lucknow. My topic was ‘Surviving the Investing Game.’

Click here to download the presentation and notes, or read it in the panel below.