Reblog: The Dhandho Investor


Value investor Mohnish Pabrai wrote The Dhando Investor: The Low-Risk Value Method to High Returns (Wiley, 2007).  It’s an excellent book that captures the essence of value investing:

The lower the price you pay relative to the probable intrinsic value of the business, the higher your returns will be if you’re right and the lower your losses will be if you’re wrong.

If you have a good investment process as a value investor, and you’re focused on cheap and good companies with low or no debt, then you are likely to be right on roughly 2/3 of your investments.  Because losses are minimized on the other 1/3 – due to the low price paid – the overall portfolio is likely to do well over time.

Mohnish sums up the Dhando approach as:

Heads, I win;  tails, I don’t lose much!

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Reblog: The Benefits Of Productive Worrying – yes worrying can be good for you!!


Seth Klarman is one of the world’s most respected value investors, and when he speaks, it always pays to listen. Unfortunately, Klarman is relatively media-shy, his interviews over the years have been few and far between. You have to dig to find all of his prior media coverage.

This month’s copy of Value Investor Insight magazine pulls some Klarman wisdom out of the archives. The wisdom is taken from the pages of the value fund manager’s 2004 letter to investors of his industry-leading hedge fund, Baupost. Titled “productive worrying,” Klarman talks about one of the key traits every successful investor has and how the average investor can better their investing process by looking to the long-term and worry about the things that matter not the issues they have no influence over.

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Reblog: Hedge Fund Managers Struggle to Master Their Miserable New World


Howard Fischer, wearing a white shirt and khakis, leans back into a window seat at a juice bar in Greenwich, Connecticut, sips a cold-brewed Mexican mocha and shares his angst.

“It’s miserable, miserable,” the 57-year-old manager of $1.1 billion Basso Capital Management says of hedge fund returns over the past few years. “If that’s the normal expectation, I don’t have a business.”

Fischer’s lament and ones like it are echoing through the industry. It’s an existential crisis for former masters of the universe who once prided themselves on their trading prowess. Now they’re questioning their wisdom and their ability to generate profits that made them among the richest in finance.

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Online Trading – Yet another feature on stockarchitect.com


We recently revamped the entire website, as you know by now. It is not just a cosmetic change but we have added new features for the benefit of our users. The whole purpose of the revamp was to add more value to the time invested by the users on the website.

One such feature is Online Trading.

How often have you read about something interesting like a view on a particular stock etc. but then you had to go log in to your Zerodha account to trade? In the midst of this, you receive a call and the next thing you know is that you missed it. Sounds familiar right? Not anymore.

StockArchitect in partnership with Zerodha brings the convenience of trading right into the interface so that you never miss out that important trade even for a split second.

Using the feature is simple.

Let us take a stock say, Bharti Airtel.

In the top middle of the screen, you will the Buy and Sell buttons.

Click on Buy or Sell and you will be asked to login to your Zerodha account.

Voila – you are now on familiar territory. Trade as you would.

Don’t have a Zerodha Account? Help is at hand. You can sign up now.

Keep yourself tuned to this space as we announce new features for our users.

Happy Investing!


Interactive Charts – A new feature on stockarchitect.com


We recently revamped the entire website, as you know by now. It is not just a cosmetic change but we have added new features for the benefit of our users. The whole purpose of the revamp was to add more value to the time invested by the users on the website.

Interactive charts – is one such feature.

How often have you read about something interesting like a view on a particular stock etc. but then you had to go some place else to look up the charts? Since you are away from the machine that had these charts, you missed it. Sounds familiar right? Not anymore.

StockArchitect in partnership with Tradingview brings the convenience of charts right into the interface.

Using the feature is simple.

Let us take a stock say, Punjab National Bank.

To the right of the screen, you will see the link interactive charts

Click on the link and you will be able to see the chart in a new window. The charts are easy and intuitive for beginners, and powerful enough for advanced chartists.

Keep yourself tuned to this space as we announce new features for our users.

Happy Investing!


Reblog: How safe is my broker?


Investors are often cautioned about investment risk, market risk, etc. by their advisors and brokers. Investing in a particular asset or any equity share in particular, can give back good returns or, on the contrary, even wipe out the basic value of money that you have put in. But did anyone tell you that the broker himself can also cheat you? He can go bankrupt or be a fraud?
Not only have the small ones, but big investment firms have also given their clients a nightmare. If viewed from the brokerage company’s perspective, it is doing a business purely. Profits are their primary motto. And your money, except from the brokerage charges, is a secondary element for them.
So, how can a stock broker deceive you?

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Reblog: Making Sense When There is No Sense to be Made


Our brains were built to save us from ourselves. We misremember the past and pretend we can predict the future. We’re able to make sense of things when there is no sense to be made. Here’s an example- I was staying at a hotel a few weeks ago in San Diego and I walked into the shop to get some sunscreen. I was going to speak onstage the next day and I burn faster than most people.

I went to the counter and when the bar code was scanned it said $20. My first thought was holy shit this is insane, let me just go to another store. But it all happened so fast and I get uncomfortable in situations like this, so I took out my wallet and paid the man. As I walked away I could not believe I just paid twenty bucks for sunscreen that I would use for two days. Why didn’t I just put it back like a normal person and go somewhere else?This went on in my head for about five minutes. But then my brain came to the rescue. Here is what my internal dialogue sounded like:

Yea I spent twenty bucks, but how much would it cost somewhere else, $7 or $8? So what did I really waste, $12 or something? Not so terrible. Also, how much would I pay to not have a burnt head? At least $100. Wait a minute. They undercharged me by like eighty bucks, I robbed those suckers blind!

This is only a slight exaggeration; but the point is I was able to rationalize my absurd purchase in well under ten minutes.

Here’s another example of something that logic can’t defend but our brains easily do anyway.

You’re at a bar with five of your buddies and somebody steps up and picks up the bill, it’s $70. Your friend pulls out a credit card and nobody thinks anything of it. But what if he or she pulled out $70 in cash? Might you have the inclination to reach for your wallet? $70 is $70 whether it’s paid with paper or credit, but I imagine those two scenarios would leave your five friends feeling quite different.

We’ve all read the behavioral finance books. We all know that our brain plays tricks on us and that our heart sabotages our brain.

So what can we do about it? How do we avoid the same mistakes that investors have been making since the beginning of time? If I had the answer I would, well, I don’t have the answer, but here are a few ideas.

If you’re making a decision about the future, which is by definition unknown, go with regret minimization. You have a stock that’s gained 100%, but it’s hard to sell because what if it gains another 100%? But at the same time, what if you get greedy and and give back all your gains? Tough situation. Here’s how I would think about it: What would feel worse? If you sell it now and it doubles, or if you hold onto it and give back all your gains? You’re not going to sell it at the top, so make a decision with the information you have and then live with it. But it’s never that easy, because whatever you decide this time will affect your decisions next time. For example, you sell now and it doubles again, what do you think you’re doing next time? You’re going to hold on because you remember that painful experience. Try as hard as you can to not allow the past to poison your future.

Here’s another idea- If you’re about to buy a stock, have a plan before you buy it. For example, you buy at 70, you’re out of a quarter at 80, another quarter at 90, etc. Same thing if it goes in reverse. A trailing stop, or predetermined exits might not be optimal, but who runs an optimal portfolio? It’s about getting better, not getting it best.

If you’re not trading stocks and instead hold a diversified portfolio, know ahead of time when you’re going to rebalance. Put it on the calendar! Also, decide how far you’re willing to let your target allocations drift before you bring it back into balance. I’ve never met an investor who consistently makes the right choice in the heat of the moment so having these things written down can save you a lot of trouble and money

Just knowing that we have biases is not enough to stop them, you have to actually take proactive steps before you pay twenty dollars for a tube of sunscreen.

The original article is authored by Michael Batnick, CFA and is available here.



Sensex snaps 7-day losing streak on bargain hunting, ends 61 points higher on Friday


The benchmark indices on Friday settled higher thanks to early rollovers to January series and bargain hunting at lower levels after market witnessed seven straight sessions of losses. The S&P BSE Sensex finished at 26,040, up 61 points, while the broader Nifty50 closed at 7,985, up 6 points. The market breadth, indicating the overall health of the market, remained negative. On the BSE, 1,309 shares fell and 1,249 shares rose. A total of 174 shares were unchanged.

BSE Capital Goods and BSE Consumer durables were the top sectoral gainers and added nearly 1%.

Cipla was the top Sensex gainer and surged 4%, bouncing back 6.5% from intra-day low, after the pharmaceutical company said its flagship product Sereflo received final approval from UK health regulator.

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