Hat Tip Rohit
Categories
The state of Silicon Valley today
Hat Tip Rohit
Category: Excerpts
Categories
Basant Maheshwari on Value
Now, a great management in a great business creates tremendous value. Like Narayana Murthy with Infosys.
A great management in a bad business will lose value. Like Tata Sons with Tata Steel.
A bad management in a great business will lock value. Take, for instance, Vijay Mallya with United Spirits.
A bad management in a bad business will always blow up value. Like Vijay Mallya with Kingfisher Airlines.-said Basant Maheshwari
I don’t love Ben Graham and his ideas the way Warren does. You have to understand, to Warren — who discovered him at such a young age and then went to work for him — Ben Graham’s insights changed his whole life, and he spent much of his early years worshiping the master at close range. But I have to say, Ben Graham had a lot to learn as an investor. His ideas of how to value companies were all shaped by how the Great Crash and the Depression almost destroyed him, and he was always a little afraid of what the market can do. It left him with an aftermath of fear for the rest of his life, and all his methods were designed to keep that at bay.
I think Ben Graham wasn’t nearly as good an investor as Warren Buffett is or even as good as I am. Buying those cheap, cigar-butt stocks [companies with limited potential growth selling at a fraction of what they would be worth in a takeover or liquidation] was a snare and a delusion, and it would never work with the kinds of sums of money we have. You can’t do it with billions of dollars or even many millions of dollars. But he was a very good writer and a very good teacher and a brilliant man, one of the only intellectuals – probably the only intellectual — in the investing business at the time.- said Charlie Munger
Categories
The skills needed to make money
James Altucher lists the skills required to make money:
- how to sell (both in a presentation and via copywriting)
- how to negotiate (which means win-win, not war)
- creativity (take out a pad, write down a list of ideas, every day)
- leadership (give more to others than you expect back for yourself)
- networking (a corollary of leadership)
- how to live by themes instead of goals (goals will break your heart)
- reinvention (which will happen repeatedly throughout a life)
- idea sex (get good at coming up with ideas. Then combine them. Master the intersection)
- the 1% rule (every week try to get better 1% physically, emotionally, mentally)
- “the google rule” – always send people to the best resource, even if it’s a competitor. The benefit to you comes back tenfold
- give constantly to the people in your network. The value of your network increase linearly if you get to know more people but EXPONENTIALLY if the people you know, get to know and help each other.
- how to fail so that a failure turns into a beginning
- simple tools to increase productivity
- how to master a field. You can’t learn this in school with each “field” being regimented into equal 50 minute periods. Mastery begins when formal education ends. Find the topic that sets your heart on fire. Then combust.
- stopping the noise: news, advice books, fees upon fees in almost every area of life. Create your own noise instead of falling in life with the others.
Hat Tip: Shivam Bose
Disclosure:I am market making in the shares of Bombay Stock Exchange
In a move that could increase the stake of foreign investors in Indian stock exchanges, the government is considering a three-fold increase in the single-investor investment ceiling.
Currently,a foreign portfolio investor (FPI) investment in an exchange is capped at 5%.
The finance ministry has written to the regulatory authorities to increase the ceiling to 15%, said sources. The proposal is said to have in-principle approval from the Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) and the Reserve Bank of India (RBI).
The move would bring the FPI investment limit in line with those for financial institutions such as insurance companies and banks.
The government allowed the foreign investors to invest in stock exchanges in 2006, with an overall cap of 49%. This latter cap is likely to be unchanged.
BSE and the National Stock Exchange (NSE), the two large nationwide bourses, are likely to benefit from the increase in limits. BSE has eight foreign investors, which cumulatively own about 31% in it. The shareholding of Deutsche Boerse Group and Singapore Exchange Ltd are a little below the 5% ceiling.
NSE has about 20 foreign shareholders, holding around 36%. Cyprus’ Gagil and Goldman Sachs own 5% each; Citi Group has around 2%.
“The finance ministry has received representations stating that the present limit of five% is a deterrent in attracting long-term anchor and strategic foreign investors in stock exchanges. Following which, the ministry has sought comments from both Sebi and RBI,” said a person privy to the matter.
A higher foreign investor limit will not only encourage more investment in Indian bourses but help in exchange of technology and products, said exchange officials.
“A five% limit on the shareholding of any single investor or investor group is too small to encourage them to take sufficient interest in growth of the exchange,” said an official associated with one, asking not to be named.-from BS