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Some learnings from an Investor Meet

Had attended an Investor Meet yesterday.

Some learnings from the Meet:

  • Look for headwinds and tailwinds…with the right tailwind, the entire sector can give multi-fold returns.Many sectors in India have given 25x-100x returns with the right tailwinds.On the other hand,when there are significant head-winds,wealth destruction happens
  • Look at promoter hunger.“We are in the markets to make money, not give integrity certificates”.The perception of the Promoter being a chor or not changes with the share price.
  • Look at opportunity size.If the size of the opportunity is big,a hungry promoter with good execution skills can make you buckets of money.On the other hand, if the market size itself is small, then its difficult for earnings and hence valuations to grow.
  • “Chalane Wale, Chal Base” – don’t buy a stock, just because a big name/broker is buying it.Don’t have false expectations that these big names will make the stock price go up
  • Watch out for story tellers-Some managements are master story tellers…watch their quarterly results carefully.If they don’t walk the talk, then exit.
  • Watch out for the word “next”. If someone says, this is the next TCS, the next Page,the next L&T , the next….then a story is being told to you
  • There are two types of people in the markets-“Jo paise gavake rota hain, jo paisa jeetke rota hain” i.e. investors have two regrets-regret of losses and the regret of booking profits too early.Always try to be in the second category. Leave money on the table, its impossible to get the very last dime
  • Look for “insight information, not inside information”.More money has been lost on trading on inside information than anything else.On the other hand, after talking to management,trade etc, you get insights on the industry,sector,competition,emerging technologies etc, that can be very valuable
  • “Be a shana, don’t be a dedh shana” -Be smart, but don’t be over smart.Avoid leverage,avoid selling quality to go for optically cheap stocks etc
  • It’s an exciting time to be in India.As India grows from a $2.5 Trillion economy currently to $10 Trillion in next 20 years, more wealth will be created in India in the next 20 years as was created in the last 5000 years.Think about it.
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Jim Chanos on Auditors

Hat Tip: Amit Mantri

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Charlie Munger: The Best Single Expense of Berkshire

Hat Tip: Aditya Shrimankar

“I almost despise the business of executive search because I find that they really want to sell you the best that’s available even if he’s no damn good and I don’t like that.

But the best single expense that Berkshire ever had as we paid an executive recruiting firm to find Ajit Jain to come in our little tiny insurance operation.

He doesn’t have any experience with insurance at all. He was an honors graduate of the main technical institute in India. He was a very smart man. He came in and create (our reinsurance business).

And that’s the only big business we created from scratch and Ajit created the whole damn thing.

And of course, he talked with Warren every night. And so, it’s like father and son. This is a very Confucian company and that was unbelievable.

So, we hired an executive recruiter and he brings us an Indian with no experience at all in insurance.

He talks to the old man every night, and it’s now by far the biggest reinsurance business in the world. That’s been a gold mine. There’s at least 60 billion dollars in Berkshire of net worth that Ajit has created that we would not have credit without him.”

said Charile Munger

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Newgen Software : Your money,our furniture

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Wah Taj !!

Source: Indian Hotels Annual Report 2016-17