In 2019, I finally decided to call it quits on my nearly two-decade-long IT career and take up investing full-time. Having spent the entire duration also as an amateur investor, I had long passed the point where working for the month-end salary made sense for me. The lure of owning my own time was the biggest attraction.
But life as a full-time investor is pretty difficult, especially for long term investors. There is nothing to do on a daily basis. In fact, sometimes the urge to do something, anything, drives one to mistakes.
Two things drove me to start intelsense.in.
Firstly, I have a multitude of interests, which if you are a regular reader of my blog, you would already be aware of. I was afraid if I did not create a regimen of work for myself, I would get derailed and fill up my time reading the whole day.
Secondly, by my association with ValuePickr and having spoken at multiple conferences and colleges over the years I had the opportunity to interact with tens of thousands of investors. I always felt that if some help could be provided to investors who are beginning their equity journey today then it would be truly rewarding. Donald Francis, the founder of ValuePickr, actually over the years had drilled the idea of giving back to the investor community into my head.
The Beginning
I started intesense.in on 15th April 2019. The day happened to be Poila Baisakh, the Bengali New Year’s Day. Even if there were 50 subscribers, I would consider my venture successful. I think it crossed that mark in the first couple of days. I was, and to date, continue to remain amazed.
Strategy Diversification
I started with only the long-term strategy because that is what I was good at. Next came Quantamental and Hitpicks. This was a result of delving into the world of technical analysis and quantitative methods and also the understanding that markets work beyond a single factor (value/growth/momentum etc). A mix of strategies tends to work better over time than any single strategy. A mix of strategies will not yield the best result of all strategies but will have a better equity curve.
The last change, till now, I made in my investing journey is to start concentrating. Quiver, the smallcase, was a result of an experiment using all that I know - fundamental, technical and quant with a concentrated portfolio.
PMS
The next leg came when many subscribers started requesting me to start a PMS. I was always wary of doing something which required a lot of operational overhead. This took shape when I decided to join hands with Shree Rama Managers. In the PMS, I have only two funds, Shree Lakshmi and Shree Vriddhi, loosely modelled on long term and quant-based strategies.
Biggest Learnings
The main learnings over the last few years:
Multi-strategy is better than single-strategy.
Stop getting over-influenced by overseas market gurus. They performed in a different economic and market context. What may have worked then may not work here and now.
Quant overlay on both fundamental analysis is better from a performance and risk-reward perspective
Managing drawdowns well can help investors persist with a strategy better through its ups and downs.
Investors look for higher returns when the going is good and lower drawdowns when the market is falling. One cannot have the cake and eat it too!!
Most investors are clueless about their investing goals. When asked they say things like, “Maximise wealth creation”, “Retirement needs” etc. Most have never worked on the numbers and have a vague notion of their needs.
Psychology beats everything else
Everyone is learning and making mistakes. Don't follow anyone blindly. Do what makes sense to you.
Test all your assumptions. Don't take opinions at face value. If you don't have data, try to read as much as possible on the topic and across divergent opinions. Form your own conclusions.
Keep an open mind. Be ready to change your opinions when the data changes.
Capital is sacred. Don't lose it. Making less money than the index or your friend is okay. Losing your capital is not.
DISCLAIMER:
Investments in the securities market are subject to market risks. Read all the related documents carefully before investing.
SEBI Registered Research Analyst - Cupressus Enterprises Pvt Ltd - INH000013828.
Registration granted by SEBI and certification from NISM in no way guarantee the performance of the intermediary or provide any assurance of returns to investors.
Biggest Learnings was a gem. Sheer gratitude! 🙏 A few questions:
1. What is the source of your idea generation?
2. How do you manage concentration & diversification at the same time?
3. When you say multi-strategy works & also change opinions based on data, how do you test new strategies? It's tough psychologically, capitally & time wise. I guess it takes a lot of time to get convinced about a strategy, devise your version of it, define a harness to test it, backtest it as a dry run & then put it to work, get results back, etc.
4. What if there are too many sectors doing well (like today's times), how do yoy decide which sectors to ignore? Otherwise, concentration becomes tough right?
5. What's your capital allocation strategy or do you decide depending on the strategy you followed to pick the stock up?
6. How many stocks makes you feel that you have enough concentration & enough diversification at the same time?
7. Who is your most favourite Indin Investor? (I know it's one of the toughest questions as I can't answer this myself. I have so many heroes including Hiteshbhai, Donald sir & you.)
I have many more questions but will stop here for now. May be after the next article. 🙂🙏