India’s Middle Class is Losing Ground to the Rich & the Poor
The Indian middle class is losing ground not just to the super rich, but also to the poor. Over the past decade, the average annual income for the Indian middle class has stayed flat whereas that for the low-income group has grown at 4% p.a. Three sets of drivers have come together to squeeze the […]
Short read: Stocks Are More Expensive Than They Used to Be. Because the Companies are So Much Better
The sustained rally in the American stock market has surprised many, raising calls of a bubble scenario or irrational exuberance. The naysayers use data points such as how whilst the American economy contributes 30% to world GDP yet its stockmarket makes up 75% of the global market capitalisation. This misses the point that some of […]
Short read: How India’s food shortage filled American libraries
In this article, Soutik Biswas delves into the quirky origins of why American universities have the world’s best collections of books & manuscripts from India: “The 132-year-old University of Chicago houses more than 800,000 volumes related to South Asia, making it one of the world’s premier collections for studies on the region. But how did […]
Short read: Why kids need to take more risks: science reveals the benefits of wild, free play
With increased urbanisation, we see kids over the years spending less time in free play and even lesser in the open amidst nature, and more in structured settings in somewhat protected environments. This might be one of the factors of rising mental health issues as this research shows kids with exposure to risky play grow […]
Long read: The Origins Of Wokeness
Wokeness refers to an extreme form of political correctness which has gripped the world at large and the west in particular. Whilst there isn’t anything wrong with political correctness by itself, it is the enforcement of that in turn curtailing freedom of speech is what the opponents of wokeness argue. One such opponent is Paul […]
Long read: The man making a business out of China’s burnout generation
This long read in The Guardian is the story of a high-flying marketing executive from China, Li Jianxiong, who had a mid-life crisis and then had to reinvent himself to survive. For middle aged professionals like Li this story feels like one that we live through every day. In that regard, Li’s rediscovery of purpose […]
Long read: The audacious man behind the iconic Bombay Stock Exchange building
Mustansir Dalvi was the longest serving professor of architecture in the University of Mumbai. In this long read – which was first published in the National Herald – he reminisces about his employer, the late Chandrakant Patel, the architect behind Mumbai’s most familiar landmark, the BSE building. Mr Dalvi writes: “At the cusp of the […]
MeritorQ: Rebalancing Bonus
We have previously highlighted in MeritorQ: The Moneyball of Quality Investing the key reasons to rebalance in the context of MeritorQ’s investment rules. In this newsletter, we delve into how rebalancing between uncorrelated equity styles like Quality and Value, which forms the basis for selecting stocks in MeritorQ, further enhances MeritorQ’s returns. We call this the […]
Portfolio Performance and Update on Fundamentals – December 2024
Note: For all strategies except GCP, Performance data shown is net of fixed fees and expenses charged till December 31st, 2024 and is net of annual performance fees (Except for Little Champs Portfolio) charged for client accounts whose account anniversary/performance calculation date falls upto the last date of this performance period. Since, for Little Champs Portfolio, […]
Short read: How exercise may be the ‘most potent medical intervention ever known’
Sleep well, eat healthy and exercise daily is now well accepted as a simple model for a healthy life. But just how useful is exercise hadn’t been fully understood until this recent study. Euan Ashley, a professor of cardiovascular medicine and genetics at Stanford University calls exercise the single most potent medical intervention ever known. […]
Short read: How much happiness does money buy?
Research has shown that asset allocation i.e, how you allocate across stocks, bonds and other asset classes, matters more than what securities you select, in terms of determining investor’s risk adjusted returns. But here’s a half century old theory by a Nobel prize winning economist – Robert C.Merton (of Black-Scholes-Merton and Long Term Capital Management […]
Short read: Area denial is how India can counter China’s 300 stealth fighters, Pakistan’s possible J-35s
India started building the Tejas light combat aircraft more than 40 years ago. In 2025, the Government of India is hoping that the America under Trump will agree to supply’s GE’s engines for Tejas. In the meantime, China has launched its sixth generation of stealth fighters. As Yusuf Unjhawala explains for The Print: “China has […]
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