The Stock-Buyback Swinde
This well written article says that American corporations are spending trillions of dollars to repurchase their own stock. “The practice is enriching CEOs—at the expense of everyone else.” It wasn’t always thus – buybacks are a recent fad. “Before the 1980s, corporations rarely repurchased shares of their own stock. When they started to, it was […]
Being Market Savvy Doesn’t Help Very Much
Published on:7 August, 2019 The Government of India allowed Marcellus to incorporate as a private limited company on 7th August 2018. We have enjoyed serving our 500 clients – in India and abroad – over the past year. We thank our clients for their support and aim to continue compounding their wealth for many years to […]
Page Industries – Why do we continue holding it in our portfolio
Page’s promoters have used their experience in the Philippines to fortify Page’s moats around: a) product differentiation based on in-house manufacturing in a labour-intensive industry; b) aspirational brand recall using Caucasian models in high-impact advertising campaigns; and c) IT investments and control on the distribution channel to manage a wide spectrum of products. Whilst these […]
The RBI Can Reverse the NBFC Crisis
Published on:30 July, 2019 Indian NBFCs are struggling not because of lack of liquidity in the system but because the money market has lost faith in most NBFCs’ balance sheets and in the credit rating agencies’ ratings. Hence rather than cutting CRR/SLR/repo rate, the RBI should vet the balance sheets of the NBFCs and make […]
Instagram Turns Obscure U.S. Sights Into Social-Media Destinations
Author: Jim Carlton Source: The Wall Street Journal (https://www.wsj.com/articles/instagram-turns-obscure-u-s-sights-into-social-media-destinations-11562410801) Internet and internet companies like Instagram, Facebook, etc have made access to data/information very easy and have helped people across the world come more close. People are sharing their information on a real time basis and one of the unexpected beneficiaries out of it is the […]
Like fossil fuel in the ground, customer data may soon be a liability, not an asset
Author: John Naughton Source: The Guardian (https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/jul/14/the-networker-customer-data-liability-not-asset-british-airways-ico-fine-leak-marriott-hotel-group) Oil, which was once considered as indispensable to the economy is witnessing a reversal of fortune. Environmental costs of digging up and burning oil have forced humans to look for renewable sources of energy and now talks are when will renewable source of energy will overtake oil. Countries […]
Save on Drug Costs! Ditch Useless Pills !
Author: Faye Flam Source: Bloomberg (https://www.bloombergquint.com/opinion/save-on-drug-costs-by-identifying-the-pills-that-don-t-work) It turns out that most of the drugs we pay for don’t actually work very well. To make matters worse, they actually have negative side effects! “Buried among the mediocre drugs are a few that do add years of life or alleviate significant suffering. Clarifying which ones really are […]
An economist walks into a brothel and comes back with lessons in financial risk
Author: Allison Schrager Source: The Scroll (https://scroll.in/article/928505/an-economist-walks-into-a-brothel-and-comes-back-with-lessons-in-financial-risk) Central to our investment philosophy is the idea of reducing risk to the extent we can, as elaborated in our blog “Crushing risk is more rewarding than chasing returns”. Allison Schrager, an economist and journalist has delved deep into the world of risk in her book “An Economist […]
Isaav Asimov Asks, “How Do People Get New Ideas?
Author: Isaac Asimov Source: MIT Technology Review (https://www.technologyreview.com/s/531911/isaac-asimov-asks-how-do-people-get-new-ideas/) A 1959 essay by Isaac Asimov about Creativity -what makes creative people succeed, how to identify people with a creative bent of mind, how to form a team of creative people and how to incentivise such teams. From creating new art forms to new scientific discoveries, the […]
How To Use Technology And Not Be Used By It: A Psychologist’s Reading List
Author: Margaret Morris Source: Fivebooks.com (https://fivebooks.com/best-books/how-to-use-technology-margaret-morris/) Psychologist Margaret Morris talks about the five books that shaped her approach to technology. These books are: · The Saturated Self by Kenneth Gergen; · The Stories We Live By: Personal Myths And The Making Of The Self by Dan McAdams; · How Emotions Are Made: The Secret Life […]
The Mahabharata and the Ethics of Investing
(Pictured above: The Panchachuli peaks photographed from Saurabh’s decrepit phone) Published on:23 July, 2019 As investment managers, can we morally justify earning healthy returns year after year from investing in companies which generate supernormal returns from monopolising the sale of essential products to millions of Indians? The Mahabharata provides guidance on this troublesome ethical question. […]
The Generosity Of True Sportsmen
Author: Rohit Brijnath Source: The Mint (https://www.livemint.com/mint-lounge/features/the-generosity-of-true-sportsmen-1563513345806.html) Just as last Sunday’s double sport madness in London culminated with the insane end to the cricket world cup finals and the rivetting five-setter Wimbledon men’s singles finals, one could crave for how Rohit Brijnath, one of the best writers of sport prose, capture this on paper. Unsurprisingly, […]
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