Short read: Pods, Passive Flows, and Punters
Albert Bridge Capital’s Drew Dickson has been putting out some insightful pieces and this one should rank right up there. It might sound familiar to readers of Marcellus’ newsletters where we keep banging on about fundamentals. In this piece, whilst Drew rants about why in the long run fundamentals matter, he raises three aspects why […]
Short read: Bengaluru’s woes
Climate change is already having a life-changing impact on several parts of India. As we approach summer in India, water shortages have begun to kick-in across the nation with Bangalore being the most high profile of India’s increasingly parched cities. As per The Statesman: “The textile industry, a vital economic player in Bengaluru, is feeling the […]
Long read: War in space is no longer science fiction
In the recent past, we have featured a few pieces on the emergence of space-tech, more in the context of investment opportunities related to innovation in the world of space exploration. Of course, the likes of SpaceX by Elon Musk and Blue Origin by Jeff Bezos are now well-known private companies with heavy investments in […]
Long read: Chennai startup finds a solution for ‘overqualified housewives’. No more motherhood penalty
Nobel Laureate Claudia Goldin famously identified the ‘motherhood penalty’ i.e. the price women pay (in terms of compensation foregone) for having a child. She wrote, “Women earn less than men, and that is especially true of mothers relative to fathers. Much of the widening occurs after family formation when mothers reduce their hours of work.” (Source: https://www.nber.org/papers/w30323) “According […]
1. Long read: Disappearing tongues: the endangered language crisis
As many Indians know, language evokes intense emotions in many parts of India. What most of us might not know is, “At present, about half of all languages are spoken by communities of 10,000 or fewer, and hundreds have just 10 speakers or fewer. On every continent, the median number of speakers for a language is […]
The Rise of the Woman Voter Has Big Investment Implications
Amongst registered Indian voters, more women today are voting than men. The rise in women’s active participation in politics (despite lower representation in Parliament) is a culmination of greater access to information and to business opportunities and greater availability of free time. All of these have been, in part, facilitated by positive policy changes. […]
Short read: Why you should never retire
The FIRE movement, standing for ’Financial Independence, Retire Early’ has become popular across the world. Whilst financial independence truly gives you freedom to pursue your passions or ideas even if they were not financially rewarding, retiring early could have its own problems. Of course, one is not talking about retiring from jobs or careers you […]
Short read: How Ameen Sayani Helped Unite the Soul of India
India’s most famous RJ, the iconic Ameen Sayani, passed away on 20th February at the age of 91 after living a life that most of us would envy. The Wikipedia page on this remarkable man says, “Ameen Sayani was born on 21 December 1932 into a Gujarati Muslim Khoja Ismaili family in Bombay (now Mumbai). His parents […]
Long read: Cost of Capital and Capital Allocation – Investment in the Era of “Easy Money”
For many of us, Michael Mauboussin remains a crucial bridge between theory and practice, with his books and essays all drawn from his background that straddles academics and industry (he has been a finance Professor Columbia Business School and a highly regarded strategist on Wall Street). This paper is no different. It begins like: “There is […]
Long read: In Assam’s Majuli, Climate Crisis Threatens Indigenous Craft Of Boat-Making
Majuli is a 500 square km island in the middle of the Brahmaputra river in Assam. It is the world’s largest river island, home to 170K people and is renowned for its tribal and neo-Vaishnavite sub-culture. Now, however the island is grappling with severe climate change related issues. Bikash Bhattacharya’s article focuses on a specific […]
Long read: IISc deep tech startups are pushing India into elite league. Baby firms with big ambitions
For several years now, there has been much angst in India that the venture capital ecosystem in the country does little more than finance pizza delivery apps. As entrepreneurial verve seeps deep into the pores of Indian society, that is changing and at the vanguard of change is India’s number 1 university, the Indian Institute […]
Rich rewards from Investing in Quality during the Toughest Phase
Long periods of outperformance by quality firms are often characterized by intermittent periods of severe underperformance – something that has been unavoidable by even the likes of Warren Buffet. Such underperformance was especially prominent during three instances (first half of 1970s, Mar’99-Aug’00 & Nov’04-Apr’06) wherein Berkshire Hathaway’s underperformance was in high double digits even as […]
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