College pedigree, daddy’s name, BBC accent no longer golden ticket. India has a growing new elite
Those of us with a little bit of grey hair in Marcellus have realised over the past decade that in the booming cities of Asia, elite education is not worth the paper it is written on. Whilst we have written about this in our books (see Chapter 3 of ‘Unfiltered: the CEO & the Coach’), […]
This is Why You Stay the Course
The past couple of months have seen a sharp recovery in the Indian markets and even more so for Marcellus’ portfolios driven by the return of FIIs (Foreign Institutional Investors) who have pumped in $5bn this financial year after selling north of $30bn over the previous 18 months. However, investors’ activity measured by flows into […]
Compounding Optimism
At Marcellus, we are big believers in the power of compounding (of not just money) as well as big fans of Morgan Housel. So when the concept meets the author, we have to feature it. Housel is at his story telling best to drive home a simple yet powerful but not necessarily intuitive point – […]
Neil Shen goes it alone in China after Sequoia split
Neil Shen, the legendary venture capitalist who built Sequoia’s investing empire in China, is the latest titan to feel the chill winds of Cold War II as China and America slug it out for global dominance. Last week, Sequoia announced that its American, Chinese and Indian venture investing arms would hitherto function as three completely […]
Why AI Will Save the World
Ever since ChatGPT shook the world in terms of how close we are to AI being in our lives, we have been featuring pieces to help improve our understanding amidst all the hype and noise. Whilst some of these pieces have been looking at the potentially harmful effects of AI, here’s a positive piece to […]
17 fatalities, 736 crashes: The shocking toll of Tesla’s Autopilot
Tech companies naturally tend to overstate the bull case for what they do. The reality of what they can deliver is often less spectacular than the hype. This long read in the Washington Post (the legendary newspaper which was responsible, for – amongst other things – Richard Nixon’s downfall, and is now owned by Jeff […]
How govt drone survey is clearing up land ownership in villages across India
Those of us who studied economics in our youth had it drilled into our heads that well defined property rights are crucial to facilitate the socioeconomic development of the poor. Why so? Because formal land titles – theoretically speaking – enable the poor to use their land as collateral for credit, providing them with a […]
MeritorQ: The Value of Free Cash Flows
In MeritorQ value is measured by comparing the free cash flow generation ability of a company versus its share price, a valuation measure known as P/FCF. We show that in India P/FCF is superior to other commonly used relative valuation measures like P/E, EV/EBITDA, and P/B. In fact, a free cash flow-based measure of relative value […]
I love electric vehicles – and was an early adopter. But increasingly I feel duped
Now that EVs going mainstream is just a matter of when not if, it is time to take a critical look at EVs and their ability to achieve the stated intention of reducing emissions. Here’s a piece in The Guardian, not by an environmentalist or an automobile industry expert but the legendary comedian and actor […]
Assam has an old love for quizzing, but this year’s Guwahati Quiz Fest was special
One of the great joys of living in India today is to see the effervescent flowering of cultural and intellectual life in India’s cities. The burgeoning cultural and intellectual scene is not just no longer confined to the swanky parts of Delhi and Mumbai; in fact, the most exciting things are no longer happening in […]
The myth of the ‘Asian Century’
Here’s another angle at the changing world order. Economics and political commentators around the world have talked about the so called ‘Asian Century’, implying Asia will dominate the global economy and hence influence the world order. In this piece, Martin Wolf, the chief economics commentator at the FT, debunks the myth of the Asian century, […]
What would humans do in a world of super-AI?
Whilst there is no doubt that Artificial Intelligence is here to stay, much like other predecessor technologies it is clearly going through its own hype cycle. The hype is not just in the form of its commercial potential but also its supposedly destructive effect on humanity. But given the recent statements by Sam Altman, the […]
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