Why Compounding is so Difficult
Another topical piece from the house of Akre Capital. In the past, we have featured Chuck Akre’s Three-Legged Stool investment strategy and Chris Cerrone’s The Art of (Not) Selling. In this piece, another partner at Akre, John Neff reminds us why compounding is so difficult given the markets currently. “Why do more investors not reap […]
‘If you work hard and succeed, you’re a loser’: can you really wing it to the top?
Mostly we value people with great work ethic – systematic approach, deep thinking and hard work. But every now and then we are in awe of those few who are spontaneous and end up pulling things off with sheer instinct. This article tries to understand if it is actually possible to succeed by just ‘winging […]
Learning how to think well involves hearts as well as minds
As one gets older as a professional, one runs into a knotty HR problem, namely, some of the most brilliant minds we run into Finance lack a moral compass. Since the education system does not measure morality, such people often have distinguished qualifications. However, since immorality gets found out in corporate life, such people often […]
A chat with Ray Dalio
Ray Dalio is the founder and co-CIO of Bridgewater Associates, the world’s largest hedge fund. Dalio is also known for his book – Principles which talks about his principles in Life and Work, some of which such as ‘Radical Transparency’ we have attempted to implement at Marcellus. His Youtube video on ‘How the Economic Machine […]
The Art of Listening
As Ernest Hemingway noted in 1935, “‘When people talk, listen completely… Most people never listen.’” Poor listening skills, says the author of this piece MM Owen – a British nonfiction author – afflict most of us. Listening he says is a powerful skill and master of listening was a psychologist named Carl Rogers: “Listening well, […]
The ESG Mirage
Across the world, the hottest investing theme for the past few years has been ESG i.e. funds where the investor purports to be making investments with Environmental, Social and Corporate Governance factors being central to choosing the assets which will go into the fund. However, over the past month, intelligence authorities across the developed world […]
Rising Giants Standing Tall Amidst Global Turmoil
The Rising Giants portfolio companies’ track record of sustaining healthy fundamental performance from FY12-21 despite several macro challenges gives us enormous confidence about the portfolio companies’ prospects. The earnings performance of these firms in FY22 (median portfolio PBT up 23% YoY) despite headwinds around cost inflation and supply chain issues further adds to our conviction. […]
15th anniversary essay: Thoroughly conscious ignorance
In many ways, the most crucial personal trait in investing is humility. Adam Grant in his recent book Think Again brings out the power of knowing what we don’t know. In this blog, Anand Sridharan, an investor with Nalanda Capital looks back at his 15years in the firm and attributes his success (modestly calls it survival) to […]
Open network for e-commerce: It’s an idea whose time has come
One of the key elements of The Economist’s last month’s cover story on India titled ‘India’s Moment’ was the national “tech stack”. The article said “As the country emerges from the pandemic, however, a new pattern of growth is visible. It is unlike anything you have seen before. An indigenous tech effort is key. As the cost of […]
Tata Power bets on microgrids for rural power supply in India
In our 28th May blog we highlighted that like Japan in the 1970s, India too is poised to pivot away from fossil fuel based power generation. Already 14% of India’s power generation is from solar. This FT story about how Tata Power is investing in microgrids as a precursor we believe of how India will tap […]
We were all wrong’: how Germany got hooked on Russian energy
Whist the war in Ukraine sees no signs of peace, oil prices have rallied again as Europe imposed sanctions on Russian Oil. However, as George Soros highlighted in his Davos speech, it is not easy for Europe, in particular Germany, to wean itself of Russian gas. How bad exactly is Europe’s dependence on Russian energy? The […]
About 200 years ago, the world started getting rich. Why?
We are all taught in secondary school that the world started getting rich two centuries ago because the Industrial Revolution started. What we are NOT told is why did the Industrial Revolution take place 200 years ago rather than at any other point in human history. We are not also told why did the Industrial […]
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