Published on 27 Dec, 2020
Last Man Standing
It is only appropriate that we end the year with a piece on compounding and that it happens to be from Morgan Housel...
Dec 2020
- Week 4
- Week 3
- Week 2
- Week 1
Short Read
Published on 27 Dec, 2020
Why being kind to others is good for your health
Human beings are wired to do good, says this piece in the BBC by Marta Zaraska, the author of Growing Young: How...
Published on 27 Dec, 2020
Why Capable People Are Reluctant to Lead
We all know people who we believe would make great leaders but have failed to grab leadership opportunities that were...
Long Read
Published on 27 Dec, 2020
Masters in Business Interview with Tom Slater of Bai...
Many of our readers have suggested that given changes in how people consume information, we should also include videos...
Published on 27 Dec, 2020
How an Elite Consulting Firm Helped America’s Opioid...
Plenty has been written about the opiod crisis in America wherein low income people are fed addictive drugs like...
Published on 27 Dec, 2020
Twenty20 in Premier League
It is said that all it takes is a generation for today’s fringe political ideas to become tomorrow’s mainstream...
Short Read
Published on 20 Dec, 2020
I Was the Homeland Security Adviser to Trump. We’re ...
As Moderna’s vaccine joins the Pfizer one to have received approval in the US building up the good news in the run up...
Published on 20 Dec, 2020
Why fair play pays
Nice guys finish last, is a belief held by many in competitive fields such as politics, business or even sport but more...
Published on 20 Dec, 2020
U.S. Financial Reporting Is Stuck in the 20th Century
Much has been written about the death of value investing as it was known historically i.e, buying stocks at low PE or...
Long Read
Published on 20 Dec, 2020
How Science Beat the Virus, And What it Lost in the ...
Ed Yong has to be right up there among the best Covid-19 journalists for his thoroughly well researched and balanced...
Published on 20 Dec, 2020
The Art of Building the Impossible
This piece from the New Yorker profiling the work of New York City’s most celebrated carpenter, Mark Ellison is very...
Published on 20 Dec, 2020
The Glorious Legacy of Dilip Kumar
In the first 10-15 years after Independence, a troika of male stars ruled Hindi Cinema, namely, Dev Anand, Raj Kapoor...
Short Read
Published on 13 Dec, 2020
Astad Deboo assimilated many forms to create a new l...
As the author begins “This is a year of obituaries. And now Astad Deboo is also gone”. Astad Deboo, often...
Published on 13 Dec, 2020
Michael Mauboussin: Why Companies Die
The most common pushback we receive from potential investors is that stocks in our portfolio trade at high PE...
Published on 13 Dec, 2020
Everything We’ve Learned About Modern Economic Theor...
Economists have been under attack as a profession collectively not least for their failures in predicting or explaining...
Long Read
Published on 13 Dec, 2020
All stars
The digital age characterised by our ability to capture and process vast amounts of data for decision making is helping...
Published on 13 Dec, 2020
The Donut King who went full circle – from rag...
We all love to read about linear narratives of zeroes who become heroes. We also love to read about turnaround stories...
Published on 13 Dec, 2020
Nestlé gives a flavour of the future
Nestle India sits inside the majority of the 4,000-odd portfolios that Marcellus manages for its clients. This Indian...
Short Read
Published on 06 Dec, 2020
Amazon’s Panorama box lets firms check if staf...
Like most firms, we at Marcellus have also had to adopt Covid-safe measures such as taking additional space to...
Published on 06 Dec, 2020
Email Lessons from Napoleon Bonaparte
Last week, we featured Cal Newport’s brilliant piece on how email has adversely affected productivity given our...
Published on 06 Dec, 2020
Why 2020 has been rotten for quant funds
Quant funds have been pulverised in 2020 because the models that these funds use rely on history. Obviously, nothing...
Long Read
Published on 06 Dec, 2020
The Confessions of Marcus Hutchins, the Hacker Who S...
Somebody buy the movie rights for this piece already, so thrilling is the article that one can go nonstop from start to...
Published on 06 Dec, 2020
Bhavani Iyer – Feminist writer who remains ‘utterly ...
One of the most interesting subjects of study in any society is how cultural and social change happens. How do people...
Published on 06 Dec, 2020
The next decade could be even worse
If you haven’t heard Peter Turchin, the mathematician who uses centuries of data to foretell the future, you are...
Nov 2020
- Week 5
- Week 4
- Week 3
- Week 2
- Week 1
Short Read
Published on 29 Nov, 2020
Maradona’s contribution to monetary theory
There’s plenty of high-quality prose on the internet to read about the legendary footballer, Diego Maradona who...
Published on 29 Nov, 2020
The fascinating science of sleep and its role in hum...
There’s increasing realisation of the importance of sleep, as the author of this piece puts it “it is the third...
Published on 29 Nov, 2020
Your Brain Is Not for Thinking
The pandemic has brought to fore the issue of mental illness. This piece gives us an important understanding of our...
Long Read
Published on 29 Nov, 2020
How Venture Capitalists Are Deforming Capitalism
Yet another fascinating piece from The New Yorker. Much has been written about the fun and games at WeWork, some of...
Published on 29 Nov, 2020
Alagiri to Dinakaran, all the pieces of Tamil Nadu p...
TamilNadu has over the last 60 years been a bellweather state for those who follow Indian politics – what happens in...
Published on 29 Nov, 2020
The Rise and Fall of Getting Things Done
Cal Newport is revered in Marcellus as a demigod whose books showed us a life beyond networking, endless travel,...
Short Read
Published on 22 Nov, 2020
Why value investing still works in markets
Reams are being written about the death of value investing or in defence of it. Michael Mauboussin, one of the best...
Published on 22 Nov, 2020
Hold in the head: Saying “I don’t know&#...
More often than not, our client meetings begin with the question – “Market kya lagta hain? (What is your view of...
Published on 22 Nov, 2020
How two companies sprinted ahead in extraordinary ra...
Following last week’s announcement by Pfizer that its vaccine under trials had shown over 90% effectiveness,...
Long Read
Published on 22 Nov, 2020
In jail, humanity is bubbling: Stan Swamy
As many Marcellus clients might know, the last three years have seen the National Investigation Agency (NIA) make a...
Published on 22 Nov, 2020
Yale may have turned institutional investing on its ...
Thirty years ago Yale changed the ways university endowments across the Western world invest by highlighting the merits...
Published on 22 Nov, 2020
Soumitra Chatterjee lived a full life beyond the screen
Soumitra Chatterjee, a giant of Bengali, Indian and World cinema lost his fight with Covid-19 on 15th November 2020....
Short Read
Published on 15 Nov, 2020
Pfizer COVID vaccine: promising results – here’s wha...
News of the positive trial data from Pfizer’s vaccine development added to the euphoria post the US elections...
Published on 15 Nov, 2020
Why Warren Buffett Sees Investing as a Loser’s...
At Marcellus, we believe in risk minimisation as a means to help our clients fulfil their financial goals as opposed to...
Published on 15 Nov, 2020
Lost school time might lower lifetime earnings for l...
Earlier this month, the UK announced a four week lockdown shutting down all including pubs, restaurants, non-essential...
Long Read
Published on 15 Nov, 2020
Elon Musk’s Totally Awful, Batshit-Crazy, Completely...
Elon Musk, according to many in the Silicon Valley is perhaps the only true genius going around, one with a mission to...
Published on 15 Nov, 2020
The Top 20 Business Transformations of the Last Decade
Marcellus’ investment philosophy looks for continuity i.e. companies who do one or two things really really well for...
Published on 15 Nov, 2020
The Servant Economy
This long essay is written with the US economy in mind but arguably its relevance to the Indian economy is even...
Short Read
Published on 08 Nov, 2020
Coronavirus: Are Indians more immune to Covid-19?
Back in the early days of Covid spreading to Italy and other parts of Europe, there was talk about why Indians...
Published on 08 Nov, 2020
High quality equities remain the best option for growth
With a second wave of Covid infections threatening to derail what has been an encouraging economic recovery out of the...
Published on 08 Nov, 2020
Inside the Chaotic Unraveling of Jack Ma’s $35 Billi...
Another story about Chinese authorities reining in critics. This time, a home-grown hero, Jack Ma, known for his...
Long Read
Published on 08 Nov, 2020
The Erasure of Mesut Özil
Most celebrities tend to shy away from taking stances in public about political or social issues lest it jeopardise...
Published on 08 Nov, 2020
An Indian-Made Motorcycle With a Retro Look Is Comin...
In our Little Champions portfolio (which is now shut to fresh inflows as it has reached capacity) we have highlighted...
Published on 08 Nov, 2020
Value Investing III: Requiem, Rebirth or Reinvention?
The legendary finance professor begins this long piece by setting up his stall – value investing is dead he says...
Short Read
Published on 01 Nov, 2020
‘I feel free here’: how a miracle girls’ schoo...
We end this week’s edition with an inspiring story about how an artist and anthropologist from New York built a...
Published on 01 Nov, 2020
My Approach to Valuation
Abdullah Al-Rezwan is a young analyst who publishes some deep dive research on specific companies on his blog. In this...
Published on 01 Nov, 2020
History shows that equities outperform under Democrats
The title of the article may be a bit misleading i.e, the author, who is the Chief Investment Strategist at Charles...
Long Read
Published on 01 Nov, 2020
What Is The Internet Doing To Boomers’ Brains?
Social media has accelerated the creation and dissemination of fake news and misinformation, more so among older...
Published on 01 Nov, 2020
How solitude and isolation can affect your social sk...
In the wake of Covid-19 making many of us spend lots of time at home and by ourselves, psychologists have begun...
Published on 01 Nov, 2020
Opposition must think harder about political economy...
In this outstanding piece Pratap Bhanu Mehta highlights the BJP’s achievement over the past six months – whilst a...
Oct 2020
- Week 4
- Week 3
- Week 2
- Week 1
Short Read
Published on 25 Oct, 2020
Lots of Overnight Tragedies, No Overnight Miracles
In this piece, Morgan Housel brings out the emphasis on time as a critical factor of compounding. To drive the point...
Published on 25 Oct, 2020
The real lessons from Sweden’s approach to Cov...
Sweden has gone from initially being hailed for the most liberal lockdown only to later on becoming the whipping boy...
Published on 25 Oct, 2020
Use of fear: Witness protection in India
Whilst there are no prizes for guessing that most of Marcellus’ clients come from the most affluent strata of Indian...
Long Read
Published on 25 Oct, 2020
HDFC Bank sitting upon $6-7 billion of excess liquid...
The outgoing CEO of HDFC Bank and the only one that the bank has had in its 26yr history, Aditya Puri, talks about some...
Published on 25 Oct, 2020
Social Capital: 2019 Annual Letter
To continue with the theme of big technology monopolies, no better to get the perspective of someone who is a Silicon...
Published on 25 Oct, 2020
The 14 Juiciest Quotes From the House Antitrust Report
The Antitrust Subcommittee of the US Congress published a 400 page report a couple of months ago on the practices that...
Short Read
Published on 18 Oct, 2020
How Eddie Van Halen transformed Michael Jackson’s Be...
Eddie Van Halen, the lead guitarist and songwriter of the rock band Van Halen passed away last week, triggering a whole...
Published on 18 Oct, 2020
Laughter May Be Effective Medicine for These Trying ...
We have been featuring articles about how mental health has become even bigger an issue during the pandemic given...
Published on 18 Oct, 2020
Garry Kasparov on the need to improve our politics w...
Technology in general and social media in particular have transformed several social sciences in recent times,...
Long Read
Published on 18 Oct, 2020
The Race for a Super-Antibody Against the Coronavirus
Through the pandemic, we have featured pieces that help us understand what seems to be one of the more complex systems...
Published on 18 Oct, 2020
People-meters have a history of manipulation. Huge p...
TV ad spend amounts to around Rs 27,000 crores per annum (around $4bn). How that cake gets sliced up is driven by TRP...
Published on 18 Oct, 2020
What made Don Bradman better than the rest?
Most of us are suckers for books and infotainment on how the great & the good made it to the top. Unfortunately,...
Short Read
Published on 11 Oct, 2020
Elon Musk’s 2 Rules For Learning Anything Faster
Two weeks ago, we featured a piece on using the T-model to build our individual capabilities – a combination of a...
Published on 11 Oct, 2020
Shareholder value isn’t past its sell-by date as a c...
We featured a piece a couple of weeks ago, reigniting the debate on whether the sole purpose of a corporate is to...
Published on 11 Oct, 2020
The Best Way to Compete with Big Companies: Do Nothing
There are growing concerns on how the global economy is getting concentrated into the hands of a few large technology...
Long Read
Published on 11 Oct, 2020
Inside the airline industry’s meltdown
The airline industry despite the crucial role it plays in connecting the global economy, is notorious for destroying...
Published on 11 Oct, 2020
I stopped using screens on Sundays. This is how it c...
The author says that after an episode of seizure & fainting in 2019 she decided to slow down her life. She reduced...
Published on 11 Oct, 2020
What Warren Buffett sees in Japan Inc
In late September, Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway invested $6.5bn in five Japanese trading houses that are well...
Short Read
Published on 04 Oct, 2020
Healthy gut, improved mood? The link between your mi...
The presence of bacteria in our intestines which help in digestion has been well-known but now with a breakthrough in...
Published on 04 Oct, 2020
The making of an open source dictionary
We could not have done a better contextual introduction to this piece than the author’s own: “This is not a post on...
Published on 04 Oct, 2020
Why Breathing Is So Effective at Reducing Stress
Covid is causing increasing stress levels among working professionals who were already under the pump given rising...
Long Read
Published on 04 Oct, 2020
This Overlooked Variable Is the Key to the Pandemic
The Covid infection data for India is showing reasons to cheer with the active case count now declining for two...
Published on 04 Oct, 2020
Behind the new rules for NGOs to get foreign funds, ...
The front pages of Indian newspapers contain so much news on cricket and Bollywood that one would be forgiven for...
Published on 04 Oct, 2020
Standing Tall – Lessons in leadership from Sat...
The late Satish Dhawan did much to make the Indian Institute of Science (IISc) the premier science research centre in...
Sep 2020
- Week 4
- Week 3
- Week 2
- Week 1
Short Read
Published on 27 Sep, 2020
Childhood hero to colleague: Deano was the player yo...
Dean Jones, the Australian cricketer turned commentator died of cardiac arrest last week at the age of 59 in the middle...
Published on 27 Sep, 2020
Milton Friedman Was Right About Shareholder Capitalism
It is the 50th anniversary of what many regard as one of the most influential opinion pieces in media history –...
Published on 27 Sep, 2020
The Daughter of a Slave Who Did the Unthinkable
Jason Zweig is one of the finest writers in finance around today. This piece may not be about investing but an...
Long Read
Published on 27 Sep, 2020
Why America Is Afraid of TikTok
TikTok, owned by the Chinese company ByteDance, was the most popular mobile app in India until it got banned by the...
Published on 27 Sep, 2020
To become Invincible at Life : Create your own T
One of the reasons we like to share what we have read with other people is that it allows us to live and learn within a...
Published on 27 Sep, 2020
Big Investors Are Dying to Know What Amateur Traders...
In America retail investors now account for 20% of cash equities trading volume and 12% of options trading volumes...
Short Read
Published on 20 Sep, 2020
Snowflake’s IPO is a bet on companies using AI for e...
The most critical trait of a successful investor they say, is humility – the open mindedness that you could be wrong...
Published on 20 Sep, 2020
The Billionaire Who Wanted To Die Broke . . . Is Now...
We are living in an age where the word ‘billionaire’ may have lost meaning given the number of unicorns...
Published on 20 Sep, 2020
The ‘serendipity mindset’: how to make y...
Like in life in general, in investing too, you need an element of luck to succeed. At Marcellus, we make it a point to...
Long Read
Published on 20 Sep, 2020
How China Controlled the Coronavirus
A few days ago, pictures of a massively crowded pool party at a water park in Wuhan went viral, leaving people across...
Published on 20 Sep, 2020
India and China might not want war, but will not be ...
Whilst Pratap Bhanu Mehta has made the occasional error of judgement in the past (who hasn’t?), in this piece he is...
Published on 20 Sep, 2020
Over and over and over again: Jimmy Anderson keeps o...
This long essay on the most successful fast bowler of all time, the one bowler that no Indian batsman (barring perhaps...
Short Read
Published on 13 Sep, 2020
Declining COVID-19 Case Fatality Rates across all ag...
Amidst the alarmist reports about continued rise in Covid cases in India, here’s a positive set of research findings....
Published on 13 Sep, 2020
5 Lessons on Coping and Thriving from Around the World
The philosopher, Eric Weiner, is the author of three bestselling books on philosophy – “The Socrates Express: In...
Published on 13 Sep, 2020
R.I.P David Graeber – Prophet of Wall Street
David Graeber, the scholar, anarchist and intellectual leader of Occupy Wall Street passed away on 2nd September. One...
Long Read
Published on 13 Sep, 2020
SoftBank, Robinhood and a Margins Singularity
Last week we featured two pieces on short term price movements – first, Aswath Damodaran on the meaningless rally...
Published on 13 Sep, 2020
Tech = unoriginal, lazy, consensus, etc
The next long read later in this edition discusses the Softbank effect on the tech stock rally this year and how it...
Published on 13 Sep, 2020
Why do you feel lonely? Neuroscience is starting to ...
With research over the years increasingly pointing to social relationships as a key source of happiness and well-being,...
Short Read
Published on 06 Sep, 2020
A Supercomputer Analyzed Covid-19 — and an Interesti...
Whilst advances in science and technology on the one hand showed how quickly the Coronovirus’ genetic code was...
Published on 06 Sep, 2020
SoftBank’s Bet on Tech Giants Fueled Powerful ...
History may not repeat itself but it rhymes, they say. The rally in tech stocks (Nasdaq up 25% this year) only partly...
Published on 06 Sep, 2020
Only a shift in labour’s bargaining power can light ...
Through the pandemic, we have been featuring commentaries on the unprecedented stimulus by central banks and its...
Long Read
Published on 06 Sep, 2020
Illusion, Perception and Reality: Stock Splits and I...
In his book ‘Conservative Investors Sleep Well’, Phillip Fisher said “The stock market is filled with...
Published on 06 Sep, 2020
Rajkumari Amrit Kaur: The princess who built AIIMS
Week after week, the Indian Express continues to be the one Indian newspaper which publishes perspectives, insights and...
Published on 06 Sep, 2020
You are the product
This three year old long essay on Facebook is interesting at three levels: a) it helps you understand how much thought...