My Investment Philosophy & Why I Post These

Disclaimer:  I am not a professional investment advisor nor do I have any formal credentials to be one.  Nothing  in these pages is to be construed as investment advice.  I am sharing ideas on what I consider as good bets for myself and bringing it to others as ideas for their own research.   You take my views at your own discretion.  Do your own research.  Over a period of time, you will yourself discover what you look for and you won't need me, hopefully.  You will probably also see I am distilling hours of research into a few snippets for you.

MY INVESTMENT  PHILOSOPHY

0. Money is necessary - even to do good, in fact if one wants to do much good - but is only a means and should never become the end.  The ability to earn it is a talent like any other (just like those that a great poet - Milton -lamented about wasting), and one should not waste it.  What makes it all right or wrong is how one earns it and what one uses it for.

1. Good investment involves protecting one's capital and earning a better return above inflation rates and major indices.  Anything else is speculative or being stupidly lazy.

2. I don't believe in parking money in an index fund or somewhere like that, or worse still delegating its management to someone else.  I don't want my returns to be average, I like it to be above it to make the exercise even worthwhile.

3. I am not going to let someone else "manage" my money to their benefit.  So, I will stay away from advisors like those at brokerages who have an obvious conflict of interest.  [Not all are bad, some are even very good, but I don't have the luxury of experimenting, nor do I want to get burned again -- and thank God I didn't have much to lose when I did stupid things like that long back.]

4. To succeed, you need to observe how the winners play the game and learn from them, and I do that on a continuous basis.

5. I solve very complex problems in my day to day work, am very analytic, etc.  Compared to everything else I do, managing my investments is not all that hard.  I refuse to be too lazy to learn the intricacies of that or to allow myself to be taken by anyone.

6. I have equipped myself with quite a bit of training   through my own studies, from university courses, one-on-one coaching, etc., and from a lot of shadow boxing over a few years with investment ideas.  I continue to educate myself more.

7. I refuse to fall into the trap of becoming  over-confident and remind myself each day that for every one successful in this area, there are hundreds who have failed miserably.


WHY I SHARE MY IDEAS

1. That is my nature.  Plus it burns me to see otherwise bright and brilliant people getting burned or losing opportunities just out of  misconceived notions like: this is hard; I have no time; my work (and making someone else richer) is more important.

2. Life is going to be harder for the next generation without our safety nets of pension, social security, etc.  I am hoping my kids will take a greater interest in such matters as will their friends.

3. I am all too aware of the many studies that confirm the regression to the mean by each immigrant ethnic group to the USA and want to do my best for my cohorts and their kids to maintain the lead our generation has given them.

4. I am sure that if you see a good idea, you will pass it my way and give me yet another idea to research and add to my learning and possibly benefit financially too.

5. Posting my preferences publicly forces greater discipline of research on my part, and some day if I turn pro (most unlikely, though), you can judge if I am worth it.