While on Social Media a couple of days ago I saw a news item about Urmila Matondkar’s wedding. Normally this would not have caught my attention as a news item, but I saw this one – and decided to read the comments.

They were so harsh!!

Imagine a girl/lady says ‘I am getting married / got married…’ you just say God Bless, right?

Here the comments were vicious – she has ruined her life,….etc. etc.

Then I saw another article about Reliance Jio – and the article was talking about license and the reference to Mukesh Ambani, was not just as Mukesh Ambani – the word – the Richest Indian was tagged along. In this article that tag was not necessary at all.

Voyeurism and subtle jealousy seems to be eating us. I was in a group where they were discussing somebody spending Rs. 2.4 crores  on his son’s wedding. One of the persons commented ‘the amount spent on a marriage is inversely proportional to the number of years that a marriage lasts’ – again this guy knew neither the boy nor the girl…just sheer plain subtle jealousy WHICH WE OURSELVES do not realize.

I once saw a kid take a stone and scratch a nice big car. Then I realized – we all do that do we not?

Look at the number of people calling Vijay Mallaya a failure. I am not here to support VM, but you have to understand that over the past 30+ years he has built his company into a powerhouse in the liquor business. A complete top dog.

Yes his mistakes include Mangalore Chemicals and Fertilizers and of course KIngfisher Airlines. I think his biggest mistake was that he did not have a top class management team. His biggest mistake was he was perhaps a poor judge of people. Nobody will be able to find out the role of his ‘top’ executives, and perhaps the amount of corruption in his operations. Too late perhaps. However, to call him a failure is great – but you are ignoring his marketing strengths.

When you see somebody successful, feel genuinely happy. I have been going through portfolios of various people – and realizing that I am not a judge of ‘should he have made so much money’ . My job is to clean a portfolio, not judge.

There are portfolios where 99% of the returns have come from 2-3 stocks in a portfolio of 100 shares.

There are portfolios where COMPOUNDERS have done better than their doctors. (so much for qualification)

In general, more activity has helped the broker more than the portfolio.

I am again and again convinced that it is not in the buying or in the selling that you make money in the equity markets, it is in the sitting tight that you make money. Of course what you buy is important, but sitting through bad times is far far more important. Ask those who sat on Asian Paints, Gillette, Nestle, ……..omg the list is jealously long.