Sorry, but senior citizens should have seen this coming.

When your daughter is 9 years old you tell her ‘see what you wear’, do not do this, do not do this….and all your life you have spent giving gyan, now it is your turn to listen. So please listen.

When your age crosses 70, the chances are that more complicated decisions are more difficult to make. I have no clue how I will know how I will find that out. Since I do not know that, I will move to less complicated assets.

So things like I am doing now – I sold all my Bharti Airtel shares where the Bharti Tower IPO hit the market. Indian promoters tend to ‘support’ their shares when there is a family IPO. Once the IPO was over, I bought back Bharti Airtel. ON 23/03/ 2016 I had a sell on Bharti simply because they announced the sale of the tower business. Sure I like Bharti for the long term in my portfolio, so I may have a little amount left. However when there is some major problem announced, I expect to get Bharti at say 340 if not lower.

Once I am 70 I will not do this. I will have a small equity portfolio and sell from that from time to time. Only buying would be into an index fund etf.

My debt would be about Rs. 20L in bank fixed deposits (assuming 5 years expenses), and maybe Rs. 15L in SCSS. One debt fund with a 2 year maturity and low risk fund to hold about Rs. 1 crore and the balance in ETF. I hope to have an annuity of Rs. 1 crore and that will give me a Rs. 7L annual pension.

Now let me tell you the kind of products that 70 year olds buy:

Life insurance for their kids (without medical) where they are going to pay the premium. They have NO WAY of understanding whether it is a regular premium or a one time premium. They do not know whether it is a ULIP of a classic endowment plan. They know they have to sign somewhere and give a copy of their pan card.

One such 70 year old bought a Rs. 25L REGULAR premium from a life insurance company. THE COMPANY called him to confirm whether he had understood the product (independently verified too). HE SAID YES UNDERSTOOD. After some time he said ‘I thought it was a single premium’ – pure, pure escape route. LUCKILY for the old man there was some forgery in the papers too – convenience forging I would think…and so there was a police case and he got back his money. If the executive had not forged the signature, this old man would have been in deep shit.

Now he went to Priyanka Sambhav of Pehredar (I remember having a 1 hour chat with her over this case!!) and thanks to Priyanka they got back the money. I am doubtful whether they thanked Priyanka, but  that is for another day. THEY WERE PLAIN BLOODY LUCKY to have got the money back. Age: 72, Kolkatta.

I know one senior citizen who issued cheques from his son’s account for making a fixed deposit which was lost. Chennai. Age 70.

I can go on and on..people have lost their money, their children’s money…etc.

Simple argument: keep quiet, sit tight.