Some of the media based advice is so dangerous or simply useless, let us see them…

1. Indexing works in the USA, but in India there are many funds that outperform the indices by a long margin: how useful unless you can say “Xyz is a good fund which will outperform the index over the next 20 years your investing life” – impossible to say this, so it does not work.
2. You can never go wrong buying a good company: Well if 5 years ago people had bought Tata Steel, LnT, Reliance industries. He would still be nursing a big loss.
3. Your IFA is good only if he can get outsized returns like the guy who got 3000% return in a game.
4. You should rebalance your portfolio once in a year. You must not time the market.
5. Experts beat the market regularly. Every measuring period that is.
6. Good fund managers remain on top all the time. If they do not, it is time to sell.

Questions that they cannot find answers in the media (including blogs and fellow readers):

1. How many funds to invest in to get a diversified portfolio?
2. If mid cap will always outperform large cap in the LONG RUN, WHY should I invest in large cap at all?
3. I can handle volatility so should be in a 80% equity portfolio?
4. Will I really make money buying LnT at 1020 and selling at 1085?
5. Why do ticker channels not play their 4 month old tapes to tell us what really happened?