After spending a few decades dabbling with accounting, Income tax, equity research, law, investing, meeting 100,000 people while talking about money,…I asked myself this question “Should Morality worry you while investing”?

I have never been able to answer this question clearly. I will keep visiting this question again and again – so in 2029 I might have a different answer – on the assumption that I am alive till that date…

I had Monsanto, ITC, etc. in my portfolio – suddenly a few years ago I sold off saying “I do not want to hold companies which are almost against humanity”. My call completely. I have friends who smoke – hey that is their problem, not mine.

I am not into Sharia investing – so you will find a lot of banking stocks in my portfolio, but that does not bother me much. I understand enough about banking not to kill myself over usurious banking practices. Yes banksters have earned the name like presstitutes have. That I can live with.

I am convinced about the following:

• In business “completely moral” does not exist
• Some businessmen who are moral have done WRONG things -many times unknowingly too
• When a person is caught doing something wrong, he is feeling bad about being caught!
• There is nothing called partly moral.
• Small businessmen are far more moral than big businessmen
• Corporate executives are FAR MORE IMMORAL than the business counterparts
• Every body has a narrative about why they are immoral
• Laws exist but people rank themselves in an imaginary scale and FEEL they are doing well!
• Laws are too broad, and most Indians believe they are too small to be tried or harrassed
• Even when they are caught (if at all) they say they are being victimized !!
• Employees, by definition can’t be Moral – their employer can make them do immoral acts

Even the attitude towards right and wrong is dynamic. I know of one CEO of a life insurance company who said “Yes Subra I know rebating is wrong, but first catch LIC’s agents who rebate”. Good logic. Like Amitabh of Deewar saying “Us aadmi ko lao jisne mere haath….” – you know the stuff.

Another high ethical and moral claiming CEO once told me “Subra we treat the Ceo and his driver alike, so we cannot change the premium just because he is a big man”. This was a life insurance company. I then asked 2 common friends to talk to the CEO / Head of Underwriting directly. In both those cases, the premium got reduced. So his ethics / morals is worse. Of course I have no respect for him, but he is held in high regard by the industry.

There was another CEO who used to say “We do not recruit from our competition, because ethics and morals cannot be taught”. Funny he would felicitate Mr. X as a great agent…when we all knew that the agency was in his wife’s name. I brought it up with his COO who did not have much to say.

In fund management….oops I could write a book.

Its better to be a simple, one-man operation where I am responsible for what shit I do. Or what shit I do not do.

In this environment if you claim to be a moral investor who invests only in moral companies (oops the choice is very small)…how do you know how long a company will remain loyal to its morals and ethics?