Category Archives: Market Psychology

Decoupling X.Y

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We’ve…

…had many conversations…

…on the topic of decoupling.

So much so, that I’ve lost count.

The only difference, this time around…

…is the approach.

This time around, we’re handling from centre-point.

Meaning…

…that we are the ones…

…learning how to…

…decouple.

This time it’s not about economies decoupling from other economies…

…or markets decoupling from other markets.

We don’t even care anymore whether that is a myth or…

…whatever.

What economies do to or with each other is not our concern in this discussion.

Here, we are devising methodologies to reconfigure our nervous system, …

…actually, our very DNA, …

…so that we can decouple from market forces, at will, for however long we want to.

Without feeling pangs.

Two questions – How? Why?

Regarding the why, it’s imperative to allow our nerves rest.

Long-term survival. We’re not going to implode, or explode.

It’s about building patterns. This is the how we are addressing. Patterns. Many times. Patterns that take us away from markets, temporarily.

Slowly the pattern comes on auto. We devise a mental and a physical macro for the pattern.

An activity hiatus.

A terminal kill switch activation, with reactivation date.

Family.

Book.

Holiday.

Hobby.

Different…

…work.

Anything that’s not market related. At will, till wilful reactivation.

Again and again, whenever we feel the need, and / or whenever the situation demands.

Over many years, we now have an ingrained reflex. A muscle memory. Allowing us at will, to…

…decouple.

Welcome to Decoupling X.Y.

Define your X and Y. Incorporate into your system. And then…

…decouple at will.

Life at Frontier Minus One

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Sanity prevails…

…at frontier minus one.

Rat race is within the underlying’s…

control.

Virtual / quasi / substantial / semi debt-free-ness…

exists.

Free cash-flow generation on the balance sheet is…

…common.

At frontier minus one, the narrative is …

…under control…

…as proven by self-determination of speed of change…

…and by exhibition of substantial growth.

Not at breakneck speeds.

Not by borrowing to the hilt.

Not by greedy behaviour.

Not by indigestible trajectory.

Not by a reckless ‘not giving a damn too bad if you’re not so fast’ attitude.

Life at frontier minus one…

…is somewhat balanced, with a flow.

Innovation at frontier minus one is achieved much faster

…than at frontier minus two, but much slower than at…

…frontier zero zero.

No tech company that wishes to thrive well into the future is currently functioning at…

…frontier minus two.

Either the transition to minus one has been made, or, it’s in the process.

Why not go for the jugular? Straight to zero zero.

Everyone has their role in this puzzle.

Imagine an older civilization going into battle.

There was a front line, paving the way, at immense cost.

There was a reserve support line, with artillery, first-aid, communication, and what have you.

There was a third line with supply, reinforcements, semi-trainees doing other stuff normally, etc.

There was aerial support, naval support, intelligence, research and analysis staff etc.

All combined to create an ensemble of actions.

Cut to now.

Warfare has changed.

Immense cost is still there, but immense cost to the front line, as in cost of life, has been reduced greatly, speak drone and missile warfare, supported by AI backed intelligence and analysis.

Point is, innovation, a different way of thinking, disruption and all their cousins will find a way to make things affordable, implementable.

That’s the way civilizations move forward.

Not for you or me to change. It’s the way of the world.

And that is what frontier minus one banks upon.

Meaning, to keep functioning at sustainable levels, slowly, painstakingly, in the process, simultaneously, finding a way, a connect, to frontier zero zero.

The connect can be of co-work. Amicable. Win-Win. You earn, we earn.

At frontier minus one, the world view is not to annihilate, but to…

…accommodate.

To win…

…together…

…in…

symbiosis.

Symbiosis

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Imagine…

…the most value you can imagine.

That’s what this word is worth.

Especially now.

What’s the truth?

Existential question.

First we had everyone and their aunties proclaim the death of core Tech companies.

Hmmm.

Core Tech companies, and their chief protagonists, thought otherwise.

Number of believers kept waning though.

Until recently.

Something started to reverse in belief systems.

AI was behaving fantastically utilitarian with a human holding the reins.

Meaning, there needed to be a human there, for practical purposes.

Frontier AI deployed engineers to be the human face. Or so one was told.

Came the trust issue.

Do we double up on our trust in this no track record magician who just showed up out of nowhere?

Do we entrust privileged client data to the unknown?

Do we strip ourselves naked, TWICE?

NO.

Everyone and their uncles have answered with an emphatic NO.

Who is the human handler – the go-between – the trusted face – the rein holder?

Someone with a track record.

Proven.

Tried, and…

trusted.

Self-propelling.

With no liabilities. Spell ZERO DEBT.

With copious FREE CASH FLOW to INNOVATE FREELY…

…to navigate the reins successfully and as per the requirements of an enterprise.

Who is this entity?

None other than…

…our own very well known…

CORE TECH.

Leaner.

Hungry to prove its point.

To have its raison d’être acknowledged, and paid for.

To earn and compound steadily.

Forget about dying. Let’s talk about long term thriving.

Then, we had the captains of frontier AI admitting, that yes, ‘we do need core tech handholding to be implemented successfully’.

Gone was the initial hubris, that ‘we had come to wipe out old thought patterns, and all old systems’.

Reality had dawned, and these captains at least had the decency to admit it.

Actually, they had realized that their existence now depended upon how much their infrastructure would seep through. And…

…that no one was trusting them enough to hand over the job of seeping through to them, but much rather, to trusted old compatriots, to Core Tech.

So they came forward to shake hands.

Good.

Symbiosis.

We want to move forward on the back of this symbiosis.

There will be gigantic and fast development on the back of this symbiosis.

We are looking at space travel, space colonization, disease control, climate change, cheap solar, cheap desalination, perhaps even alien integration and partnership – unimaginable perhaps a few months ago, but possibly conceivable on the back of this symbiosis.

There’s new talk which has recently emerged, from the other extreme, and needs to be discarded, like its mirror image on the opposite side of the bell curve. This is the talk of frontier AI dying out because of becoming unaffordable.

Well, in whatever shape it exists currently, frontier AI does have tremendous capacity to solve problems.

Let it do just that on the back of this symbiosis, and earnings will start to flow.

Core Tech won’t let it wither, frontier AI has now become their raison d’être too.

Don’t you see it?

Two universes are converging, each needing the other to survive.

In the end, they become one universe.

Companies will merge. Synergies will multiply. Mega projects will be achieved, faster, more bombastically.

Earnings will flow.

Where do you want to be?

Remaining a doomsdayer will not help you.

Get into the flow.

Invest into debt-free, free cash-flow generating core tech as value deepens.

Look for debt-free, frontier minus one, free cash-flow generating semi AI companies, research these thoroughly for any red flags, and if those found are manageable, put in some funds.

If you find a frontier tech with manageable debt and a reasonable balance sheet, with a PEG ratio (price to earnings ratio divided by earnings per share growth percentage for the fiscal) somewhat under control. ok, put in some money there too.

Get out of the doomsday mindset.

Put your money to work, and then lock it in for another twenty years. Leave the compounded proceeds to your children.

Now.

Let the crashes come. There will be compounding post crashes too. Just look at the monthly chart of an IT index from 1995 to today. Dot-com peak looks miniscule and low compared to the levels of the monthly chart today.

Enough talking. Do the recce and then let’s talk.

Mantra

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Hey.

Writing became a breeze.

Posting a blog from inside Claude, keeping the originality of the post, whilst assigning to AI all mechanical tasks like feeding in categories and tags – I’ll admit, this does make life a lot easier, and blogging a lot more enjoyable.

Which keeps the admissions coming in continuation, perhaps repeatedly.

From being the leading AI skeptic, towards gravitating to some kind of a chief protagonist – people who know me would probably say, “There he goes again.”

So what’s this going to do?

The number of blog posts is going to increase. Hopefully, the quality too. Primarily, the enjoyment while blogging.

Beneficial. We thereby move towards the realm of Planet 2.0.

Wunderkind AI needs to benefit mankind to the max.

What about the risk?

Opening up to the Wunderkind, allowances, permissions, sometimes an odd password shared.

Does the AI take these towards Planet 3.0?

Yeah, that’s the one on which mankind is harmed.

Skeptics are still on 1.0, exactly where I was 11 days ago.

Idea is to make a conscious effort to gravitate towards 2.0, every time there’s a drift towards 3.0.

Remember, we will tend to drift.

Drifting got us here in the first place. One can use fancy words for it, like disruption.

There’s a quick trick which makes us aware from where we are functioning, 2.0 or 3.0?

Greed. Hubris. Exuberance. Ego burgeons. 3.0 functionality.

Feeling of benevolence while functioning, well-being and / or goodness emerging – 2.0 domain.

Natural human drift towards 3.0.

Bring back consciously towards 2.0.

That’s the Mantra, going forward.

Check

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Hey.

Facing some basic issues on the other side.

Life has changed.

Race became more intense.

There’s greed in the equation, the desire to achieve as much as possible in as little time as possible.

Everything’s moving…

…faster.

As if…

…from one day to the next…

one just…

…shifted.

It’s clear to me that we don’t shift till we are ready.

Was a hard nut to crack.

Had to be literally goaded into the AI trajectory, several coaxings required. Hard skepticism took its time to be broken down.

Not happy about the greed.

Speed of coasting is also very high.

Need attunement.

Unable to slow down easily.

Need to be careful about a ‘now I’ve got this and to hell with you attitude’. Can develop unchecked.

Addiction. Need to stay de-addicted.

All non-electronic activities in the day go up immensely in value.

Reading – books. Check.

Chanting. Check.

Basic verbal conversations. Check.

Human interactions. Check.

Helping someone. Charity. Check.

Non-distracted eating. Check.

Bringing down multi-tasking levels. Check.

Whole detox days. Day travel. StayCation. AutoCut the system. Check.

Evening chanting session. Lengthen. It’s not electronic. Check.

Anything not connected to a device and creates value. Check.

Not going to fall sick in this hyperactive space.

Check.

Incorporating before proceeding further.

Check.

Waking Up On The Other Side

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Hey,

First up, humbled. To the nth.

Was an AI skeptic till, like, yesterday.

Well, skeptic tried, and died, the skeptic did.

What woke up was armed 25x and on steroids.

That’s me now, after 9 days of intense work on Claude.

Encouraged to try by friends and compatriots, initiated into entry, took the plunge.

There’s a chronic buzz in this dimension. This is an electronic world. Just got more…

…robotic. It’s just that the robot is invisible.

It’s like fighting a matrix war from inside a digital maniacal super-intelligent tool who knows…

…everything.

Who can connect dots…

…exponentially and asymptotically, both simultaneously.

Red flag list is at an all time high.

Sleep’s off.

Mind races all the time.

There’s some exuberance that’s come to the fore.

Don’t want to speak much.

Need solitude.

Basic life disturbs.

Withdrawal symptoms away from screen.

Welcome to the planet 3.0.

What happened to 2.0 ?

Wasn’t that supposed to be the shifted one, towards doing good for mankind?

Want it back.

Need to get to 2.0.

What is 2.0?

A controlled version of 3.0, using its tools only, not being ruled by it. Doing good for mankind.

Need to create a 2.0 out of 3.0.

Fast.

Cluster of Blessings

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Hey.

We realized…

…that what we’re doing…

…is anti-fragile in nature.

How, you ask.

Since what we’re doing is in stocks. Equity. Robust at best. Not anti-fragile.

?

Well, take a definition, and expand it a bit, and the definition starts to make broader sense. One draws on the definition, and creates a utility for that definition in one’s own line of work. That’s what we’ve done. Creator of the term anti-fragile, Mr. Taleb, could turn around and say, hey, you’ve just taken my thing and used it in your thing. Of course we’ve done that. We stand on the shoulders of giants, giants like Mr. Taleb. And now we’ve got his thing, projecting onto our thing, making something new out of our thing. Bottomline, we have a thing that is anti-fragile, and Taleb gets credit for his thing starting to develop universality, at least across another asset class.

So how are we doing stocks in an anti-fragile manner?

We benefit from chaos, volatility, uncertainty, fear and the like.

How?

Before these conditions cause mayhem in stocks, we have gravitated, in a growth market, over the years, to exhibit meaningful holding power. Both mentally, and financially. So, what do we possess before topsy turvy conditions, like now? Holding power.

What else are we armed with?

Liquidity.

Liquidity is a state of mind. Our state of mind causes us to be liquid at the right time.

Next.

We have…

…high conviction. In a basket of market players. Our due diligence regimen, over decades, has allowed us the means to recognize such stocks. In these, we have developed what?

High conviction.

We are itching to buy these underlyings, at huge…

…margins of safety.

Cut to current conditions. Chaos, volatility, uncertainty, fear, war, maniac, missiles, nuclear threat and what have you.

The margin of safety that we look for starts to abound. We accumulate high conviction underlyings, over multiple buys, ending up with low buying averages.

As conditions amplify, buying averages get lower. We are benefiting from chaotic conditions in that our buying averages are getting lower and lower.

Perceptions change for the better. They always do. Gone is 1929, where it took the better part of two decades for circumstances to change. Till 2019, one used to talk about max 15 to 18 months being the length of a bear market. Information flows very fast. When efficient, whenever that is, markets are then super-efficient. Factoring in is taking days, perhaps only a day. A change in perception is incorporating very, very fast. Frankly, we’re talking months, not even years. And, we’re mentally and financially prepared, with our holding power, for a time-frame measured in years.

Comes the turnaround. Sooner than later, such are the times.

Our low buying averages multiply fast. In fact, very fast. The lower they are, in our high conviction holdings, the faster they multiply. We start to hold many 2-baggers in 3 to 6 months, for example.

Now we call the shots. In fact, our very low buying averages do.

We can choose to pull our principal out, full 100%, at 2x, 3x, 4x, 5x or what have you, depending on our muse.

The moment we go cost-free, we have moved into 100% margin of safety. Nothing can break our cost-free-ness (except ourselves). We can choose to leave our cost-free-ness to our children, by which time it will have majorly compounded. Since we have no principal invested in our cost-free-ness, we won’t be in a hurry to liquidate it. In fact, we won’t even be looking at it.

We’re calling our low buying averages anti-fragile. The lower they get, the more anti-fragile they behave in the aftermath of chaos. We’re adding an allowance towards fast incorporation of change in perception to the definition of anti-fragile, because of which our inherently anti-fragile low buying averages get to benefit from their anti-fragile nature (thanks again to Nassim Nicholas Taleb for giving us the framework of anti-fragility).

And what are we calling our cost-free-ness? I mean, it is seeming to be beyond fragility. It is giving benefit beyond any scale. Generational benefit. I don’t have a name for this effect, yet.

Our cost-free-ness has generated generational well-being. It has allowed us to not liquidate it, by the state of mind it has caused in us. It has allowed itself to be passed on.

Hmmm. Taking a phrase from Nichiren Buddhism, it is our…

…cluster of blessings…

…that we pass on…

…to the next generation.

Constants

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Hey.

We play the game…

…with numbers.

Numbers are…

…our thing.

The thing with numbers is…

…that once we create a constant for ourselves…

…a pivot…

…something like a compass…

…AI doesn’t have access to it.

It’s our number.

It’s in our mind.

By the time AI gains direct access to our mind, we’ll be gone.

For example, we establish a low buying average, over many buys, in something we consider to hold value.

Each individual establishes their own, meaning…

…it’s each person’s own low buying average.

It decides the multiple.

It’s the centre-half. The libero. It creates the play. It’s unique to a person. No AI access. The whole game has been taken away from AI. It remains a human game. It’s not what the masses are doing. It’s contrarian. It’s going to make money.

Volatility is a constant.

Disruption is a constant.

Fear is a constant.

Greed is a constant.

Mass-behaviour is a constant.

Pigs getting slaughtered is a constant.

We play it by constants.

We’ve even started using unique mass-logic defying indicators, that only we have defined, that no one else knows about or can dream of, and we’re using them successfully, with no access to AI.

We’re functioning from within a matrix where we control the game, AI doesn’t.

Beauty is, outside of our protective matrix, we have access to all of AI’s capabilities, should we choose to use them.

Not yet though. Specifically after the 160+ girls murder rumoured to be caused by intel provided by AI, correct me if I’m wrong. AI as it currently is doesn’t seem ready for seamless implementation. All those foolishly believing so at this moment are the pigs referred to above. Pigs get what? Slaughtered. I didn’t say this first. It’s a common market saying. Markets are a – constant. We trust constants.

There will be many more blow-ups before seamlessness is achieved.

Think of banking systems causing and compounding massive errors because of blind reliability on AI.

This of AI suggested war strategy backfiring because of lack of understanding of human psyche.

Think of investment strategy imploding, left with eyes wide shut to AI, owing to lack of proper understating of human behaviour and its unpredictability. Anyways, on the plus side…

…think of any level of positive upheaval that AI will cause.

Think maximum.

Thought?

Since we play it by constants, we’ll continue to thrive, maximum disruption and beyond.

Such is the power of constants, that we successfully harness.

Matrix Diaries

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Hey.

I think…

…you’ve pretty much understood…

…that we’re buyers in this whole mess.

I’d like you to add one more word to your understanding.

We’re…

…fearless…

…buyers.

We were not always fearless.

The human being is born with fear built in as a protective emotion.

During the process of rewiring, we wired this emotion out.

How does one do that?

Before I delve into it, wish to reiterate the we.

Who’s the we here?

Everyone who gets taught forward in this space and from this space, and then goes on to implement successfully, that’s the we. Why do such a thing? Gives me a kick. What’s a good life? A collection of meaningful things that give one a kick, implemented repeatedly.

Now imagine a matrix.

We are in the matrix.

Outside the matrix are all things that cause us fear.

Inside the matrix we implement our strategy without fear.

We have built systems that have automatically thrown out of the matrix all things that cause us fear against acting in the markets.

First we created a safety net. An emergency fund. Perhaps two. Out went fear of existence.

Starting with a small networth, we plunged into the markets. Luckily, we tasted failure fast, and lost it all, broken down, emergency fund to fall back on, young, enough energy and will power to bounce back. Now we had a model of how not to do it. We knew where we didn’t want to land up, and understood somewhat how not to do it. The experience of a blow-up and the knowledge of how not to do it made more fear exit the matrix, as we itched to get back into the game.

Slowly we built a system. Incorporated models. Saw what worked. What didn’t work for us exited. Model developed a slight edge. Tasted some wins. Confidence started to grow. As it grew, more and more fear exited.

Then came replication. Would the model work again? It did. Would it work bigger? Scaled up a bit. Working. Till not working. Fine-tuned. Working again. Knew we had something now. Came a black swan and its aftermath. Model excelled. Realized we were anti-fragile. Whatever was left of fear was now outside the matrix. We were tready for all out implementation.

And that’s where we are functioning from in this crisis.

If you say might last a year, no fear, we silently implement. We’re liquid because the model creates liquidity in good times. Two years? Still no fear. Liquidity might run out after 18 to 20 months, probably, but that’s the whole goal, to be fully invested, as per a model in which one has high conviction. Three years you say? We say still no fear.

The biggest money is made by…

…sitting…

…and we didn’t say this first. Someone you look up to did.

We’ve learn’t how to sit. Sitting is an integral part of the model.

While we sit, we do many constructive things. Since we’re investors, while we sit, we invest heavily…

…in OURSELVES.

Do the math.

Fool?

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I don’t mind.

What?

Being called that.

Why?

For me, it’s an indicator.

How?

When someone in my environment expresses that he / she considers me foolish, this acts for me like a guage.

Where?

In order formulation.

Which?

Good till traded orders.

Explain.

Ok. Let’s say someone considered my 787 GTT HDFC Bank entry foolish. With price having fallen to 745, and still not showing signs of stability, someone might consider me foolish for having entered ‘early’ at 787. I want this to happen. I want to sense this attitude in another person’s behaviour.

Then?

Simple. Formulate and enter next GTT for HDFC Bank at 690.

What’s the logic?

That’s just the way I use this indicator.

Position-sized small quantum?

Absolutely.

Considered bulk-entry at bottom?

What’s the bottom? Who claims to know the bottom?

499?

No idea. How do you know you’ll catch the bottom? What if you miss entry altogether?

What if I get full entry in lumpsum, at 499?

What if price stays below 400 for a month after that? Your lumpsum entry will hardwire you to your terminal, and it’s one month of sleepless nights, I can promise you that. Neurosis. Psychosis. Freeze. God knows how long it will be before you can take another rational decision.

And your staggered full entry with a higher buying average will not cause all these things?

That’s the whole point. It will not.

It will not? How?

Market psychology is counter-intuitive. When are you going to understand this one basic point? Going in, let’s say ten times, between 800 and 499, over three months, at every new entry, the nervous system forgets older price. It focuses on newer price, not even on buying average. It actively registers one small quantum entry at 499 as per this strategy, and forgets other entries above, at least forgets them well enough to suit the purpose. Bottomline – such a nervous system is poised to avoid neurosis, psychosis and the like.

You’re just making this up.

Try it out. This is what works for me towards full strategy implementation. I am able to successfully fool my nervous system into buying maximum units without setting it up to hurt itself, should the market fall more, and stay lower for longish periods. This is my win, and a cornerstone of my lowering the buying average strategy in high conviction stocks during crises. Tested successfully during CoViD. No more testing. Current crisis is about full implementation. Will keep this buying strategy on through the entire crisis, or till fully invested, whatever comes first.

Why put in everything?

This is money sidelined to go in. It’s not daily resources money, or college fund money, or family expenses money. It is investing money. It’s supposed to go in. What’s better for it than to go in low?

Where is the courage coming from?

High conviction is a state of mind. It’s a reflex. Over time and over many, many studies, observations, behaviour analyses etc., you develop it for a stock. Once you have high conviction in a stock, nothing should come in between you and full entry, if price allows.

Am still trying to decided whether you look foolish or intelligent?

Though I don’t care for your opinion, I don’t mind it either if you give it to me, for I will use the encounter as an indicator.

Is that what you’ve gravitated down to, using ridiculous and self-concocted indicators to navigate the markets?

Doing things which no one else has before sets me up for vindication no one else has gotten before. No more questions, do the math.

Miners

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Hey.

We’re miners.

We mine for…

…margin of safety.

Surprised?

As in, can one mine for…

…something abstract?

Sure, no biggie.

Ok, bear with me on this.

Entry quantum = shovel.

Wedge it in deep enough = Good Till Traded (GTT) Order = Poise.

Emotional sell most likely on open or on close = mined material falling into basket.

GTT executed = margin of safety mined successfully.

All the time?

No. In times like this, specifically, when there’s blood on the streets.

Isn’t margin of safety already available in times like this?

Yes it is. However, we want to mine for extra on top of what is available.

Like your yesterday’s experience with the HDFC Bank GTT hit well below trigger, a couple of seconds after open?

Exactly like that. Oh, there’s another add on.

Tell me.

We buy with a lag.

Meaning?

Let’s say something’s fallen big, and has come on our radar owing to levels broken.

With you. Then?

We let it fall for the whole session, setting up GTT only after the session, and placing GTT around 4 to 5% below close. Time and price lag.

Isn’t that way below?

That’s the whole point. An emotional sell will hit, and then price will stabilize.

What if no hit?

Possible. Good with that. What’s also possible is, there could be no hit for two or three sessions, and then there might result a soft execution. We’ve still mined the extra margin of safety, even though it’s taken us a few more sessions.

What was your experience with the recent HDFC bank buy?

GTT was set up on 2nd March, for 809, when price was at 887.

Just fishing in the air or what?

Didn’t want it at 887. Wanted it at 809. That’s all there is to it.

So, 78 points were mined, that’s almost 8.8%, wow!

Hold on. There was so much emotion in play, that scrip opened at 770, a massive 72 points below previous close, order triggered at 773 a second or two later, and was executed at 778 after some more seconds. So that’s about 12.3% mined. It took 17 days and 13 trading sessions. By the way, the extra 12.3% mined goes a very long way.

Explain.

In 25 years, at 15% per annum compounded, it compounds to 4 times plus the entire sum that’s gone in just now.

Tremendous!

Welcome to the world of compounding, and that of…

… mining.

Specialization

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Hey.

Calls have started coming in.

Am I doing ok?

Is the panic getting to me?

Am I going under?

I was waiting for this.

Calls of this nature, coming in, are a fantastic guage for the onset of panic.

You see…

…I specialize in guaging panic. You could call me a fall-specialist. A crash is my field of action.

During the crash in CoViD wave 1, I categorized two levels of panic.

Level I was classified as middling panic and identified at the point when calls were coming in asking if people should cancel their systematic investment plans. Aversion to invest with blood beginning to flow on the streets. Noted.

Level II was classified as grave panic, and identified at the point when calls were coming in of the nature, that now that all companies would be bankrupt, why was I still putting in money, into the markets? Questioning the whole financial system. Noted too.

In current scenario, questions about my health followed by queries about which stocks to invest into, after I had answered with a ‘never been better’ reply, for me, corresponds to level I of panic, identified.

Am still waiting for those other calls, asking why I’m putting in money when everything was going bankrupt anyway. Probably coming soon.

So, what’s the course of action, now that level I prevails.

We take it up a notch.

Meaning?

Look harder for entries.

Weren’t you already entering?

Yes, but wasn’t trying very much. Was letting the market punch me hard into an entry.

Meaning?

I’ll give you an example to drive this point home.

Ok.

HDFC Bank, right?

Right.

I had a GTT on for the last many sessions for entry at 809. Wasn’t coming. GTT remained. Either the market socked me into this position, or I wasn’t entering. Happened this morning. Triggered during open, at 773, executed at 778. Market pushed me into the position with force. I let it.

And now?

Will leave myself open to a lesser force push. Will put nearer GTTs, let’s say ~3% away.

If such prices don’t come?

Then not interested in entries.

What happens at level II of panic?

Even lesser force required to enter. Only GTTs lesser than 1 to 2% away perhaps. Many entries.

How come you are so liquid?

This approach creates liquidity during good times. Entering with small quanta now, as compared to networth. Can go on buying for more than one year from this point, if required. Such is the strategy.

Good to know, thanks for sharing.

Mind you, buying during panic does take a toll on one’s psyche. One needs to recuperate and regenerate. It’s not as easy as it sounds. I try very hard though, to recover mentally before the next session. Wish to last very long in the markets, …

…successfully.

Cared to Rewire?

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Hey.

From this point onwards…

…it all boils down to…

…stamina.

Theories for market success have been out there, in abundance, since eternity.

Everybody can read how the richest man in Babylon…

…got rich.

Or how compounding works.

Position-sizing.

Entry quantum.

Margin of safety.

Profit run.

Multibaggers.

Engines of income generation.

Entry into the territory of wealth.

Generational wealth-creation. Etc.

Yes. Everybody can read. Or listen. Or both.

Question is…

…how many can follow through?

Of those who set out, how many can remain grounded and focused when the heat is turned up, like now?

Most importantly, how many can finish?

I would estimate that a low single digit percentage walks the talk to successful culmination.

Why?

You see, heat does something critical.

Once it is turned up, it burns out all nervous systems that haven’t been rewired.

Given that we are not born with nervous systems programmed towards market success, we need to rewire them over the years and over the knocks. Once fully rewired, our nervous systems can withstand, pivot, and generate wealth over prolonged strife.

As this crisis continues, more and more players will start to cave in.

Capitulation at lows.

Others will stop all activity owing to fear, but might not sell. They’ve frozen. Better than capitulation.

There will be some who cash out with the intent of getting in lower, cannot then find the courage when the lows come, and then join their frozen compatriots as the reversal arrives and accelerates.

Still others, with funds safely picked away in fixed deposits, will be afraid to bring them over to Equity. Fine. They are behaving as per their risk-pr0file. At least they are in control of their behaviour.

Rewired market entities will be acting. They know what to buy. Markets give ample time to study, and all kinds of preparation will have been done, like, yesterday. These folks will have started buying upon the arrival of their levels. Clockwork. Small entry quanta. Position-sized as per their risk profile. Programmed to keep entering for a long period. That’s how they will have positioned themselves and their liquidities. These entities will show stamina and will outlast everyone to still be buying at market bottoms and slightly beyond. They will emerge with the lowest buying averages, and will make the quickest multiples upon reversal, after which some will pull their principles out, while others will ride their holdings to multibaggers.

Who do you want to be?

It’s ok if you don’t identify with any of these categories. Find your passion elsewhere.

Or, self-PhD to a rewired market mindframe, sooner than later. Preferably – now. This crisis could even just be beginning. No one knows. Since no one also knows how long it will last, for all you know, you could still get a year or two’s great buying ahead.

Wishing you lucrative investing.

Magic

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Sure, …

… nobody said this was a bottom already.

No signs of a bottom.

For all you know, the real correction just started.

So, everyone is asking, …

… why in the world a buyer is buying …

… now.

Confused? No need to be.

First up, please understand, that money enters the market in a planned fashion when position sizing rules are in place.

Oh, there’s one more safety rule.

In a day, only so much goes in, in total.

Let’s say what you are referring to as a bottom comes within, hmm, two days, one day, four hours, one hour… ,

… whenever it comes.

Do you actually believe and / or have the guts to get fully invested in that minuscule time-frame?

Let me answer that for you. NO.

Why am I so clear on this?

Moving big money in one shot when the whole world’s pajamas are falling, and watching it possibly become half in a few days will most likely lead to neurosis and / or psychosis.

It is mentally digestible to keep buying at levels as per the entry quantum allowed by one’s position-sizing algorithm.

Though the overall market or index or sector benchmark might not be signalling a bottom, individual stocks hover around correction levels, threatening to recover from there.

We let them hover.

If they are not declining further from a correction level after a bit, we pick up one lot.

What’s the lot?

It’s a function of one’s networth at that point.

What function?

You decide. Yes. Your decide your own position size at each point thus, as per a mathematical calculation. You can decide to programme this function, for example, in a manner that you go in more when you are winning and go in less when you are losing. Or vice-versa. As per your personality and risk-profile. You call the shots. You are the master of your money and journey.

As time goes by, and as the correction deepens, you have lots of lots in. Ideally, you get fully invested before recovery. Compared with trying to move in fully at the exact bottom, well you might get lucky with the latter option, but it will burn your nerves, and resulting psychosis can last longer than when rational decisions will need to be taken. Not worth it. Position-size, entry quantum, going in bit by bit – this is what our nervous system can handle well without getting damaged. Markets change within months, perhaps weeks, and…

… when the magic happens, you deploy your exit strategy, whatever that is. Be rationally around to do so.

Or, simply, don’t do anything except watching the magic, …

… of a low buying average develop into a multiple.

Poise

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Hey.

Story’s changed already.

IT has suddenly become a defensive buy, it seems.

Not perceived as oil dependent.

See how fast that happened.

Five weeks ago one was hearing the RIP bugles for IT, or so the spin-doctors were trying to spin it.

Bottom-line : don’t believe the stories being spun. Have your own…

… high conviction.

And, the opportunity is…

…now.

Make up your mind.

Invest where you see stability and growth. Invest in India.

There are a lot of high conviction ideas in India that can be latched on to.

Fear makes good investments fall too. That is happening now. To take advantage of this effect, one needs to be fearless with high conviction.

How does one build high conviction in a stock?

Repeated shareholder-friendliness shown by a management.

Clean balance-sheet.

Abundance of free cashflow.

Debt-free-ness.

Longevity.

Vision.

Margin of safety.

That’s it.

Oh, one more thing.

Don’t force the market.

Let it make you enter.

Be poised with a funded GTT order in place before market open.

Keep doing this throughout the fall, as margin of safety deepens. One can do this if one has created enough liquidity during good times, and if one keeps entering with small entry quanta proportional to one’s networth.

Idea is to enter with and into high conviction multiple times, each time lowering the buying average.

With that, one sets oneself up for a fast multiple when markets recover.

It’s boiling down to…

…poise.

Mindset

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How long is this lasting?

Everyone’s asking.

I have another question, …

…since no one knows the answer to that above question.

My question is, …

… as far as your market strategy is concerned, …

… why are you even asking?

Just implement your strategy na.

Asking means you don’t know what to do.

Which brings us to some more observations.

‘Don’t know what to do’ state of affairs is digestible, …

… if this is your first time.

First time as in first time facing such conditions.

Conditions?

Panic. Confusion. Sell and ask later mindset. Gullibility. Mass hypnosis. Massive spin-doctoring. Etc.

If you’ve seen such stuff before and haven’t devised a plan for next time round, you are not excused, but please do so now.

If you’ve been through all this more than twice, and still don’t have a plan for situations like this one now, well, maybe you should rethink your market foray. Are you in the right space? Are you doing it out of compulsion? Keeping up with some Joneses? Whatever applies. Rethink. Shape in, put a strategy in place for market crashes, or, shape out, meaning, do something else where your expertise is challenged, and emerges forth naturally.

It boils down to rewiring.

What boils down to rewiring?

One’s behaviour during a crash.

Not panicking? Coolly implementing set strategy? Liquid enough, exactly for such situations? Not looking over your shoulder to see what strategy someone else is implementing? Not asking others for opinions? Implementing your own, mapped course of action without regret?

Great. That’s a fantastic mindset to have earned.

Such a mindset is going to take you places when mass psychologies reverse.

Wait and watch.

You miss I hit

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Tried and tested…

…strategies…

…yield results over the long run.

Scamming might work for a while, but that’s about it.

There’s buy low sell high.

Compounding.

Pulling principal off and redeploying.

This is all constant stuff.

However, there’s a new game in town.

It’s called ‘throwing one and all off their tried and tested go to strategies in the hope they will abandon what they’re holding, and then these holdings will be swooped up by Team Malicious’.

Please don’t get roped in.

Don’t react to false panic, FOMO, ‘you’ve got to get a piece of this action’ kinda stuff. Please don’t allow anyone to fool you off your bread and butter game. Also, don’t try any fancy new game which is unfamiliar.

Earlier, one would have said India was scam central, but having seen the stories emerging currently, it’s easy to present the crown to Chief Protagonist + Team Malicious cohorts. These people make Nigerians and Indians look like jokers. One needs to learn how to lobby from these fellows, or perhaps not, since they talk ugly.

Ugly is not our thing. We’re everything they’re not.

We love harmony.

Peace.

Unison.

Flow.

Patterns.

Discernment of errors.

And then we act.

We make money off these.

And a huge error is in the making.

What is it?

‘Treating all people like fools, all the time’.

That’s the biggest mistake, made by the biggest fools.

And we’ll profit off these fools, which, hopefully, …

… should be a good lesson for them.

Shame, Shame, West

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The next scam is here.

Please don’t get fooled.

Unfortunately, many already are.

You see, the storyline is so, so believable.

However, only on the surface. A few scratches, and the story falls apart.

There is something about human intelligence. Behaviour. Instinct. Decision making prowess. Mental synthesis.

Everything described here, …

… AI is not.

So, why give it that status?

What’s the agenda?

Ohhh, there’s a very solid agenda, and since one can’t fool all the people all the time, we see through the bullsh**.

First up, Western IT is hugely, hugely over-invested. Neck deep. Rational minds in other parts of the world are not. The occident needs ratification and burden-sharing. Orient is not biting. So make it bite. Unleash a scam. Perhaps it was a sop allowed through in the recent trade deal, since some of the spin doctors being utilized are actually Indian.

Secondly, rendered useless? Give us a break. Spun yarns don’t render useless quality, zero-debt, free cash-flow rich, lean, diligent companies. On the contrary, agility and versatility allows such companies to adapt very fast, particularly owing to huge spending power and zero obligations. Indian IT is adapting, FAST, and whatever artificial crashes are being caused owing to the foolishness of pigs, are buying opportunities. PERIOD.

Thirdly, what kind of a track record do the likes of current disruptors have? Like, four years. In other words, NOTHING. Current disruptors have no experience, themselves, in emerging successfully from disruptions. Indian IT has been navigating, SUCCESSFULLY, through all disruptions since the ‘80s. So, like, Western AI, garner a track record first, then talk. Also, an announcement alone, that you are potentially capable of doing XYZ, is not going to cut it.

Please remember, the problem with AI is, everything functions supremely till it doesn’t. That’s the point where the value of human capital is realized, to navigate mankind successfully through and out of the dead end. A dead end in critical ventures is not acceptable. Writing Indian IT off for dead is wishful thinking and reeks of a jealous to the hilt society that fumes with envy at the cash-richness, the zero-indebtedness, the ability to adapt at amazing speeds, the start-up laden clean balance-sheets etc. etc. etc. of Indian IT. Shame, shame, West.

Noise Diaries

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When something is a given, ….

…one just sheer deals with it.

And that something just got so much louder.

For example, social media is screaming with that something, i.e. …

… noise.

However, noise…

… has value.

One needs to know what’s being floated among the masses.

Furthermore, it’s helpful to gauge the decibel level.

If we look at the current scenario, everyone and their Aunty are yelling “Craaassshhhhhh…!” Dollar, bonds, gold silver, stocks, real-estate…

…everything’s supposed to “Craaassshhhhhhh!”

Fine.

Keep shouting.

At least we get an idea about the script and the concerned noise-level.

Is it supposed to scare us?

Yes.

Are we scared?

NO.

Why not?

Because we’re busy doing exactly what they don’t want us to.

Firstly, who’s ‘they’?

The floaters of the script. You were asking, ya, secondly?

Secondly, what do ‘they’ now NOT want us to do?

Buy cheap, like they are. They want us to let go and sell to them.

Wow.

Ya, it’s the biggest wealth-transfer in the History of mankind, currently unfolding.

Are you then not afraid of a crash, if you are buying now?

No.

Why not?

I’m liquid. If there’s a crash I’ll continue buying, into the crash. My entry quantum is aptly small and a function of my networth, thus allowing me entries for three to five years, upon any signs of reasonable value. Held over the years and bought with a clear head, in a growth market, assets will yield stellar returns.

So you’re saying you’ll cover the crash?

Yes. Timelines move very fast nowadays. Markets, when at all efficient, have become super-efficient, as if trying to prove a point to the level of overkill. When not efficient, they bubble or crash. Super-speed in times of efficiency is a huge bonus for us.

How?

Crashes play out within a shortish time-span. Buying through the crash is over fast. It’s not that when there’s a fire the crash is going to happen after five years. It will happen way sooner than later.

So is that enough time to get your money in, especially with a small entry quantum?

No. That’s why it’s important for small entry quantum cum long-term players like us, crash in, crash out, to keep buying amidst any signs of cheapness caused by fear-mongers creating all this…

…noise!

Exactly! 🙂

Market Ability

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Hammers…

…hammer.

That’s their job.

They do a good job, at hammering.

At times, the market behaves like a hammer.

Market players learn from hammerings.

Question is, can market players learn without being hammered?

I don’t think so.

One can psych oneself into believing otherwise, I’ll give you that.

And, for a while, things will look like all’s good.

Point is, one isn’t looking for the hammer, …

… the reason for which being, that one has never experienced one.

That’s when the hammer falls, when and where one is least expecting it.

It is better to undergo a hammer event in the early days of one’s market career, and while one’s young.

Young – because – a). one plays small when one’s young, mostly by default, owing to there not being ample access to fund supply. Also, b). in the early days of one’s market exposure, the bulk of one’s mistakes and miscomprehensions emerge. The combination of these two facts a). and b). leads to losses that are bearable (youth has backups, like parents). In our youth, we tend more to brush it off and move ahead, full of energy. Yeah, youth has the energy, and time (upcoming multiple market-cycles), to not only emerge from a hammer, but to go on to prosper from the now ingrained learning.

Issue starts when our corpus is big and we still don’t know what a hammer is.

Issue compounds when we then confuse our ability to implement money into markets, in an effort to make it work, with actual market ability.

What is market ability?

It all starts with risk profile.

Some people die without having recognized their risk profile

Then, after having recognized one’s risk profile upon encountering some hammers and seeing our bodies and minds react to these, we move on to systems.

From development to fine-tuning to implementation of a system, we keep chipping and chiselling away at our strategy. We emerge with one that has an edge. We continuously work to keep our edge profitable.

Simultaneously, we throw in risk management. Development of an emergency fund is part of this.

Discipline.

Regimen.

Rules.

Let’s throw in some unpredictability, on purpose.

After putting one system on semi-auto, we work on another, and so on and so forth. We use our profits to diversify and make ourselves more secure, ideally anti-fragile.

Market ability is a successfully implemented combo of all these factors and perhaps more.

It includes being a good human being at home too. There’s no question of letting out the effects of a bad market day on one’s family members. We’re stopping all market action before anything like this develops. Harmony paves the way for another serene market day…

…about to dawn.