rohit c. posted an article on Understanding and Applying Value Investing Principles - Feb 9, 2012, 4:19 pm
A bear market is a time for lots of activity for me. A 25%+ drop in 2011, with a near collapse towards the end of the year, threw up a lot of opportunities. During such times, the problem for me is that my portfolio soon starts resembling a zoo – it has a stock of each variety.How do I end up in s...
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rohit c. posted an article on Understanding and Applying Value Investing Principles - Jan 28, 2012, 4:30 pm
This title must have made you wonder – now what leap of logic is this guy having here ?Let me walk through the logic to prove to you that I have not lost my marbles (not yet !)An IPO and frenzyMOIL came out with an IPO in late 2010 and there was quite a bit of frenzy around it. I think the IPO got...
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rohit c. posted an article on Understanding and Applying Value Investing Principles - Jan 21, 2012, 7:20 pm
Does the professional investor, FII or the institutional investor have a big advantage over the small, part time investor? Fact 1: The professional investor has access to in-depth research on a large number of companies. They also have access to the management and other industry professionals which ...
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rohit c. posted an article on Understanding and Applying Value Investing Principles - Dec 9, 2011, 7:20 pm
The short answer to this question is – Most companies in this industry never make any money ! Sure they make money once a while, but over a period of time most airlines loose money. As a whole the industry has lost money for its investors over a period of time.If you don’t believe me, following ...
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rohit c. posted an article on Understanding and Applying Value Investing Principles - Nov 27, 2011, 4:49 pm
This is an odd post to write when markets are dropping by the day. However I think that at times like these, it is important to remind ourselves of the basics so that one does not get overwhelmed by the negativity and fear around us.So coming back to the question – Why do stocks go up? Well it dep...
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rohit c. posted an article on Understanding and Applying Value Investing Principles - Nov 16, 2011, 5:28 am
As an armchair investor, I usually analyze companies and their economic models through their annual reports and other published documents. This is a top down approach and does not involve any grass roots analysis or any kind of investigation at the ground level. At the end of the day, it has a virtu...
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rohit c. posted an article on Understanding and Applying Value Investing Principles - Oct 27, 2011, 8:50 am
I often torture myself by looking at my past mistakes, every now and then. It may not be fun, but it is a very useful exerciseThe idea of doing these exercises is not to beat myself up , but to identify patterns of incorrect thinking, and avoid repeating them in the future.So why analyze mistakesThe...
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rohit c. posted an article on Understanding and Applying Value Investing Principles - Oct 19, 2011, 7:42 pm
There is virtue in being patient, more so if you are a long term investor. I got a taste of this lesson again, recently with tata steel.I had been analyzing tata steel for a few weeks and got extremely tempted when the stock hit 400 Rs a share. I would have pulled the trigger on this one, but decide...
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rohit c. posted an article on Understanding and Applying Value Investing Principles - Oct 10, 2011, 10:44 am
I am married to some stocks, which in these times of hyperactive trading, is quite shocking to a lot of people.I have held some of these stocks for five to ten years. I have discussed most these companies on my blog in the past. A partial list followsBalmer lawrie – Held since early 2005: compound...
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rohit c. posted an article on Understanding and Applying Value Investing Principles - Sep 25, 2011, 4:08 pm
A swing of 1% up or down is a decent move in the stock market during normal times. In the US and European markets a 3%+ swing is now becoming the norm. If you have been looking at these markets, you will realize that the volatility of these markets has gone up.The European debt crisis and other issu...
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rohit c. posted an article on Understanding and Applying Value Investing Principles - Sep 17, 2011, 5:24 pm
I wrote about maharastra seamless a few weeks back. The initial part of the analysis is here. The rest of the analysis follows Competitive analysis There are several companies in the steel tubes and pipes space. Some of the key companies in this space are Welspun corp, PSL, APL Apollo tubes etc. Wel...
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rohit c. posted an article on Understanding and Applying Value Investing Principles - Sep 12, 2011, 10:01 am
One of the most common advice on investing is to be patient. I read this early on and always wondered what it meant? In my early days of investing, I thought I was missing something profound and did not get what the writer had to say. Overtime I have come to realize that a lot of people, who write t...
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rohit c. posted an article on Understanding and Applying Value Investing Principles - Sep 1, 2011, 5:33 pm
I have a constant struggle in my mind – Do I pay for quality (overpay?) or do I buy cheap stuff, which may turn out to be a value trap.The ideal situation would be to get a high quality stock at a cheap price. But then if wishes were horses!, I would be a good looking billionaire with my own priva...
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rohit c. posted an article on Understanding and Applying Value Investing Principles - Aug 20, 2011, 6:42 pm
26-Aug : A clarification In the post below, i spoke about investing in the index either via a systematic investment plan or through some simple rule set ( such as buy below a PE of 12 and sell above 20). I did not imply that one should be investing in the index now !. I am surely not investing in th...
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rohit c. posted an article on Understanding and Applying Value Investing Principles - Aug 8, 2011, 3:46 pm
The Indian middle class is on the cusp of a fantastic change. The economy is growing by leaps and bound and so is the per-capita income. With all this money in our hands, we are and will continue to buy fridges, TVs, pressure cookers and all other comforts of life. The white good co...
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rohit c. posted an article on Understanding and Applying Value Investing Principles - Jul 31, 2011, 6:20 pm
About Maharashtra seamless is in the business of seamless and ERW steel pipes. These steel pipes are made from steel billets and HR coils respectively. Seamless pipes are used mainly in the oil and gas and other such industries where there is a need to carry fluid under high pressure application. ER...
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rohit c. posted an article on Understanding and Applying Value Investing Principles - Jul 13, 2011, 3:23 pm
As part of my paid subscription, I recently added a stock in the portfolio. I bought this company at around 16 times earnings and as I am constantly preaching about buying stocks on the cheap, it must have surprised a few subscribers. A good friend of mine wrote to me and we exchanged a few emails w...
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rohit c. posted an article on Understanding and Applying Value Investing Principles - Jun 22, 2011, 8:51 pm
The number one problem faced by value investors is not a big permanent loss of capital, due to overpayment for growth, but the weak and anemic return from an average business bought at a cheap price. Let me explain further – A typical value investor (who are far and few anyway) general...
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rohit c. posted an article on Understanding and Applying Value Investing Principles - Jun 13, 2011, 8:16 pm
I have discussed about the various factors or parameters in analyzing a bank in some earlier posts (see here and here). In this post, I will use these parameters to evaluate a real example. A warning before I proceed – The wieghtage given to each factor and conclusions derived depend heavily...
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rohit c. posted an article on Understanding and Applying Value Investing Principles - May 31, 2011, 12:29 pm
The idea for this post came from a question from a reader – Rohit – you gave us the ingredients in the last two posts on banking (see here and here for various factors on analyzing banks), but these ingredients or factors alone are not sufficient. Where is the recipe? How do i combine the ...
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rohit c. posted an article on Understanding and Applying Value Investing Principles - May 23, 2011, 12:02 pm
In the previous post, I covered several important variables in analyzing a bank. These factors are a good starting point in evaluating a financial institution, but they are not sufficient to arrive at a conclusion. I am listing several additional criteria I consider personally, when analyzing ...
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rohit c. posted an article on Understanding and Applying Value Investing Principles - May 11, 2011, 10:19 am
I recently started analyzing financial institutions such as brokerages, banks and HFC (housing finance companies). I wrote about brokerage firms here and here. In this post, I will be looking at some key factors in analyzing banks. I have written about banks earlier – see here, here and here...
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rohit c. posted an article on Understanding and Applying Value Investing Principles - Apr 24, 2011, 6:56 pm
Lets say you have a portfolio of around 15 stocks, which I think is sufficient diversification for most of us. Now let’s say, you are one of those odd guys who for some inexplicable reason, believes in long term investing – that is buying high quality companies at decent prices and then holding ...
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rohit c. posted an article on Understanding and Applying Value Investing Principles - Apr 17, 2011, 4:39 pm
I thought my previous post on the brokerage industry would receive minimal hits as it is quite a dry topic and has no entertainment value. However, I am glad that I have been proven wrong. Considering that a lot of users are interesting in reading such dry topics, I will continue to publish such ana...
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rohit c. posted an article on Understanding and Applying Value Investing Principles - Apr 10, 2011, 7:20 pm
I have started analyzing financial service companies such as Banks, brokerage firms, NBFC etc to find some attractive ideas in this industry. I think financial services as an industry is likely to do well as the Indian economy grows and the average level of income rises with it. Globally, the ...
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rohit c. posted an article on Understanding and Applying Value Investing Principles - Apr 2, 2011, 7:08 pm
First of all – yipeeeee !!! No I didn’t win the lottery, but India won the Cricket World cup. Wow, what a match ! it was thrilling and exciting to say the least. Now, coming back to more mundane things, I am often asked – where do I find my investment ideas ?. I would say that I find my ideas ...
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rohit c. posted an article on Understanding and Applying Value Investing Principles - Mar 22, 2011, 4:09 pm
I have a preliminary list of companies, which I am looking at more closely now. These companies have passed the 5 min smell test (nothing obvious to reject these companies), but now require a more detailed analysis to make a decision. I am listing two such ideas below. I do not hold any of the comp...
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rohit c. posted an article on Understanding and Applying Value Investing Principles - Mar 13, 2011, 9:24 pm
My portfolio is now a certified zoo. Although the bulk of my portfolio is in the top 10 holdings, I still hold several stocks which are not as attractive. I initiated a clean up few months back, but it is not as easy as i thought it would be. How did I get here? I have always had this problem to a ...
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rohit c. posted an article on Understanding and Applying Value Investing Principles - Feb 26, 2011, 11:07 pm
About Oil India an E&P company (oil exploration and drilling) which came out with an IPO in 2009. The company is a category – I, miniratna which allows them operational flexibility from the government (atleast on paper). The company operates mainly in the north-east with additional fields in Rajas...
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rohit c. posted an article on Understanding and Applying Value Investing Principles - Feb 20, 2011, 12:07 pm
I am currently in the process of looking for new ideas and have shortlisted a few. I have done some preliminary analysis and these ideas have made through the initial filters. However, these ideas need deeper analysis to make a final buy decision. I am discussing one such idea in this post – Amara...
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rohit c. posted an article on Understanding and Applying Value Investing Principles - Feb 9, 2011, 9:29 pm
I was having such a happy time!. The economy was growing at 8%, midcaps and small cap companies were showing great increases in profits and the stock prices were following suit. The India growth story was coming true and due to my brilliance in recognizing it, my portfolio was up a billion percent f...
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rohit c. posted an article on Understanding and Applying Value Investing Principles - Jan 27, 2011, 7:09 pm
I think being rational – making decisions inspite of your emotions telling you otherwise, based on facts and data is very critical to successful investing. I try very hard to be rational in making my investing decisions (though I am not successful a lot of times). So if rationality is an importan...
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rohit c. posted an article on Understanding and Applying Value Investing Principles - Jan 19, 2011, 10:13 pm
A typical research report provides you with a few years of historical data and a year or two of forecast, especially of sales and netprofit. The better reports may also include some kind of valuation based on PE and discounted cash flow to arrive at an estimate of fair value. Most of these research...
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rohit c. posted an article on Understanding and Applying Value Investing Principles - Jan 9, 2011, 3:49 pm
I typically have a look at my current positions every 6-12 months independent of the quarterly/ annual results. This allows me to evaluate the company independent of the recent results (which would bias my thinking) About The Noida Toll Bridge Company Limited was incorporated as a Special Purpose Ve...
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rohit c. posted an article on Understanding and Applying Value Investing Principles - Dec 31, 2010, 5:47 pm
A happy new year to all the readers and thank you for reading and visiting my blog
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rohit c. posted an article on Understanding and Applying Value Investing Principles - Dec 28, 2010, 11:37 pm
It’s the time of the year when everyone looks at the year gone by and makes resolutions for the new year. My resolution for the new year? run a 5K marathon :). Anyway, I digress. This blog is not about my attempts to get fit. I did an annual portfolio review in 2009 here. I think the returns ...
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rohit c. posted an article on Understanding and Applying Value Investing Principles - Dec 22, 2010, 11:27 pm
Now, before I start crowing, let me come clean on a few points. The Kesar enterprise arbitrage idea was brought to me by ninad (see his blog here). I was smart enough to get on the ride. This deal was announced in March and it took around 9 months for the deal to complete. I have also listed some t...
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rohit c. posted an article on Understanding and Applying Value Investing Principles - Dec 14, 2010, 9:26 pm
I typically look at 1-2 companies every week in some detail, to figure out whether they are attractive enough for further analysis. As I have said in the past – rejection is easy for me. It takes me 10-15 min or sometimes lesser than that to reject a company. Investing into a company is like marr...
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rohit c. posted an article on Understanding and Applying Value Investing Principles - Dec 7, 2010, 9:51 pm
The last six months have been a ball. If you were smart or lucky (or both) to have picked the right midcap or small cap stock, you could have seen a 100-200% return by now or may be even more. In the initial stages, it is quite likely that the diligent and focused investors picked these stocks aft...
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rohit c. posted an article on Understanding and Applying Value Investing Principles - Nov 30, 2010, 6:48 pm
Statutory warning – Long post detailing further analysis of the company. Can knock you off to sleep – please be seated while reading :) I described my process of analyzing two companies from the sector – construction material, in an earlier post. At the end the analysis, the only conclusion I...
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rohit c. posted an article on Understanding and Applying Value Investing Principles - Nov 26, 2010, 2:53 am
I decided to start a mailing list today for all the readers who could be interested in a paid subscription service. It couldn’t be a better day to start ! No sooner I put up the signup form on the sidebar, the market drops with midcaps and small caps dropping more than 5% and some even 10%. If pu...
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rohit c. posted an article on Understanding and Applying Value Investing Principles - Nov 21, 2010, 6:02 pm
I recently came across this industry as this sector seems to have been beaten down by the stock market. The stocks in this sector are selling at PE of 5 and below. Anything cheap always catches my eye!! So if the stocks seem so cheap, one should sell his house, his cows and everything else and load...
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rohit c. posted an article on Understanding and Applying Value Investing Principles - Nov 14, 2010, 12:58 pm
The idea of buy and hold was popularized in the US by warren buffett, the guru of value investing (and if you have realized, my intellectual guru too). The idea behind buy and hold has been that one should buy the stocks of the really good companies and hold them for the long term (sometimes over d...
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rohit c. posted an article on Understanding and Applying Value Investing Principles - Nov 3, 2010, 9:00 pm
A few of you may have noticed updates on my portfolio page. I don’t update this page on a real time basis, but it roughly reflects my current positions except for one stock. I have been reviewing the Q2 numbers of most of my positions and have been satisfied with the performance of most of the co...
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rohit c. posted an article on Understanding and Applying Value Investing Principles - Oct 24, 2010, 9:58 pm
I recently made a discovery – The higher the market goes, the more I get a lot of intellectual thoughts. This is exactly reverse of a lot other people who seem to be finding a lot of good ideas to invest in the market. Well I guess I may have to work a bit harder to find something good …sheesh w...
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rohit c. posted an article on Understanding and Applying Value Investing Principles - Oct 19, 2010, 6:47 pm
It’s not that I have always been a bear on IT companies. I have held NIIT tech, Patni computers and Infosys are various times over the last 5-6 years. You can see my analysis of NIIT tech here and patni here. The main reason for my bearishness is simply ‘valuations’. Mid cap companies like N...
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rohit c. posted an article on Understanding and Applying Value Investing Principles - Oct 12, 2010, 3:38 pm
I analysed mangalam briefly here and here and recently started analyzing the company again as I was looking at some other cement stocks. This is what I found - The good The company has a 2MT plant and supplies to the northern markets of Rajasthan, MP, Haryana and parts of western UP. The company w...
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rohit c. posted an article on Understanding and Applying Value Investing Principles - Oct 5, 2010, 7:09 pm
Happy days are here again ! The index is at 20400 and will soon touch 22000 and then maybe 25000 or even 30000. The sky is the limit with India growing at 9%, and with a young population and all the other great factors working in its favor. 2008 was actually just a small bump on the way and the sma...
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rohit c. posted an article on Understanding and Applying Value Investing Principles - Sep 28, 2010, 5:09 pm
I had written about Lakshmi machine works earlier here. I would recommend reading the earlier post, especially the comments. The post and comments were right in the middle of the financial crisis. The stock was quoting in the 500-600 range and went down to the low 400 range in the subsequent weeks. ...
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rohit c. posted an article on Understanding and Applying Value Investing Principles - Sep 19, 2010, 5:36 pm
Balmer lawrie is a decent size holding for me and hence I make it a point to review the annual performance in detail. The annual report for the company was published recently and I have been looking at it. Following are my thoughts on the performance of the company – I have written about the comp...
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