BIBLIOPHILE: THE MOST IMPORTANT THING BY HOWARD MARKS “Combating Negative Influences”

Posted on September 10, 2017 by Jimit Zaveri under BIBLIOPHILE: THE MOST IMPORTANT THING BY HOWARD MARKS

In this article, I am going to discuss regarding the psychological factors which affect our decisions negatively.

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Market many times provide us an opportunities to earn superior performance through inefficiencies, mispricing, misperception, mistakes of other people.

But the question is why such opportunities come? What makes us different from other people? Why mistakes do occurs?

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We need to analyze data and reach the conclusion. In investing errors occurs not due to analytical factors but errors mainly come from psychological factors.

Let’s look at the few psychological elements which affecting the investment decisions.

First emotion is GREED – Desire for money.

Most of us are making an investment for making more money. If we don’t care about the making more money than we are not going to make an investment.
And also there is nothing wrong with trying to make money. The market and economy run because of our desire to make money. But we should remain careful with a transformation of desire towards greed.

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Real estate

Real estate sector in India in the year 2007-08 creates a bubble and huge jump in the optimism by everyone. Such situation resulted under the sharp fall in the value of the sector.

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Due to an impact of greed, people hope that their strategies help them to produce higher returns without taking higher risk for forever. And due to this hope, many times people hold highly priced securities with expectations of more appreciation can be possible. Many times such expectations went wrong and prove that expectations were unrealistic and people have ignored the risk.

Opposite of Greed is FEAR. As similar to the greed, excess fear is also harmful to the investors. Excess of fear stops us from taking a constructive decision while actually, we require taking such decisions. Due to fear, many a time we cannot able to make a good investment and also lose the opportunity.

The third factor is PEOPLE’S TENDENCY TO DISMISS LOGIC.
Generally, it happens that people stop using logical thinking and they start doing work with an irrational mindset. Many a time, we are not ready to accept logical reasoning for the situations and work as per unrealistic scenario. We do not apply what we have learned in the past but get easily deviate from those learning.

When market or a particular strategy starts generating higher returns for a while, then we started believing that it will continuously generate such returns without an involvement of risk.

Howard Marks called such situations as “Silver bullet”, the Holy Grail.

But is it really same strategy keeps on generating higher returns without risk?

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As Warren Buffett mentioned, when prices started rising then it affects to the reasoning power of the people. It led to mania and situations of mania results towards the bubble.

The fourth factor is THE TENDENCY TO CONFORM TO THE VIEW OF THE HERD RATHER THAN RESIST.

Many a time, we started Believing to the crowd and starts to take an action as per the crowd behavior. Though behavior of the crowd is harmful and dangerous to us.

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The fifth factor is ENVY. Envy comes into the picture when we are comparing ourselves with others. And envy works as a negative force which affects our decisions.

When we see that our investment is growing then we remain happy. But the time we start comparing our investment returns with investment returns of others then we become sad. Now, envy starts showing its color and we make decisions which we may not take or which may be harmful to the financial health.

It is very difficult to see the higher growth of other compared to our growth.

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The sixth factor is EGO. Ego gets satisfaction while we generated higher returns compared to others. And we are keeps on evaluating our return in the short term. While we should focus on the longer horizon returns rather than keeps on tracking returns in the short term and also try to get out of the trap of ego. Ego can be harmful to the financial health. We keep on demonstrates that how much we know much compared to others rather than focusing on how much we know and how much we do not know.

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The seventh factor is the CAPITULATION. It means investors give up towards the situations while economic and psychological pressure becomes irresistible.

Many a time, overpriced assets become more overpriced, and underpriced assets become more and cheaper. This scenario affects to the psychology of investors and repetitions of such situations inspired investors to give up towards the situations and make investment decisions without using logical reasoning.

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When few or all the factors combined then it affects to the investor’s decision making and that affects the market. This resulted in the mistakes and those can be expensive for our financial health.

Psychology in IPO is funny. When our friend is applying to IPO and we asked for the business then he doesn’t know about the business. But he is applying for getting good returns. And he continuously getting higher returns and such higher returns earned by our friend attracts us to make an investment into the IPO. And such situations keep on repeating & more people get involved into the IPOs.

IPOs

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Read for more detail: The Most Important Thing Illuminated by Howard Marks

SIMPLE IS BETTER – ISSUE -9 – OUR LIFE AND INVESTMENT – 3

Posted on July 26, 2017 by Jimit Zaveri under Simple is Better

We have seen profit and loss statement in issue 8. Now, in the current issue, I am going to discuss on the balance sheet. The balance sheet is another important financial statement which is essential for analyzing the financial strength of the person and of the company.

“A Balance Sheet is a statement of the financial position of a business which states the assets, liabilities, and owners’ equity at a particular point in time. In other words, the balance sheet illustrates your business’s net worth.” – The Balance

For Detail Issue, Click here —> SIMPLE IS BETTER – ISSUE -9 – OUR LIFE AND INVESTMENT – 3

BIBLIOPHILE: THE MOST IMPORTANT THING BY HOWARD MARKS “CONTROLLING RISK”

Posted on July 16, 2017 by Jimit Zaveri under BIBLIOPHILE: THE MOST IMPORTANT THING BY HOWARD MARKS

In the last article, we have talked about the identifying risk and recognizing risk. Now, in the current article, we discuss regarding controlling the risk. Generally, in the market, we put much emphasis on the higher absolute return instead of superior risk-adjusted return. But the great investors are those who focus on the risk and generate moderate returns with low risk or high return with moderate risk.

Generating higher returns with the higher risk for a long time is rare in the market. The risk of losing money arises when our investment meets adverse situations and Loss does not occur till the negative events occur. We should always focus on controlling the risk because we do not know that when the negative situation arises and we met losses.

When we bought the home, we check that the home is constructed in a way which can be protected by earthquake or not. The similarly, we should focus on our investment. We should focus on the situations where the occurrence of such negative situations can destroy our wealth. And work as an earthquake in our financial position.

It can be possible that an earthquake will never happen in life long, but we bought the home which can be protected with an earthquake. Similarly, it may be possible that adverse situations will not arise during our investment time, but we should focus on raising of adverse situations and how we can able to protect our wealth from such situations.

The risk is not always easily visible. If our surrounding environment is positive, then we start thinking that negative situation may not arise due to the influence of that positive environment. But in fact, the risk is always present in the good environment also. And anytime good environment can easily turn out to the bad environment. Such transformation does not come to us with the prior intimation. We must have to be ready properly with such considerations before making investment decisions. Even controlling risk is becoming essential into the good environment because nobody is talking about risk and in a bad environment, risk takes care of itself because everyone fearing of risk.

Generating superior return compared to benchmark with the similar risk nature is a good performance. But, a good value addition is while we generate a return which is like the benchmark return with the lowest risk and with proper controlling of the risk. Such scenario is even better.

When the environment is positive, everyone rides the wave and we cannot able to say which one is better. (Good article – Doubled your Money in Last 3 Years ? Skill or Luck ?)

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So that we should always focus on the controlling risk, whether it will rise or not. Because we cannot able to really predict the occurrence of the risk.

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Careful investors always know that they cannot able to know the future so that they try to focus on controlling risk and try to factor the risk of loss of capital while they make any investment decisions.

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We start avoiding focusing on risk as the environment is going positive. Initially, we might put weight on risk, but many times that risk might not get triggered. So that we start avoiding it and started believing that there is a no risk into the environment. Such risk will not occur and we saved from the negative situation.

As we have seen in Russian Roulette with 100 chances, we may save for 99 times, but the 1 time can kill us. Or if we are lucky we can be saved all the 100 times. It doesn’t mean that there is no risk or risk may not arise in the future.

Example – THE EVENTUAL CONSEQUENCES OF RISK SEEKING OR RISK BLIND BEHAVIOR

We constructed belief in our mind from our past experiences. If we have seen the positive environment, then we have made belief that negative situations never come. We should always keep in mind that occasionally extreme situations can arise and that can be out of our all belief.

In the year 2007, also welcome structured products, huge capital inflows, etc.

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We should not run from the risk but should manage risk intelligently. We should take the risk, but at the appropriate time and most importantly at an appropriate price.

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When we walk on a road with keeping our eyes closed and we do not meet an accident, then it’s not our talent, it’s a pure luck which plays out. We are a real blind if we consider such situation as our own skill. And such risky situations do not stay rewarding for a long period and we must walk on the road with keeping our eyes open.

Read for more detail: The Most Important Thing Illuminated by Howard Marks

BIBLIOPHILE: THE MOST IMPORTANT THING BY HOWARD MARKS “RECOGNIZING RISK”

Posted on June 25, 2017 by Jimit Zaveri under BIBLIOPHILE: THE MOST IMPORTANT THING BY HOWARD MARKS

We have seen the process for the identification of risk in the previous article of the same series. In the current issue, I am going to discuss regarding recognizing of the risk.

For the successful investing, we must have to focus on the generating return with having a proper control on risk. And for the controlling risk, we require to identifying and recognizing the risk.

The risk is always being at a much higher where we are too much optimistic towards the particular scenario and also paying a much higher price for the buying particular asset. But we should focus on When odds turn out against us than how we can able to protect ourselves or get out of such scenario with least damage. So, for the protecting ourselves, we need to avoid paying too high prices and also keep ourselves away from the extreme level of optimistic sentiment.

Click for Video — Auction scene

We always forget the real worth of the assets in the bull phase and start chasing that asset class. Such behavior is dangerous for the health of our wealth. This increases the risk while we are purchasing assets more than its worth.

The market always works in a pendulum and people generally forget the nature of the pendulum. The pendulum always moves towards the both extreme directions.

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Whenever pendulum moves towards the bullish extreme, many of us forget that such situations will not stay forever. Many of us forget about the risk which involves during the bull phase. And start taking higher risk for generating higher returns; which invites further huge amount of risk. At bullish sentiment, people generally buy assets at the highest valuations multiple and that invites the risk to the particular asset class. This scenario has a very high chance of getting damage to our wealth compared to generating a higher return.

Reverse to such scenario, whenever the pendulum moves towards extreme bearish phase, then generally people start recognizing the risk and start avoiding to invest in the particular asset class; which take out the risk from that particular asset class. Such scenario is the appropriate time for capturing the opportunities because in such scenario we have very less chance to lose.

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Many a time due to bullish sentiment, we think that the risk is very low, we start taking more risky situations, also start taking leverage and from that time risk starts taking its shape. Our behavior towards particular asset class invites risk.

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Risk will be only low if we as an investor behave in a careful and wise manner. We cannot eliminate the risk, but we can able to control its effect. We have to analyze risk in every scenario. Risk always has its presence, though we are having a bullish sentiment. And according to me, the risk is much higher while having a bullish sentiment.

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At the extreme bullish sentiment, we forget to worry, fear of loss and instead of it, we think about to miss the opportunity. We think that all others will earn the money and we remain without earning money. We start taking much leverage and believe that we are living in a low-risk world.

Click for Video — Bull phase in auction

We have seen in the above video that the person who doesn’t want to purchase a horse for the Rs.5 lakh; same person bought the horse for the Rs.5 lakh due to the influence of the increasing value of the bid for the horse. The person doesn’t want to lose the horse and cannot see others to take that horse.

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