Moving

Hi everyone,

Hope you are all doing well.

I'm moving to New York in a few days and have been really tied up with work and preparations for the move, which is why I have been unable to post for a while now.

Give me another 2-3 weeks to get everything sorted out and then will be back with some new material.

Thanks for your patience and do keep coming back!

Have a Wonderful 2007!

A happy new year to you! Hope 2007 brings you peace and prosperity and takes you several steps onward in your journey to wealth and financial freedom!

Addendum Squared!

Sorry about these repeated post-scripts, but I've just figured out how to use Google Groups to upload templates and other tools that you can use to jump-start / accelerate your journey to wealth.

Here's the link to an Excel template you can use to calculate your net worth. All data are fictitious, and intended to illustrate how the sheet can be used.

If you are not familiar with pivot tables (used in the template), please just create standard charts for your analysis. I'd appreciate it if you could send me across a copy so everyone can benefit from your efforts.

Thanks and hope you like this new feature. I'm going to use it as often as I can!

Please Vote!

By the way, I've set up a couple of polls where you can vote to give me a better idea of what you want to read and whether you use the info from this site for your personal investments.

Request you to take a few seconds to vote and help me improve on my efforts.

Thanks!

ET Article Link

Thanks to.. err... 'Anonymous' for sending me the link to the Economic Times article. Was looking for it all over!

Thanks to the Economic Times

Hi everyone,

I've just learnt that this blog has got a mention in the Economic Times as one of a rising number of blogs on finance, investing and the stock market. Can't find the article online but will post a link once it is put up on the net.

[I, of course, look like a chump for having been a no-show on this blog for the past ten months. Oh, well, that's the price of celebrity... the intense media glare, the paparazzi, the complete lack of privacy...]

Thanks to all you readers who've followed my writing for the past couple of years and returned every so often only to read the same old stuff because I've been too lazy to add anything new. Will try to buck up now!

To the newcomers, please feel free to browse the archives. There's some stuff you might find useful. And do drop in from time to time to catch up on new articles as well.

Thanks for coming by!

Help Me Fight 'Comment Spam'

I just spent 45 minutes deleting spam comments from various posts on the blog and am really PISSED! So far I'd kept the comments free for all, hoping that it would encourage all you guys to share your views with the minimum of fuss and bother.

Unfortunately, spam comments are outnumbering genuine ones by at least 5 to 1 and so I'm having to disallow anonymous comments. I hope all you guys out there will understand and take the time to create a blogger ID so you can continue to contribute to this blog. On my part, I hope this step reduces the spam to a more manageable level so I can devote more attention to writing.

Thanks for your support and do come back soon!

A New Beginning

It came as quite a shock when I found that my laptop was stolen. Not only did that have my office documents and a lot of personal information, it also contained a year's worth of research into shares and real estate investing. And while the former were backed up in the form of mails and soft copies, my investment research was gone forever. I'd have to start all over again.

Somehow, however, I feel that's not such a bad thing. Sure, I'd lost a lot of work but then there was also a fair amount of baggage there, wrong conclusions, poor assumptions etc. that I was willy-nilly carrying around. Perhaps these were even colouring my perceptions of the value of my investments. And then there were also some 'pet' stocks that I refused to give up on even though there were all indications that they were - or were about to become - lemons.

The value of research in not in documents and records. Research is best applied when it is internalized and over a year I'm sure I've learnt something. It will definitely not take a year to make up the lost ground and perhaps I'll gain some more insight in the process. Yes, there are worse things than losing a laptop.

Having said that, I think I'll blog everything just to be on the safe side!

These postings are mainly notes to myself and as such are not expert comments on investing. I'm no expert. However, I am a keen student with a strong desire to create wealth and achieve my financial goals at the earliest. As a result, this commentary is necessarily serious, practical and much of it would be applied on my own finances. That might make some of these notes interesting reading.

The research will focus on my home country - India - though the applications would perhaps be generic across markets. Being a private investor with no particular axe to grind, I would be touching upon all forms of investment that might intrigue me - stocks, bonds, art, real estate, business et al. There are many roads to wealth creation and this journey would probably take me through all - even the bad ones! It's only the beginning.

A final point - I would be grateful for comments from wiser fellow investors who may wish to save me from bankruptcy and point me in the right direction from time to time. Your experience and knowledge would greatly enrich (no pun intended!) the contents of this page and also add value way beyond my personal, fumbling efforts at prosperity.

So, who wants to be a millionaire?