Hansi has more than 25 years experience in financial services, especially in mutual fund research.
Don’t put all your eggs in one basket. We’ve heard this proverb. It’s the simple principle behind the fancy jargon called asset allocation. It’s the best thing you can do for building your wealth over time but consistently and mindfully. What is asset allocation? Simply put, it’s how your wealth or assets are split between
People think economics and finance are about numbers but remember I said finance is not a hard science like physics but a social science …so actually about people. People make up the markets that we hear about…people like you and me called retail investors but also the professional fund managers called institutional investors. And we
In the post on risk, we talked about how investment risks…what’s inherent in the investments we make. They were external risks. Now let’s talk about internal risks…what’s inherent in us. How we react to those external risks, how we view the world, how we view money. What’s a risk profile? When you go to any
When we leave the house, we usually want to go somewhere, whether it’s a place of work, or education, or shopping, or worship, or recreation…. Only then can you decide what route to take, what method of transport to take, even how to get dressed. So it’s important to know where you are going, right?
As we have seen in the previous post, personal finance is basically managing how we spend, protect and grow our money. The process of planning personal finance is financial planning. The principles are simple. But that doesn’t mean it’s easy. It’s like managing our health – we know we need to eat well and exercise.
As I launch another financial education series, I want to share why I do what I do. I have been working on financial education for decades. It all started during the dot com boom I first started working on investor education in 1999 as a twenty-something year old working at an influential investment research firm
So you want to start investing and don’t know where to start? This post will outline key concepts and then provide links to actually start investing…check this post regularly over the next few weeks What is investing? We have provided a high level outline with links to 18 one-minute videos in this post …please watch
People don’t talk about money; women even less so. Strangely, money is still one of the taboo topics in Indian society, along with sex even as politics and religious discussions have become a norm in living rooms. I asked my girlfriends about why they think this is – they simply shrugged and said something along
The ‘Architect Blueprint’ suggests you know your own capabilities, and also the ‘lay of the land’ meaning the environment. To that end, I have created a series of videos that explain basic terms in black & white, using a whiteboard. These videos are only one minute each, so you can watch them all in one
Women constantly tell me they find investing boring and complicated. They tell me they wouldn’t like to lose their hard-earned money in what appears to be a casino – the sharemarket. They tell me they don’t want to spend their precious time looking at financial investments. Here’s the thing. All these statements show women have
Before you start on a journey, you need to know the destination. At least the general direction. Similarly, the first step (ok, maybe after understanding your relationship with money as http://www.themoneyhans.com/plan/ When planning your holiday, you may look at pictures of possible destinations. When planning your home renovation, you may put together a mood or
In this teaser for the web-series I made last year, the all-knowing finance professional Mr Sikka says ‘Finance is when savers invest in the real economy…hedge their risks through various financial instruments…and understanding your risk profile by coming up with optimum asset allocation.’ What??!! Sikka is not wrong. But because he, like other finance professionals,
It’s an economic forum for women. The hotel venue is swarming with women. You’d think they would be keen to discuss money given the economic theme. But they don’t turn up to the session. There could be many reasons, but it made me think about the topic generally, as I’ve been told repeatedly that women
I had just finished a graduate diploma in applied finance and investments. With distinctions in a few subjects. I was feeling confident too. I had just got the job as an analyst by writing to the CEOs of leading research houses and investment consulting firms. Ok, perhaps, bordering on over-confident. I was 23. When I
The Guardian has one. The New York Times has one. Sydney Morning Herald has one too. The Times Of India has one too. Most newspapers have a personal finance column. Obviously money is a popular topic. I must have read thousands of personal finance columns. I started writing one here about a year and half
Good journalists do a great job of synthesizing different points of view into one coherent article, simplifying it for the reader in the process. Good articles quote experts, presenting a balanced view of different opinions. Ideally, the ideas should be more important than the authors. However, when it comes to investment or financial planning advice,
You must have heard the saying, “Don’t put all your eggs in one basket.” But the richest investor in the world, Warren Buffett, says, “Put all your eggs in one basket and watch the basket very carefully.” Wonder why? Look at anyone who’s really rich – Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg, Steve Jobs, etc. How did
When people hear the leader of a country comment on how a credit rating agency should rate its debt, they realise credit ratings are important. When they read about the role of credit ratings in the global financial crisis, they get angry about the finance industry being responsible for their misery, but figure they must
Just when there are studies that show that money doesn’t lead to happiness, how can I claim that having a stash of emergency money will make you happier? Actually, the studies refer to money above a certain level. Everyone needs some money to cover basic physical needs (like food, home, clothing) and security needs (like
