My Personal Finance Influencers

Published: June 19, 2014 at 11:30 am

Last Updated on August 30, 2021 at 3:44 pm

A list of people, who through their work and sayings, have had a lasting influence on my life.

 Manish Chauhan

Not the Manish of ‘team’ Jagoinvestor.com that you see today, but the Manish of yore, when Jagoinvestor was a fledgling.  When articles were written for DIY investors.

I learnt about asset allocation, rebalancing, how to make retirement calculators and much, much more from there.

It is unfortunate that articles like these are unlikely to be written there anymore.


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I think Manish is one of the very few individuals genuinely interested in financial literacy.

Example: He shared the list of fee-only financial planners in India on Facebook, though he was not listed in it.

His best quality is his ability to take criticism on the chin. In my opinion, Jagoinvestor is what it is today, primarily because of this attribute.

P V Subramanyam

I have neither the patience, nor the intelligence to understand his sarcasm.  Much of what he writes, I ignore.  Occasionally he says something that is mathematically precise and easy for me to understand.

He taught me the importance of standard deviation, reversion to mean, importance of not maxing PPF at an young age and to be wary of the NPS.

He once wrote a comment at Jagoinvestor criticising DIY investors for not understanding anything about post-retirement investment strategies like laddered annuities and few others I forget now.

That one comment had a lasting influence on me. All the post-retirement calculators that are here today originate from that one comment.

Today he is my biggest promoter (many of my readers originate from his blog) and my fiercest critic (each time he does not agree with my posts I get a call or a message. Safe to say, it would be forthright, followed by several ideas for calculators!)

Many of the calculators here originate from him.

Mar. 13th 2013 is an unforgettable day in my life. I received the biopsy report on a tumour in my thymus gland which was removed. A visit to the oncologist confirmed that the tumour was benign and nothing further need be done. When I came back home, this post by Subra was in my inbox: The calculator king is here!

I am indebted to him for his generosity.

M V Satyanarayana

He was my teacher and is now a colleague. We were talking about why some middle-aged scientists were unhappy and frustrated. His response made me think about my financial life holistically.

He said, these people realise that their income is not going to increase beyond a certain level in life and that they will never be able to buy the house they want, or live the lifestyle they want. Hence the frustration.

That very day, I started an excel sheet in which I projected my income until retirement and found out if I could invest enough for all my long-term goals. I maintain that sheet to this day

Jim Otar

Jim Otar is an engineer turned financial planner. He runs an advisory site, retirementoptimizer.com and is the author of the book, ‘Unveiling the retirement myth’.

His writings – the book and other articles in his site –taught me how to understand market volatility during the accumulation and distribution (post-retirement) phases in life. He believes in ‘preparing for the worst’, something I too believe in.

Ashal Jauhari

Needs no introduction to most readers. I first interacted with him, when I asked in the Jagoinvestor forum, ‘when to quit a good performing mutual fund?’. You can estimate how much I knew about mutual funds at that time!

He has a unique way of explaining complicated stuff to newbie’s and is an expert on taxation .. among other things!

Likes to state that his answers are non-mathematical in nature, but in reality, they are clinically precise!

Has enormous patience and resilience while handling questions. Something I admire, but can never imitate.

My pet peeve about him: Is too diplomatic with everyone. Especially with those from financial services!

Read his interview: Interview with Ashal Jauhari: Relentless Financial Awareness Activist

Runs an extraordinary facebook group, Asan Ideas for Wealth.  A very good reason to get on Facebook, if you are not on it!

Ramesh Mangal

Interacted with him first on the Jagoinvestor forum. I can’t exactly place the first time we interacted which is a pity. I can however guarantee that it would have been a comment in which he would have either been critical of me or someone else!

He has extraordinary analytical abilities and has an excellent understanding of long term investing, mutual funds and portfolio management. The post on Ulcer Index analysis originates from one of his emails.

Loves anonymity, can be quite forthright, and hates to suffer fools gladly.

He can punch deep holes in your theory and make you think like no other.

Itching to post more relevant links about him here but will limit myself to these:

Thank you everyone.  “What I owe you is beyond evaluation” – Lawrence of Arabia (1962)

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Pattabiraman editor freefincalDr. M. Pattabiraman(PhD) is the founder, managing editor and primary author of freefincal. He is an associate professor at the Indian Institute of Technology, Madras. He has over ten years of experience publishing news analysis, research and financial product development. Connect with him via Twitter, Linkedin, or YouTube. Pattabiraman has co-authored three print books: (1) You can be rich too with goal-based investing (CNBC TV18) for DIY investors. (2) Gamechanger for young earners. (3) Chinchu Gets a Superpower! for kids. He has also written seven other free e-books on various money management topics. He is a patron and co-founder of “Fee-only India,” an organisation promoting unbiased, commission-free investment advice.
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