This post is a response to a question posed to me by a PhD student: Everyone seems to be predicting that price of Bitcoin will increase by a lot in the coming years and it will become popular. So should I buy some (accumulate) now? To answer this, let us discuss the economics surrounding bitcoins…
Continue reading →There are times in life when you require money for a need in stages. The most common example is monthly income. Those who do not have much money to play with, cannot take risks and must rely on interest income which is always taxable as per slab. On the other hand, those who have some…
Continue reading →Readers may be aware that last month I had introduced a handpicked list of mutual funds and called in PlumbLine to accompany the freefincal robo advisory template. I was all set to write this months post, when SEBI announced its mutual fund classification rules, to be implemented by year-end. So I wanted to wait until…
Continue reading →When I announced the launch of Fee-only India, a coming together of SEBI registered fee-only financial planners to help clients and each other, Alok Singh, made this interesting suggestion: “It’s a good initiative to bring fee-only FPs under one roof. Would it possible to come up with a post describing as to what factor/points one…
Continue reading →In this post, I discuss how to calculate the annualized return from a stock investment after accounting for corporate actions like dividends, stock splits, bonuses, buybacks and rights issues. I have made a calculator that will compute the annualized return (CAGR for single investments, IRR for periodic investments and XIRR or investments on random dates)…
Continue reading →Yesterday, SEBI announced its new “Categorization and Rationalization of Mutual Fund Schemes”. In this post, I discuss the positive and negative aspects of this move. As with any change, it is a mixed bag, especially for existing investors. SEBI has made it clear that only one scheme per category will be allowed and that AMCs…
Continue reading →Here is a step-by-step guide for planning your child’s education and marriage. 1. When to start planning. The moment the pregnancy is confirmed! 2. What do to first? Evaluate your insurance cover and buy more if required. 3. How to evaluate insurance cover? Let us consider a couple with a two-year-old child. The male is…
Continue reading →What is the objective behind creating a financial plan? Who is it meant for? Do young earners or DIY investors need the services of a fee-only financial planner to create a professional plan? In this guest post, Vikram Krishnamoorthy, SEBI registered fee-only financial planner tackles these questions and discusses the real purpose of creating a financial plan…
Continue reading →You would be surprised as to how many people ask, Why not invest in multiple mutual funds to “average” out returns? and how often such an advice is provided in the media and in real life too! This post is in response to a question from S.B.Raajesh Kannan as it gives me a chance to cough up some portfolio…
Continue reading →Lump sum vs SIP investing: Which is “better”? You might have heard this question often in personal finance forums. Perhaps you have thought about this yourself. In this post, let us trace the month-by-month return from a SIP investment and a lump sum investment started on the same date. What is the point of this…
Continue reading →I received this interesting question from R Siva Prasad: “Sir, While selecting/screening a mutual fund, you advise to compare it with benchmarks. But I want to compare with Mutual Funds in the same category. As long as my fund is on top in the category why do I have to think about the benchmark? And if a…
Continue reading →Yesterday (Sep 24th) saw the birth of Fee-only India, a coming-together of SEBI registered fee-only financial planners at Mumbai. Ashal Juahari, admin of Facebook group Asan Ideas of wealth and I spent the day listening to and discussing with the fee-only financial planners from my list. An organisation of financial planners who do not sell any…
Continue reading →When we wish to choose a mutual fund, it is reasonable to expect it to have beat a benchmark (either the one chosen by the fund house or one representative of its category) consistently – say 8 times out of 10. Can we also impost an additional constraint? Expect the fund to fall lesser than…
Continue reading →There are many who believe that cashless hospitalization facility available with medical insurance policies can be misused by hospitals and that it is better to pay cash and the reimburse it via the policy later. A discussion on should I use cashless hospitalization facility or pay and then reimburse? What does misuse mean? Attempting to exhaust the…
Continue reading →Suppose you wish to “put” some money in cryptocurrency (or cryptocoins), say Bitcoin, altcoin, litecoin, fartcoin etc. would you trade or would you invest? It is obvious that due to poor liquidity, the crypto market is volatile. So instinct would tell us caution is necessary. So trading (frequent buying and selling) with regular profit booking seems…
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