In this edition of the reader audit, we meet a 34-year-old with a family of six. He describes his mistakes over the last ten years and lessons learned from them in a candid essay. We feel proud and blessed that readers come forward to generously share details about their financial life to help and inspire…
Continue reading →I started an Rs. 500 SIP in Sundaram Midcap Fund (then known as Sundaram Select Midcap) for an extended family member higher education in Aug 2009. Here are some lessons on investment risk and reward from the investment. Kindly note that I do not count this investment as part of my net worth and have…
Continue reading →This is a passive fund screener based on tracking error and return difference wrt benchmarks. The screener will help a user evaluate how efficiently an index fund has tracked its underlying benchmark. It will also help a understand how tracking a midcap index or the Nifty 100, 500 is quite different from tracking the Sensex…
Continue reading →The Sensex closed past 55,000 on Aug 13th for the first time, and usual trumpets from mutual fund guys blared, “stay invested! The stock market always moves up in the long term”. In this article, we present rolling SIP returns data for the Sensex (1979 to 2021) and the S&P 500 (1900 to 2021) to…
Continue reading →SBI Balanced Advantage Fund is an open-ended dynamic asset allocation fund benchmarked to the CRISIL Hybrid 50+50 – Moderate Index TRI. In this review, we discuss what investors need to know before considering an investment in this NFO. A balanced advantage fund is one that dynamically changes its asset allocation as per market conditions. There…
Continue reading →In this edition of the reader audit, we consider the financial journey of a 31-year-old software engineer (who prefers anonymity). This is how he moved from bank deposits to goal-based investing with mutual funds. We feel proud and blessed that readers come forward to generously share details about their financial life to help and inspire…
Continue reading →In this article, let us discuss a question received from a reader: My financial goal is my child’s higher education. I’ve 6 yrs for that. What should be my investment strategy? Let us assume that the reader has practically nothing saved up for this goal and that she has little experience investing in market-related products (mutual…
Continue reading →I often get emails from readers who wish to achieve financial independence as soon as possible and retire early from their salaried jobs. The first question I ask is, “why do you seek early retirement?” Some people offer a crisp, clear response: “I have always wanted to pursue my passion in the fine arts; I…
Continue reading →A reader asks, “Had watched many of your videos on asset allocation. I have a question in mind for which maybe I don’t have proper data to back it up. Example: In my case, let’s says I started investing at the age of 26-27and. I have saved enough money for short term goals.” “All my…
Continue reading →This is my monthly retirement stock portfolio analysis compared with an equivalent investment in a Nifty index fund and the Nifty 100 Low Volatility 30 TR index. Before we begin, investors need to appreciate the context of these investments. I started direct equity investing only after achieving a comfortable level of financial independence and ensuring…
Continue reading →The freefincal Equity Mutual Fund Performance Screener (August 2021) is now available. Use it to screen for consistently performing equity mutual funds. You can screen based on fund category & benchmark and spot mutual funds that have a higher return than a benchmark at a lower risk. Inside, you get discounted links to our two…
Continue reading →Nippon India Multi-Asset Fund is an open-ended scheme investing in Equity (including international equity), Debt and Exchange Traded Commodity Derivatives and Gold ETF. In this review, suggested by Basudeb Roy, we consider if it makes sense to use this fund as the core component of a portfolio. The fund was started in Aug 2020, so…
Continue reading →In this edition of the reader audit, we consider the financial journey of a 34-year-old male (who prefers anonymity) working in the private sector. This is how he moved from negative net worth to goal-based investing. We feel proud and blessed that readers come forward to generously share details about their financial life to help…
Continue reading →In this article, I list the lessons I have learnt from following digital marketers. Since many of these lessons are about “how not to do things like them”, no marketer would be mentioned by name. Freefincal readers assume I spend a lot of time reading about investing and personal finance news or related books. The…
Continue reading →HDFC NIFTY50 Equal Weight Index Fund is an open-ended scheme tracking the Nifty 50 Equal-Weight TR Index. In this review, we analyse the performance of the underlying index by comparing it with NIfty 50 and Nifty Next 50 total return indices. What is an equal-weighted index? The NIfty, Sensex, Nifty 100, Nifty 500 are examples…
Continue reading →