Dr M Pattabiraman (PhD) aka Pattabiraman Murari is the founder, managing editor and primary author of freefincal. He is an associate professor at IIT, Madras and the author of three personal finance books with over ten years of experience publishing news, analysis, research, and financial product development. Passionate about teaching, he was awarded the “Young Faculty Recognition Award” by IIT Madras in 2012.
Expertise and Experience
Dr. Pattabiraman’s expertise includes mutual fund analysis, investment risk, retirement planning, stock valuation and personal finance.
Popularly known as “Pattu”, Dr M. Pattabiraman has written three books:
- You can be rich too with goal-based investing (CNBC TV18)
- Gamechanger: Forget Start-ups, Join Corporate and Still Live the Rich Life you want
- Chichu Gets a Superpower!
- and seven other free e-books on various topics of money management.
He has been profiled in the Economic Times: Meet Pattabiraman, the man who helps many plan a better retirement through his calculators

His journey to financial independence has been featured on LiveMint: Light the FIRE and lose the fear of getting fired. And Can your FIRE dreams get past the COVID-19 impact?
The freefincal YouTube channel has more than 1000 videos on personal finance and DIY investing. Regular viewers are accustomed to Pattu’s opening lines and callsign, “Hi, I am pattu from freefincal”!
He is also a contributor to The Economic Times
- Why investing is not only about equity
- Mutual fund advisers earning commissions from AMCs may not give you the best advice
- DIY investing is not everybody’s cup of tea
He is a patron and co-founder of “Fee-only India” an organisation that promotes unbiased, commission-free investment advice.
Pattabiraman specialises in financial goal-based portfolio management where the investment risk is gauged based on need alone regardless of market movements. This has resulted in a unique open-source robo advisory template and a hand-picked set of mutual funds called plumbline
His analytical tools and research on mutual fund investing, stock selection, pre-retirement planning, post-retirement risk management and other aspects of portfolio management are published regularly at freefincal since May 2012. The site serves more than a million readers per year (2.5 million page views).
He conducts free money management sessions for corporates and associations(see details below). Previous engagements include World Bank, RBI, BHEL, Asian Paints, TamilNadu Investors Association etc. He follows strict journalistic integrity as defined by the organisation’s Policies and Standards.
Watch his talks
Talk given to World Bank Employees in Feb 2019: Common sense approach to managing money.
Index investing options in India: a talk given to members of the Tamil Nadu Investors Association
(4) Re-assemble is a free step by step guide to help you manage money

Download Re-assemble: Step by step money management basics for beginners
Related Links
- Pattabiraman listed on the Indian Research Information Network System
- IIT Madras faculty listing, dept of Physics listing
- IIT Madras Publications page
- Reddit AMA conducted by M. Pattabiraman
- Google Scholar Page
- Google Knowledge Panel link
- Amazon Author Page
- Amazon India Author Page
- ORCID Page
- Scopus Profile
- Mendeley Profile
Contact
- Follow Pattabiraman on Twitter
- Follow Pattabiraman on Facebook
- Connect with him on Linkedin
- Contact information: pattu {at} freefincal {dot} com (sponsored posts or paid collaborations will not be entertained)