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#17

I have to disagree with this statement because in most case I think it’s crazy to put 100% in any one investment (even cash), no matter what it is. It is puzzling to me that you can have 100-150 stocks and then but 23% into a single one.

Well, think carefully about what you wrote.

a) those in the US with 100% cash have not done too badly especially in this low inflation environment for a at least 2 decades now. In general, it never happens. Such individuals usually have mortgages that gives them sizable leverage.

b) There are many firms where a 100% investment will not be devastating: BRK, COST, HDB, PEP etc. Each of these firms are actually so diversified effectively that they constitute a proxy to the national or international economy.

c) Jim Mueller (TMFTortoise)- one of the most astute investors and analysts has, I think, > 30% in NFLX and he does not recommend anyone else doing that. I can keep going on this way. And these are all very successful investors with long track records. And I say this despite being the one who has had 250+ stocks in his portfolio for 5+ years now. I rarely sell. Just collect the best in class firms from TMF world.

Anurag

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#18

It is puzzling to me that you can have 100-150 stocks and then but 23% into a single one.

I agree with you on this, Chris. It would not be the way I would choose to run my own portfolio. However I recall hearing that Peter Lynch used to have hundreds of stocks in his Fidelity Magellan fund, but there were only a handful that did the heavy lifting. So he might have 10% in Walmart, and then tiny fractions of a percent in numerous other issues.

Obviously he had a staff. That would be much more difficult for the individual investor.

Jeb

#19

Well, think carefully about what you wrote.

I think about risk carefully all the time.

a) those in the US with 100% cash have not done too badly especially in this low inflation environment for a at least 2 decades now. In general, it never happens. Such individuals usually have mortgages that gives them sizable leverage.

I wasn’t talking about what happened but about exposure to what might happen. There have been times (example: Germany during the 1920s) where holding all cash would have wiped you out.

b) There are many firms where a 100% investment will not be devastating: BRK, COST, HDB, PEP etc. Each of these firms are actually so diversified effectively that they constitute a proxy to the national or international economy.

Maybe, but as you said yourself one does not know what the future holds. BRK is a collection of many companies but for the others you don’t know what will happen. Everyone has heard of Enron, Worldcom, Lehman Brothers, and many other 100% losses. It can happen so why risk it by putting all your eggs in one basket.

Anurag, I don’t really think you would advise someone to put 100% in one company so why would you say it’s ok to put 100% in HDB? There are people on here would have considered going all-in on a single investment (sweet adeline did this recently). Why encourage them?

Chris

#20

Well, think carefully about what you wrote.

I think about risk carefully all the time.

a) those in the US with 100% cash have not done too badly especially in this low inflation environment for a at least 2 decades now. In general, it never happens. Such individuals usually have mortgages that gives them sizable leverage.

I wasn’t talking about what happened but about exposure to what might happen. There have been times (example: Germany during the 1920s) where holding all cash would have wiped you out.

b) There are many firms where a 100% investment will not be devastating: BRK, COST, HDB, PEP etc. Each of these firms are actually so diversified effectively that they constitute a proxy to the national or international economy.

Maybe, but as you said yourself one does not know what the future holds. BRK is a collection of many companies but for the others you don’t know what will happen. Everyone has heard of Enron, Worldcom, Lehman Brothers, and many other 100% losses. It can happen so why risk it by putting all your eggs in one basket.

Anurag, I don’t really think you would advise someone to put 100% in one company so why would you say it’s ok to put 100% in HDB? There are people on here would have considered going all-in on a single investment (sweet adeline did this recently). Why encourage them?

Chris

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#21

There have been times (example: Germany during the 1920s) where holding all cash would have wiped you out.

And in 1929 in the US, the equities would have wiped one out. The 10 sigma risk spares no one under any circumstance. One can only think in terms of fragility to events and not probability of the risk (Learnt from Taleb). One does not have to be blind to circumstances. If the inflation is high, moving into inflation protected bonds or very safe blue chips would help. If inflation is low, then cash can’t hurt. With sudden events, no one is really safe.

If BRK or COST crash as businesses then almost entire US market will tank.

BRK is a collection of many companies but for the others you don’t know what will happen.

Not really. COST represents the entire US consumer market across 100s of industries. The management culture they have is eclectic and the kind that is CEO independent. As best as they come indeed. PEP is present in 100+ countries and has 100+ products in food and beverages. It is a proxy to global consumer spending. HDB funds every segment of Indian economy and the eclectic CEO independent management they have ensures that Bank performs superbly at all times. There is a reason why HDB has always been more than 3x expensive on P/B as compared to almost any bank out there. The supremely low risk is that reason. It is the same reason why COST trades way more expensive than WMT despite WMT having much better business operations for decades. Check for yourself what happened during 2008 crash. COST was among those firms that crashed relatively less. It was one of those rare islands of safety where everyone withdrew. So there are firms like those around.

Anurag, I don’t really think you would advise someone to put 100% in one company so why would you say it’s ok to put 100% in HDB? There are people on here would have considered going all-in on a single investment (sweet adeline did this recently). Why encourage them?

If it is firms like the ones I mentioned, then I really have no objection. Those folks only need time diversification or dollar cost averaging across multiple years to reduce risk.

Everyone has heard of Enron, Worldcom, Lehman Brothers, and many other 100% losses.

Very few firms are like those and you would be well served in reviewing the above failures. None of these firms had great management or business transparency and both of these are needed for any investment to be worth long term. There are better examples though. For example, Kodak or General Motors. These firms were great at various points of time but not very diversified. But since the business was largely transparent they gave investors decades to exit safely as they witnesses slow but persistent declines over decades. For any firm, one has to watch out periodically for any sustained changes in the business and that is true even for the firms I listed.

Of course, if one does not have time or inclination to study or understand anything at any level high repute low cost mutual funds or broad market index or target retirement funds are always reasonable options. But for those who can study deep and hard, barely a handful investments can do pretty well.

Anurag

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#22

This particular thread makes me feel that you are not making conscious decisions yourself, but are using Groupthink cloud your judgment on making buy and sell decisions.

Vish, you are portraying “GroupThink” as a bad thing, but it actually is a good thing to some extent. It means getting ideas from others and using this information after making your own decisions. Groupthink is every single MF recommendation. It’s an idea you get. YOU decide whether or not to act on it. Every single stock in my portfolio I got from somewhere else. Several from anirban in fact. I even got AMAVF originally from an article on Seeking Alpha a couple of years ago. I added to my INBK after listening to anirban. I sell things after getting information from various sources that makes me feel that my original decision is no longer valid. EVERY single stock I’ve ever owned (except perhaps Apple), I learned about from some recommendation somewhere, From Groupthink. I then evaluated and decided if I was interested in it. And if I was, and only if I MYSELF was, I bought it.

I don’t jump in and out of stocks. For instance, I’m well into my third year in BOFI, my biggest position and over 15% of my portfolio now, and starting my third year in CELG. my third biggest and 13%. I’m finishing my second year in Synaptics. I’m in my third year in Wabtec. This isn’t the pattern of someone who jumps in and out. I buy a stock to hold forever. If the thesis changes though I’m willing to reevaluate my position. I don’t feel that just because I once decided to buy it (under different circumstances) I’m required to stay with a mistake forever. I hope that I helped a lot of people to get out of WPRT for instance, and save whatever cash they had left. It was at $32. It closed yesterday at $2.31. The defenders said just what you say, essentially that you shouldn’t change your decision once you’ve made it.

There are some companies that are less successful, and will continue to be less successful, than others. I’m always glad to learn more about my stocks from other people (and don’t think of it as Groupthink).

Saul

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#23

From my perspective as a beginner who’s trying to figure it out, it makes the most sense to me to have 4-6 winning, high conviction stocks at most (ok maybe 8 at the most but even that small number seems difficult for me to follow full time)that are followed religiously as opposed to 50 positions with some winners and some risky picks that have the potential to break out.

With so many positions spread out it seems impossible to be right on most of them and the losers ball and chain the portfolio earnings.

And the winning, high conviction stocks I follow at the first sign of the story changing or bad news I will sell out and take the profit while continuing to monitor, fortunately I haven’t had to do that yet.

Going all in on SWKS a month ago was probably very dumb on my part and I should trim the position back regardless of them being the winningest of winners right now.

Sweetadeline

#24

Hi Adeline, You seem to be making good calls right now, but as you get a larger amount of capital, you’ll realize, “Whoa, I don’t want to risk all this on one stock!” But it sounds like you are having a lot of fun now!

Good luck!

Saul

2 Likes
#25

I don’t jump in and out of stocks. For instance, I’m well into my third year in BOFI, my biggest position and over 15% of my portfolio now, and starting my third year in CELG. my third biggest and 13%. I’m finishing my second year in Synaptics.

Saul,

I wasnt suggesting you jump in and out of stocks, but you sell more quickly than others. You have a really good process and it works really well for you.

I dont think Groupthink is such a bad thing if you understand what you are investing in and believe in the investment. However, asking you what a good investment is right now and then blindly ploughing money in there is definitely not a good groupthink.

When TMF recommends stocks and people buy, it is also groupthink. However when you read the rec, if you understand the market and then invest, your results will be much better.

I do understand that you generate ideas from fellow Fools and then invest, however let me ask you one thing. The stocks that you have held for longer in your portfolio, are they your own picks or were they also recommendations via other Fools. Also have you ever thought why you sell out sooner on some of the stocks, why do you do that sooner than others and how have these stocks performed after you sell. You made a comment earlier that you only need to worry about stocks you own, not ones you dont. So I believe you havent looked back, but maybe you should.

The reason I say that is, if you (i am thinking about myself here) invest purely because others have said so, I have tended to sell a lot sooner than I would like. In other cases, where I truly believe in the story, I have kept those much longer and have had really good results.

As you can see from my portfolio composition, HDB is disproportionately long. That is my longest held stock. At least 13 years so far. I like LTBH because David Gardner has made his fortune by holding stocks like AMZN, SBUX, NFLX, AAPL etc. for a very long period. That is in my mind the only way to build sustainable wealth. At least that is how I look at it.

I should not be saying these things to you, who in my mind is an extremely successful investor and has done really well over the long run.

I just wanted to shed some light on my thinking.

Vish

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#26

An off-topic diversion…

And in 1929 in the US, [holding all] equities would have wiped one out.

That got me wondering… was it that bad? Or stated another way, if an investor then was not using any leverage, was diversified in equities, and did not sell, what would they have had left at the bottom of the slide? I went looking for a simple answer. Most sources only mentioned the Dow index, but I eventually found something referencing the “S&P Composite”*, which I hope had a broader base than the Dow. That showed the loss was about -54%.

Of course that falls far short of the full picture of the crash, in particular because it does not show the impact of investing on margin, which so many were doing at that time. It was margin that magnified the fall, wiping so many people out. But those following conservative (no debt, diversified) investing rules but concentrated in equities, and who just held on, could have at the bottom still had about 45% of what they started with. Terrible, but not exactly wiped out.

(All of which is quite irrelevant and off-topic to the subject at hand, if only because the current topic concerns the viability of a single company while my example is of an index.)

*(http://www.ritholtz.com/blog/2011/08/swing-charts-of-sp-1929…)

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#27

This particular thread makes me feel that you are not making conscious decisions yourself, but are using Groupthink cloud your judgment on making buy and sell decisions.
Vish - I’m not sure why you are directing this at Anirban (who I am sure can answer for himself not that he should have to); but I honestly can’t think of anyone on this board besides possibly Saul and Denny who invests as much in research and independent thought as Anirban. Whilst Groupthink if you are contrarian may seem risky, Anirban is one of the last people on this board you should even think about addressing this to.
Ant

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#28

I dont think Groupthink is such a bad thing if you understand what you are investing in and believe in the investment.

And, it depends a lot on the group. If one just follows the market news and that is the group, then is necessarily going to be behind the curve. If one has a group like this, then the quality of information and the timeliness of that information is likely to prove more useful … especially since there are few issues where this group has a simple consensus, so one is constantly being reminded of the other side.

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#29

That got me wondering… was it that bad?

Yep. In the great depression, 90% of the stock value was lost by 1932 when market bottomed. Banks collapsed without FDIC protection and countless lost all their cash as well - invested or not. Any individual stocks investors might have faced 100% loss with large number of bankruptcies among publicly traded firms. That coupled with massive unemployment and deflation was nasty for sure. That was also an era of no social security or medicare. So unless one had cash in earthen pot, they most likely suffered real bad.

Events like that spare few.

Anurag

#30

Whilst Groupthink if you are contrarian may seem risky, Anirban is one of the last people on this board you should even think about addressing this to.

Why dont you let Anirban make that call? You dont know what exchanges me and Anirban have on these boards.

Vish

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#31

You seem to be making good calls right now, but as you get a larger amount of capital, you’ll realize, “Whoa, I don’t want to risk all this on one stock!” But it sounds like you are having a lot of fun now!

Hey, thanks for the reply Saul, I appreciate it.

The more assets you have the more you have to lose and I think that’s both a blessing and a curse, but mainly a blessing :slight_smile: All of the people here are more savvy investors with a wealth more experience and capital than I have (my portfolio is a shade under 52k), but being reckless by others standards (I knew SWKS was a winner and had zero apprehension the stock would depreciate when I bought them, otherwise I would not have been so bold) allows me to tread where most won’t go and I feel like that gives me a tangible advantage.

Sweetadeline

#32

Folks,

No need to defend me against Vish and Anurag. These are guys will poke holes but they always mean well and their intention is to help people out. Vish has always been very helpful to me, and I really value his feedback. I might not always agree with him.

This board is starting to attract some of my favourite Fools. I know John S comes out here but we need to get him to post as well.

Cheers,

Anirban

#33

Vish, I actually think that a bunch of interested, and more or less bright and informed, people discussing stocks is what this board is all about. It has often influenced me to look at a new stock to decide whether or not to buy it, and has sometimes made me look at a current investment to decide if I want to continue my investment in it. It’s very different from what you may have in mind when you refer to groupthink, where a bunch of people are pumping a stock or shorting it. We really try discussing and analyzing stocks and philosophies of investing fairly deeply here, and it’s an asset to all of us.

Saul

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#34

Saul,

That makes sense. However my response was to a post where I did not see a deep analysis of why Anirban should sell some of his stocks. Groupthink if followed by intelligent analysis is not a way to just buy or sell stocks blatantly.

So I concur with you here. I typically do not post intelligent analysis, so maybe I do not belong here, but I do post my thoughts on what I believe in. Whether that is right or wrong I am not the one to judge that. I have done well over the past decade and have learnt a lot over those years. Hence I try to help.

Vish
Just my 2c.

1 Like
#35

Sounds good.
Saul

#36

However my response was to a post where I did not see a deep analysis of why Anirban should sell some of his stocks.

Hi Vish,

I wouldn’t classify the decision to sell as group think. I agree, Saul’s comments did play a role, in particular his point that if one did the research and is unhappy with the position, then there’s no reason to really hold it. Saul’s comments were based on my writeup, where I raised concerns regarding some of my holdings. If you look at the initial review post, some positions have a “-” sign against them indicating deep concern (the reasons are there as well) and a few had a “±” against them indicating ambivalence or unclear thesis.

So, if you think of it, I took action based on my own reading of the positions. With respect to TCS, I have been on top of it following earnings etc, so I had lots of reasons to be worried about it. With respect to INVN, I have been following that company for a while, and I think I have pretty solid understanding about them.

As I said for CLNE & MTH, I did a stock replacement strategy. This reduced my capital exposure to these positions. MTH I know pretty well as well, as it has been a covered call play for me for around 2 years.

I actually feel very good about the final outcome. I think the posts from more experienced portfolio managers have been very beneficial.

I call this my “crowd sourced” approach to investing. I assimilate all the information that comes my way. Over time, I have picked up bits and pieces that I think work for me. But, I always take my own decisions. I use to buy a stock just because it was recommended. Now, I don’t do that. At the very least, I read the recommendation, check out the 10-K, and check out the earnings releases before investing. I make the final call, be it a scrip I hear about on this board or from the TMF subscriptions.

Anirban

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