As we go through the 2nd worst stock (I hope) market crisis of the century, I wanted to use this opportunity to log my buy/sell decisions and how I play this out, so that I can look back and reflect upon myself in an unbiased and objective manner.
2008 Crash
I started investing in October 2008, just a couple of months before the global financial crisis that unfolded in 2008. I still remember buying Tata Motors at 900+ and sold it at 130+. Good thing is that I had just started investing and my corpus was small. I don’t recollect meeting anyone that had not lost money in the markets that year. I resolved not to quit the markets and started reading investment books. Over the next 2 years, I read Graham, Buffet, Phil Fisher, Peter Lynch, etc., applying and practicing my learnings. By 2011, I was beginning to make a decent portfolio and the size of my portfolio was also not meagre any more. It was still less than 1/5th of my net worth, but significant enough. Few names that worked really well for me were Page Industries, HDFC Bank, Nestle, Godrej Consumer, Gruh Finance, Titan, TBZ, etc., Ever since I have been steadily increasing allocations to equities.
Early Feb 2020
While my portfolio underwent a lot of churns, some names really compounded well over the years. One stock that stood out was Page Industries which now amounted to ~25% of my portfolio, although it was never designed to be like that. I still believe I have many years left in my investing journey and decided to not reduce my holdings in page and instead increase the corpus by buying other names or adding to other stocks. Below is my portfolio as of early Feb 2020 in decreasing order of weight. This is just before the virus crisis hit the markets.
Stock | |
---|---|
1 | Page Industries |
2 | Ujjivan Finance |
3 | Canfin |
4 | Hester Biosciences |
5 | Repco |
6 | Granules |
7 | Tata Elxsi |
8 | Shilpa Medicare |
9 | Wonderla |
10 | Satin Credit |
11 | Equitas |
12 | Narayana |
13 | Ajanta |
14 | Advanced Enzymes |
15 | ITC |
16 | HDFC Life |
17 | Igarashi |
18 | KRBL |
19 | Dabur |
20 | Marico |
21 | Sinclairs |
22 | Motherson |
23 | IEX |
24 | IRCTC |
25 | Ujjivan SFB |
26 | Thyrocare |
Feb - March 2020
As the virus pandemic hit the world, even the most respected market participants did not imagine the intensity of fall that was in front of us and still ongoing. I too failed to recognize this. However, during late Feb and early March, I realized we were headed for a bear market and mentally got prepared to take a hit on my portfolio. I completely exited a few names and booked losses, some with a write off of close to 60%. I also added to existing performers and also bought into a couple of new names. I am looking at buying companies that are leaders in their space, have very little debt (not applicable to financials) and good governance track record.
Exited | Reduced | Increased Allocation | New Addition |
---|---|---|---|
Advanced Enzyme | KRBL | ITC | Info Edge |
Satin Credit | Marico | Bandhan Bank | |
Igarashi Motors | Thyrocare | ||
Motherson | IEX | ||
IRCTC | HDFC Life | ||
Ujjivan SFB | Repco | ||
Sinclairs |
Among the ones I have exited, I intend to reenter IRCTC and Ujjivan SFB at an opportune time. I don’t think these are bad businesses. Motherson has a huge execution challenge in front of them and industry tailwinds. Advanced Enzyme, Satin and Igarashi are mistakes and bad market timing.
I believe I was able to flush out most of the poison in my folio. I hold some amount of cash at the moment and aim to be a net buyer from now on. Only time will tell how the decisions of the last few months will turn out.
Current Portfolio with decreasing order of weight.
Stock | |
---|---|
1 | Page Industries |
2 | Canfin |
3 | Granules |
4 | Hester |
5 | Ujjivan Finance |
6 | Repco |
7 | Tata Elxsi |
8 | Shilpa Medicare |
9 | ITC |
10 | Ajanta Pharma |
11 | Wonderla |
12 | Narayana Hrudalaya |
13 | Marico |
14 | Equitas |
15 | Thyrocare |
16 | Dabur |
17 | HDFC Life |
18 | IEX |
19 | Info Edge |
20 | Sinclairs |
21 | KRBL |
22 | Bandhan |