<p>My father was so scared of losing his meagre savings through banks collapsing that he divided the amount equally among five nationalised banks. I inherited his genes of financial conservatism.<br /><br />Early in my career I was invited to a lot of soirees at five star hotels. I was quite a misfit among the chiffon-clad, diamond dripping society women and the Christian Dior suited men. I was happy standing at a corner nursing my tomato juice till it was time to make a quiet exit. One day I saw an ad in the newspaper for a course in ‘The art of small talk.’ I went through sessions on how to integrate with people whom I thought were more sophisticated than me. I was taught to read up on a subject just enough to start and hold a conversation. My focus was on some person called Harshad Mehta who was referred to as The Big Bull.<br /><br />I devoured all the information available on the financial pages of dailies and magazines and was soon ready to be let loose on an unsuspecting P3 crowd. At the next party I joined a group of five people who were discussing the stock market. <br /><br />One worthy was talking about FMCG stocks. I butted in and said, “The future is in banking stocks. Harshad is very positive on SBI.” This immediately had the attention of the group. As the evening progressed I harped on the profits to be made on stocks in the metals and pharma fields. By now my audience had swelled to half the guests.<br />This continued for the next few years long after the worthy Mehta’s empire collapsed. By now I was clued in about Futures & Options, too. Invitations to parties increased manifold. At one gathering I distinctly heard a Hugo Boss suited gentleman whispering, “There goes Bangalore’s Big Bull.” Thanks to the new TV Business channels and the Internet, information was spouting out of both my ears and I switched over to another flavour of the season. <br /><br />At the next party a Neiman Marcus clad gentleman asked my opinion about shipping stocks. As if on cue I pontificated, “Stocks are passé. The direction to go is commodities. The rain forests in Paraguay are being denuded. There will be a global shortage of mentha oil. There are millions to be made trading on that.”<br /><br />My wife is paranoid about speculators sending goons after me to recover their losses. I have not put in a paisa of my own in any of these activities all these years. I still live in my modest apartment. And, yes whatever little money I have saved is safe and sound in the nationalised banks.</p>
<p>My father was so scared of losing his meagre savings through banks collapsing that he divided the amount equally among five nationalised banks. I inherited his genes of financial conservatism.<br /><br />Early in my career I was invited to a lot of soirees at five star hotels. I was quite a misfit among the chiffon-clad, diamond dripping society women and the Christian Dior suited men. I was happy standing at a corner nursing my tomato juice till it was time to make a quiet exit. One day I saw an ad in the newspaper for a course in ‘The art of small talk.’ I went through sessions on how to integrate with people whom I thought were more sophisticated than me. I was taught to read up on a subject just enough to start and hold a conversation. My focus was on some person called Harshad Mehta who was referred to as The Big Bull.<br /><br />I devoured all the information available on the financial pages of dailies and magazines and was soon ready to be let loose on an unsuspecting P3 crowd. At the next party I joined a group of five people who were discussing the stock market. <br /><br />One worthy was talking about FMCG stocks. I butted in and said, “The future is in banking stocks. Harshad is very positive on SBI.” This immediately had the attention of the group. As the evening progressed I harped on the profits to be made on stocks in the metals and pharma fields. By now my audience had swelled to half the guests.<br />This continued for the next few years long after the worthy Mehta’s empire collapsed. By now I was clued in about Futures & Options, too. Invitations to parties increased manifold. At one gathering I distinctly heard a Hugo Boss suited gentleman whispering, “There goes Bangalore’s Big Bull.” Thanks to the new TV Business channels and the Internet, information was spouting out of both my ears and I switched over to another flavour of the season. <br /><br />At the next party a Neiman Marcus clad gentleman asked my opinion about shipping stocks. As if on cue I pontificated, “Stocks are passé. The direction to go is commodities. The rain forests in Paraguay are being denuded. There will be a global shortage of mentha oil. There are millions to be made trading on that.”<br /><br />My wife is paranoid about speculators sending goons after me to recover their losses. I have not put in a paisa of my own in any of these activities all these years. I still live in my modest apartment. And, yes whatever little money I have saved is safe and sound in the nationalised banks.</p>
