Breathe. Hold. Invest: What Yoga teaches us about wealth creation
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Investing isn't a destination, it's a lifelong journey that evolves with you, growing alongside you with each passing year.In a world driven by instant gratification and volatile markets, both yoga and investing require something increasingly rare: discipline, patience, and mindfulness. By aligning the philosophy of yoga with financial habits, investors can create a more balanced relationship with their money.Most equity investors look for quick results. They micro analyse each day's market fluctuation, try to rethink each decision they made, second guess not only their own research but also the advises they have acted on from seasoned professionals. But when you look back at this moment 20 or 30 years from now, these fluctuations will feel like nothing more than a small blip in time.Two decades ago, the Sensex was around 5,000 points. Despite several ups and downs like the Global Financial Crises where Sensex declined by more than 30% in less a 6 months period; a sharp fall of about 27% at the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic; and numerous periods of sideways movement, Sensex has yet again crossed the 81,000 mark. This is a 16.2x times gain in the 20 years period. This long-term growth underscores a vital lesson - patience and persistence are often the most rewarding strategies in not only Yoga but also in investing.During every bout of volatility which could be triggered by events completely out of anyone's control, investors often feel depressed looking at the temporary losses in their portfolio values. Many even act impulsively and sell some of their investments. But most successful investors aren't chasing quick wins or reacting to every market shift. They think long-term, stay calm during volatility, and many times take advantage of the market nervousness to find some compelling ideas. The power of compounding is infact like yoga - it has the power to transform your life in ways that one would have never imagined. Ask someone who has spent years meditating in a disciplined fashion, the transformation that he/she has undergone. Somebody who has never meditated cannot even imagine the inner peace that someone with that experience has achieved. Just as no one masters a headstand on the first try or fully experiences the benefits of kapalbhati or pranayama within a few weeks, it's the steady ongoing practice that brings real transformation.Every session of Yoga begins with one fundamental instruction: focus on your breath. It's a call to anchor yourself in the present moment and not on what just happened or what's coming next. The same lesson applies to investing. People need to see beyond just returns if they want to create true wealth and that is possible only when you focus on the investment process and not on the investment outcomes.When investing, one has to understand that despite all the research, analysis, and planning, there will always be elements of risk. You might pick the right fund, but the market may still dip leading to a broader level fall in your portfolio. You might invest at the perfect time, but returns could take years to compound. That's not failure, but a reality. A very important philosophy that applies here is 'aparigraha' or non-attachment. By embracing non-attachment, investors can avoid the stress of trying to control every outcome. It's about being consistent, making thoughtful decisions, and then allowing the process to unfold. This is much like holding a yoga pose with presence and ease, rather than striving for perfection.Yoga has been recognised globally to discover the essence of life. By focusing on the present, dealing day to day with equanimity, maintaining discipline to lead a balanced life and using meditation and exercises for both the mind and body, millions of people have achieved happiness. By incorporating some of these principles in our investment processes, we can have similar outcomes for our wealth as well.: Recommendations, suggestions, views, and opinions given by experts are their own. These do not represent the views of the Economic Times)
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Economic Times
18 minutes ago
- Economic Times
Patience is key in markets as global uncertainties test new investors: Raamdeo Agrawal
Investors may face short-term stagnation, but enduring patience often leads to stronger long-term returns—especially critical for newcomers navigating today's uncertain market. Synopsis Market veterans urge patience amid current dull phases and geopolitical tensions. While returns may dip temporarily, long-term gains often follow extended periods of low performance. New investors should embrace this cycle with discipline and perspective. I was talking to some people they were saying that market is dull. What do we do? So, I said expect little lower return and get ready for a bigger return. Longer you wait for a low return, higher will be the return on the back ended. So, this is a time for a little patience, says Raamdeo Agrawal, co-founder of Motilal Oswal Group. ADVERTISEMENT Raamdeo Agrawal: Coming back to your question, markets have been actually very resilient if you look at a very long term, 10, 15, 17 years. It has been very predictable market and in last 16 years if you see, we have seen…, 16 years means we are talking about something like post GFC which is about 2008-09. So, after that only Covid has been one of the big breakdown, otherwise market has been very-very nice and scaling up. And from 2020 post Covid, we are seeing virtual boom from 8,000-9,000 post covid correction to now 24,000-25,000, so 3x in five years, so it is a very sustained rise and it is very resilient. I mean, good thing is that not only it is rising, the corrections are very-very shallow and so that is giving the confidence. Even it has given a lot more confidence to retail investors and so, yes, journey has been very good. Raamdeo Agrawal: So, I was talking to some people they were saying that market is dull. What do we do? So, I said expect little lower return and get ready for a bigger return. Longer you wait for a low return, higher will be the return on the back ended. So, this is a time for a little patience. Today market is good, but generally all these geopolitical challenges, the patience is a lot more required whenever the external environment becomes hostile. So, right now we are going through slightly turbulent environment and patience is the key one should… I mean, lot of people have come new in the system, almost like 60-70% people are less than five years into the market. So, they would have not…, their patience will be tested for the first time, so they should be ready to provide that necessary patience, no return kind of a zone for some time and then journey again starts. So, my sincere request to all the new investors would be that they should be ready to provide that patience which is the biggest fertiliser for long-term investing. ADVERTISEMENT Raamdeo Agrawal: No, there has been…, a downdraft for the gold must be low. Of course, gold has done much better than I ever thought it will do. One is that there is no outperformance to further gold performance. If gold has done 15% or index has done 15%, I think I must have done at least 20%, so that 5% is not possible in gold. It is only possible in equities and I mean, some of the guys might have done 25%, 30% also, that is not possible in gold unless you leverage and those kind of things. So, yes, I mean, gold has outperformed my own wildest expectation and it has emerged globally also as a very important bucket of value, so the people who believe in gold, of course, it is good news to them. And right now, it looks very, what do you call, bullish, but I would not put anything onto the gold. I am pretty comfortable. One of the things which Mr Buffett said is do what you understand. So, I understand only equities. So, I am pretty good at staying with equities. ADVERTISEMENT Raamdeo Agrawal: No, I still think capital market remains a big opportunity because it is asset light and it is very scalable and the firms, particularly is the opportunity size is one. Second is the scalability within, what do you call, opportunity itself, like if you look at the global asset management companies, now they do not talk in billions, they only talk in trillions. I mean, like there are $8 trillion, $10 trillion kind of a single asset management company. So, those kind of… As our AUM grows, we will also see that 10-15% of the total AUM would be with one AMC, like in India out of 40 lakhs equities, SBI must be having almost like 7-8 lakh crores. So, those kind of consolidated positions will be there on a much more enlarged asset base. When asset base goes from 40 lakh crores to 400 lakh crores, these giants will have their due share in the larger pie also. So that kind of a capital market… and capital market is very, I would say, at least to me it looks like very smoothly compounding and scaling as a GDP of the country grows and the entire system remains intact. So, the capital market opportunity still is a pretty large opportunity and now markets have valued it also somewhat. ADVERTISEMENT When we talked about three years back, valuations were very cheap. Now, people are realising that and it is showing up in the valuation. So, less attractive opportunity than what it was three years back, but nevertheless longer term that opportunity still stays pretty intact. But going to other segments, if the oil price stabilises about $65 or $60, all the OMCs which are there at current, currently available at literally one book or one-and-a-half book, 10 times, 12 times for their size of the businesses that seems to be kind of a great opportunity and it is very early trend. But let us see, I mean the government also has to be supporting in terms of policy making but that looks to be a big trend out here. Raamdeo Agrawal: So, like the real estate looks to be…, real estate, defence, energy transitions, capital market, I mean these are few themes which are coming immediately to my mind, they will grow at more like 20%, 22%, 25%. Even banking, banking on the whole, the kind of policy we are seeing, the regulator wants higher growth, credit growth rate. So, if the 13-14%, if they go back to the trend, credit growth rate, in that case mid-sized banks, well-managed banks they will grow at about 18-20% or more than that. So, yes, I mean, there are whole lot of sectors who will definitely grow. I mean, almost like one-and-a-half times of nominal GDP growth rates. ADVERTISEMENT Raamdeo Agrawal: I mean, you have to be selective what companies you buy because it is a very-very large sector and the companies have their own limitation in terms of execution. Every city has two-three very large realty companies. But then if you look at the whole country, as you go from current $4 trillion GDP to $8 trillion or $20 trillion, the biggest game in town is going to be the real estate company. Anybody makes money anywhere in stock market or anywhere, first thing they go is and splurge in buying a better house, good house and better house. If somebody has two bedroom, he will go for three-bedroom, they will go for better locality. So, real wealth effect of stock market and of the broader economy will be reflected in realty boom and that is what we are witnessing and I mean, it is just about three-four years old kind of thing, till about Covid things were absolutely in dumps. Of course, they have come back from there and a lot of companies are listed also and a lot of companies are going to come up, but in this space we will find some unknown tier III companies or tier II companies or small companies making big splash in next 5-10 years. Raamdeo Agrawal: Yes, so that I forgot to tell, but that is one thing which is going to be across, I mean, there is going to be so many companies from the digital side. The way US market is looking today that 8-10 digital companies are kind of a dominating the entire index movement or corporate profitability movement, those movements will also come maybe after five-seven years in terms of significance. Raamdeo Agrawal: I mean, that is company wise, you have to go very company-wise, listen to the story, eat, drink, and spend time with them and understand their story. At that time you are able to figure out, at least the way I go about doing it is spend a full day with the company, at the end of the day you will be able to figure out whether it is in the price or you are way above the…, I mean, underlying value is more than the price or price is more than the value that you will be able to figure out by spending full day with the company. Raamdeo Agrawal: I am not too sure that world will go without IT services companies like Infosys, TCS, and all. But AI computing or what AI role…, I mean role of services companies will be changing for sure and they have been changing right throughout, from a complete body shopping in 90s to project implementation and now very large complex projects and now the new angle which has come up is the AI computing. So, I mean how relevant they will be in this new…, and they will be relevant, I do not have any doubts. The issue is, are their role going to go up or they will go through this stagnancy process or some kind of a contraction also. Because it budgets, I mean in my own company IT budgets are not going down, it spend is continuing and it is always short, your projects are not getting completed in time. So, it is not that just AI is coming and eating away all the services, no, it is not happening in real life. 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Time of India
21 minutes ago
- Time of India
Patience is key in markets as global uncertainties test new investors: Raamdeo Agrawal
I was talking to some people they were saying that market is dull. What do we do? So, I said expect little lower return and get ready for a bigger return. Longer you wait for a low return, higher will be the return on the back ended. So, this is a time for a little patience, says Raamdeo Agrawal, co-founder of Motilal Oswal Group. ET Now: So, firstly wanted to have your take on how you have seen the markets transitioning throughout these many years and from here on how do you see the market going ahead, your first thoughts on that. Raamdeo Agrawal: Coming back to your question, markets have been actually very resilient if you look at a very long term, 10, 15, 17 years. It has been very predictable market and in last 16 years if you see, we have seen…, 16 years means we are talking about something like post GFC which is about 2008-09. So, after that only Covid has been one of the big breakdown, otherwise market has been very-very nice and scaling up. And from 2020 post Covid, we are seeing virtual boom from 8,000-9,000 post covid correction to now 24,000-25,000, so 3x in five years, so it is a very sustained rise and it is very resilient. I mean, good thing is that not only it is rising, the corrections are very-very shallow and so that is giving the confidence. Even it has given a lot more confidence to retail investors and so, yes, journey has been very good. Raamdeo Agrawal: So, I was talking to some people they were saying that market is dull. What do we do? So, I said expect little lower return and get ready for a bigger return. Longer you wait for a low return, higher will be the return on the back ended. So, this is a time for a little patience. Today market is good, but generally all these geopolitical challenges, the patience is a lot more required whenever the external environment becomes hostile. So, right now we are going through slightly turbulent environment and patience is the key one should… I mean, lot of people have come new in the system, almost like 60-70% people are less than five years into the market. So, they would have not…, their patience will be tested for the first time, so they should be ready to provide that necessary patience, no return kind of a zone for some time and then journey again starts. So, my sincere request to all the new investors would be that they should be ready to provide that patience which is the biggest fertiliser for long-term investing. Live Events ET Now: In last 15 years if I look at ballpark, like we say in Hindi mota-moti gold and equity markets have given almost parallel returns. Now, with gold you have not done any hard work, you always had advantage of liquidity. With equity markets in last 15 years you have taken big knocks of volatility in covid and then in 2013-14. So, if gold has given returns which are almost equivalent to equities, what does that tell you that which asset class will outperform going forward because gold has given you good returns without any stress. Equity has given you all kind of stress and has not given you great returns in 15 years. Raamdeo Agrawal: No, there has been…, a downdraft for the gold must be low. Of course, gold has done much better than I ever thought it will do. One is that there is no outperformance to further gold performance. If gold has done 15% or index has done 15%, I think I must have done at least 20%, so that 5% is not possible in gold. It is only possible in equities and I mean, some of the guys might have done 25%, 30% also, that is not possible in gold unless you leverage and those kind of things. So, yes, I mean, gold has outperformed my own wildest expectation and it has emerged globally also as a very important bucket of value, so the people who believe in gold, of course, it is good news to them. And right now, it looks very, what do you call, bullish, but I would not put anything onto the gold. I am pretty comfortable. One of the things which Mr Buffett said is do what you understand. So, I understand only equities. So, I am pretty good at staying with equities. ET Now: But I was telling someone today that when I met Raamdeo ji three years back on Diwali, he said capital markets is going to be that one structural story and I was just admiring the way that you actually pick up big trends in the market. While capital markets theme is not going anywhere in a hurry hopefully so, but what are the other big trends that you foresee now emerging in the markets? Raamdeo Agrawal: No, I still think capital market remains a big opportunity because it is asset light and it is very scalable and the firms, particularly is the opportunity size is one. Second is the scalability within, what do you call, opportunity itself, like if you look at the global asset management companies, now they do not talk in billions, they only talk in trillions. I mean, like there are $8 trillion, $10 trillion kind of a single asset management company. So, those kind of… As our AUM grows, we will also see that 10-15% of the total AUM would be with one AMC, like in India out of 40 lakhs equities, SBI must be having almost like 7-8 lakh crores. So, those kind of consolidated positions will be there on a much more enlarged asset base. When asset base goes from 40 lakh crores to 400 lakh crores, these giants will have their due share in the larger pie also. So that kind of a capital market… and capital market is very, I would say, at least to me it looks like very smoothly compounding and scaling as a GDP of the country grows and the entire system remains intact. So, the capital market opportunity still is a pretty large opportunity and now markets have valued it also somewhat. When we talked about three years back, valuations were very cheap. Now, people are realising that and it is showing up in the valuation. So, less attractive opportunity than what it was three years back, but nevertheless longer term that opportunity still stays pretty intact. But going to other segments, if the oil price stabilises about $65 or $60, all the OMCs which are there at current, currently available at literally one book or one-and-a-half book, 10 times, 12 times for their size of the businesses that seems to be kind of a great opportunity and it is very early trend. But let us see, I mean the government also has to be supporting in terms of policy making but that looks to be a big trend out here. ET Now: So, I am using the nominal GDP as the benchmark here, 11% to 12%. For next three years which are the businesses because investing like you always say is buying a good business. Which are the businesses which will grow faster than the nominal GDP? Which are the businesses which will grow in and around the nominal GDP? And which are the businesses, themes, or sectors which will grow in single digit? Raamdeo Agrawal: So, like the real estate looks to be…, real estate, defence, energy transitions, capital market, I mean these are few themes which are coming immediately to my mind, they will grow at more like 20%, 22%, 25%. Even banking, banking on the whole, the kind of policy we are seeing, the regulator wants higher growth, credit growth rate. So, if the 13-14%, if they go back to the trend, credit growth rate, in that case mid-sized banks, well-managed banks they will grow at about 18-20% or more than that. So, yes, I mean, there are whole lot of sectors who will definitely grow. I mean, almost like one-and-a-half times of nominal GDP growth rates. ET Now: You have been extremely bullish on real estate, which you have always maintained that it is also a structural story. A lot of the positive is already in the price. The real estate sector is a well discovered sector now. But do you think with RBI's push, with all that RBI is doing with regards to norms now and infra lending, etc, as well, this sector is here to stay and there is still money to be made? Raamdeo Agrawal: I mean, you have to be selective what companies you buy because it is a very-very large sector and the companies have their own limitation in terms of execution. Every city has two-three very large realty companies. But then if you look at the whole country, as you go from current $4 trillion GDP to $8 trillion or $20 trillion, the biggest game in town is going to be the real estate company. Anybody makes money anywhere in stock market or anywhere, first thing they go is and splurge in buying a better house, good house and better house. If somebody has two bedroom, he will go for three-bedroom, they will go for better locality. So, real wealth effect of stock market and of the broader economy will be reflected in realty boom and that is what we are witnessing and I mean, it is just about three-four years old kind of thing, till about Covid things were absolutely in dumps. Of course, they have come back from there and a lot of companies are listed also and a lot of companies are going to come up, but in this space we will find some unknown tier III companies or tier II companies or small companies making big splash in next 5-10 years. ET Now: You have been a big votary of these high digit, high growth businesses, especially the digital businesses. Raamdeo Agrawal: Yes, so that I forgot to tell, but that is one thing which is going to be across, I mean, there is going to be so many companies from the digital side. The way US market is looking today that 8-10 digital companies are kind of a dominating the entire index movement or corporate profitability movement, those movements will also come maybe after five-seven years in terms of significance. ET Now: …say that you need to figure out what is in the price, whether it is good news or bad news, whether it is earnings or whether it is compounding. So as we look into the future and if one has to look at next 12 to 18 months from a market standpoint, what is in the price and what is not in the price. Raamdeo Agrawal: I mean, that is company wise, you have to go very company-wise, listen to the story, eat, drink, and spend time with them and understand their story. At that time you are able to figure out, at least the way I go about doing it is spend a full day with the company, at the end of the day you will be able to figure out whether it is in the price or you are way above the…, I mean, underlying value is more than the price or price is more than the value that you will be able to figure out by spending full day with the company. ET Now: Talk about a theme where question marks have been raised about the viability and the future existence and that is a good old IT services. Massive wealth creators but from given what is happening in AI, the maturity curve, the demand, do you think these stocks will continue to underperform and one should not call them as contra or value buyers at all. Raamdeo Agrawal: I am not too sure that world will go without IT services companies like Infosys, TCS, and all. But AI computing or what AI role…, I mean role of services companies will be changing for sure and they have been changing right throughout, from a complete body shopping in 90s to project implementation and now very large complex projects and now the new angle which has come up is the AI computing. So, I mean how relevant they will be in this new…, and they will be relevant, I do not have any doubts. The issue is, are their role going to go up or they will go through this stagnancy process or some kind of a contraction also. Because it budgets, I mean in my own company IT budgets are not going down, it spend is continuing and it is always short, your projects are not getting completed in time. So, it is not that just AI is coming and eating away all the services, no, it is not happening in real life. Yes, there is some exciting development about the AI, some of the things can be done faster, but I am not the right person to pass a judgment, but I do not think it is down and out kind of situation, no. ETMarkets WhatsApp channel )
Economic Times
an hour ago
- Economic Times
Sebi's June 2025 board meeting: A regulatory makeover with market empathy
Simplification of Institutional Fund Raising Startup Founders Rejoice Live Events Freedom to Merchant Bankers Welcome to Indian Markets Key Message: (You can now subscribe to our (You can now subscribe to our ETMarkets WhatsApp channel The Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) in its last board meeting unveiled a sweeping set of regulatory reforms that reflect both market responsiveness and forward-looking policymaking. This meeting wasn't just a quarterly update — it was a full-body reset on many longstanding regulatory frameworks, aimed at easing compliance burdens, deepening market access , and aligning Indian capital markets with global meeting also marked a strategic recalibration of SEBI's regulatory posture. It demonstrated a commitment to reducing compliance friction while safeguarding core market integrity. In doing so, SEBI is responding to the evolving expectations of a maturing market, one that now hosts retail participation at scale, large institutional flows, digitised securities infrastructure, and increased cross-border also gave its green light to a streamlined disclosure regime for Qualified Institutions Placements. The lengthy and often duplicative disclosure requirements will give way to concise, issue-specific and material risk disclosures, leveraging publicly available data. Companies will no longer need to reproduce financials already present in the public domain, making capital-raising quicker and more new-age tech companies decide to go public, they reach a point where they can no longer use the ESOP (Employee Stock Option Plan) benefits available to startup promoters. At the same time, the founders are usually classified as 'promoters' in the draft prospectus (DRHP) because of their combined shareholding. Once identified as promoters, and given the rules that apply to listed companies under SEBI's ESOP regulations, they are no longer allowed to receive ESOPs—regardless of whether the company is still considered a has been a long-standing problem, and many industry bodies, including FICCI, have given representation to the regulator to address this concern. Resultantly, SEBI in the floated consultation paper of March 2025 sought to clarify the treatment of Employee Stock Ownership Plans granted to per this recent progressive decision, the startup founders classified as promoters can now continue to hold and/or exercise share-based benefits, such as ESOPs, even after the company lists, provided these benefits were received at least one year prior to filing the previously proposing that merchant bankers separate their non-regulated activities into a different legal entity, SEBI has eased its stand. Merchant bankers can now conduct regulated as well as certain non-regulated, fee-based financial services within the same entity — provided they comply with their respective financial sector regulators' guidelines and SEBI-prescribed conditions. This was in direct response to feedback from key industry bodies like FICCI, which warned of unnecessary cost and a move intended to enhance flexibility for companies considering reverse flipping and improve investor participation, SEBI approved amendments to its ICDR Regulations. Following a consultation paper of March 2025, SEBI relaxed the one-year minimum holding period requirement for equity shares arising from the conversion of fully paid-up compulsorily convertible securities acquired under approved schemes. Investors can now offer these shares in a public issue, harmonising these provisions with the existing minimum promoters' contribution requirements.'Ease of Doing Business is not a dilution — it is a deliberate design. But it must be paired with credible safeguards, professional discipline, and investor-first thinking.'With reforms addressing Alternative Investment Funds, Real Estate and Infrastructure Investment Trusts (REITs/InvITs), Merchant Bankers, Debenture Trustees, and more, SEBI is laying down a unified, consistent, and future-compatible regulatory said, there is scope to do more. The regulator could further simplify the capital-market instruments — for example, by allowing a fast-track conversion process for Private InvITs to list as Public InvITs. Steps like these will make the Indian capital markets even more accessible, liquid, and investor-friendly.
