Decoding “Rs 10,000 invested in Wipro became Rs 500 crore” example

I am sure you must have seen the famous example of how Rs 10,000 invested in WIPRO turned out to be Rs 500 crore in 2019. That’s a massive wealth. But today I want to decode this story and let’s see what are some of the issues and problems. I have created a video on this topic, Do watch below

First of all, note that it’s not just WIPRO that has created massive wealth for its investors. There are many other examples as well, like

  • CIPLA: Investments of Rs 10,000 in 1979 will fetch 95 crore
  • INFOSYS: Investments of Rs 10,000 in 1992 will fetch Rs 1.5 crore
  • RANBAXY: Investment of Rs 10,000 in 1980 will fetch Rs 19 crore
  • HDFC BANK: Investment of Rs 1 lac in 1995 will fetch Rs 8 crore

While there are some examples of people who were able to hold the stock for 35-40 yrs and created massive wealth for themselves the one question which we shall ask ourselves is – Is it remotely possible for a common man to do it?

2 problem will WIPRO example

Problem #1: Survivorship bias

The Wipro example is a classic example of survivorship bias, where we pick the example which has worked already and survived for 40 yrs. It’s damn simple to look back and say easily that 10,000 become 500 cr if you waited for 40 yrs?

It’s nothing more than a data point. You are just looking at the statistics.

For every Wipro, Infosys, and Reliance example – there is a Reliance Capital, Unitech, and Cox&Kings example that has destroyed all the wealth in so many years.

shares which crashed

 

How will you pick WIPRO in 1980 with so much confidence for the next 40 yrs? It is almost impossible.

Problem #2: How will you handle your emotions all these years?

“If you invest for 40 yrs” is the point.

  • Who invests for 40 yrs?
  • Who buys and holds for 40 yrs?

I will tell you, it’s mostly people who are dead or someone who really forgot about the investment made.

And then there are promotors of the company who hold for so long. And finally, there is a tiny minority of few people who might have done it successfully whose example we see on the net. But it’s never going to happen with most people because it’s almost impossible to control your emotions when you see the stock going up or down so much.

  • When you invest Rs 10,000 and it becomes Rs 1 lac in 1 yr – Will you, not sell-off?
  • If not, then what if that Rs 1 lac becomes Rs 5 lacs in the next 2 yrs? – Now will you not sell-off?
  • If not, what if that 5 lacs now becomes 1 lacs and drops in value by 80%? – Will you still have “conviction”?
  • What if that Rs 1 lacs comes back to 5 lacs? Now?

I think you got my point!

Only robots and machines can stay calm and not react. We are humans and we do.

Here people sell when prices go up by 10% and we are talking of keeping stocks for 40 yrs?

Note that I am not saying that there are people who don’t keep the stocks for 20-30 yrs, but it’s not as easy a game to play as it’s made to look.

Enjoy the journey of equity bull runs and keep using the money

Note that buy and hold for 40 yrs is not always practical. Even if you have a good stock and patience, it only makes sense to take out profits from time to time and use it for your life goals. Go on vacations, buy a house, travel, and use it to buy stuff. There is no point in dying with Rs 500 crore unless you want to exactly do that.

Another point is to have a well-diversified managed portfolio where you are betting on multiple stocks and not concentrated on few ones. So have realistic expectations from stock investing and take these examples with a pinch of salt.

Only use these examples to reassure yourself that equities have huge wealth creation potential and its an important part of your portfolio.

Do share your comments below

“Guaranteed 11% returns” – A new misselling in insurance (VIDEO)

Recently I got a call from an insurance company sales executives and they tried to sell me an insurance policy which they said had Guaranteed 11% returns.

The policy was Reliance Nippon Life Guaranteed Money Back Plan

I knew that there is surely some catch and they are kind of misselling me, I didn’t know what exactly it was. So I decided to dive deeper and find out more.

After I asked them tough questions, and once they realized that my knowledge about these things is much more than an average uninformed investor, they were ready to mail me from their official email id about what I will get. Finally, I solved the mystery like CID and told them the policy has just a 4.6% return and not 11%.

Do watch the video below to quickly understand the whole game.

Guaranteed 11% returns

So when I got this sales call, a lady told me that this was a 15 yrs plan, for which the premium payment term is just 10 yrs. I will have to pay Rs 1 lac for 10 yrs and I will get a total payment of Rs 24.72 lacs towards the end and the return turns out to be 11% IRR

This sounds quite attractive and anyone who is not happy with the FD returns these days will get attracted quite fast.

Here is the breakup of the amounts she told me I will get in 15 yrs

illustration misselling insurance policy with 11% guranteed returns

I told her to send me an illustration and she did that after some time (here is a PDF Copy)

When I saw the illustration, I saw that the premium was not Rs 1 lac, but it was Rs 1,05,263. This is the first thing that she never informed me of. So instead of 1 lac, the outgo from investors pocket is Rs. 1,05,263!

When I looked deeper, I found out that few numbers she told me over the phone are visible in the illustration, but the amount of Rs 8,99,147 was missing from the illustration. This was the SUM ASSURED amount.

She had mentioned to me on call that we will get this sum assured amount also, but the illustration had no information about it.

This was the Catch

So when I asked them – “Why is the sum assured not in the payment section?, you told me that I will get that also”

To this one of the seniors told me that it’s not in the illustration, but I will get it because “Sum Assured is always paid in the policy”. I told him that it’s paid when a person dies, but where is it written that I will get the sum assured amount apart from the other numbers he had mentioned” for which he didn’t have a clear answer.

The sales guy kept telling me I will get it and finally, he told me that it’s mentioned in the policy brochure. When I looked at the policy brochure, it was mentioned that it paid

but… but …but it paid in installments and THAT WAS THE CATCH

insurance policy brochure misselling

The sum assured is given to you in small parts in year 11th, 12th, 13th, 14th, and finally in 15th year. So it’s already paid to you which you can see in the image below.

However these guys were counting the sum assured again when they told me about the plan over the phone and that’s the reason they tell you that you will get a very big amount, which you will NOT!

They are just counting the same thing twice in the benefit and they are not even lying when they say that they can mail you that you will get “sum assured” in this policy because you are GETTING IT!

Are you getting the whole game? They are just saying the thing in an incomplete way and twisted format.

To properly understand the details, do watch the video above

How sum assured is counted twice in the policy for misselling

This was a catch which most of the investors are not able to catch and believe the sales call.

They also don’t find any mistake or bluff and even though they have heard that lots of misselling happen in the insurance sector, they still go with these policies.

IRR returns of just 4.65% instead of promised 11%

When I calculated the IRR of the policy with the correct numbers, the IRR turned out to be just 4.65% rather than the 11% they claimed over the call.

IRR of insurance policy

Conclusion

Do not fall for this kind of policies which does not clearly give full information on the returns and is too complicated to understand. They will try to convince you by saying things like they will email you from their official email id because they have learned that people have learned from previous missellings of ULIPS etc where nothing was given in writing and if they say something like that, it will look very trust worthy!

Just avoid it.

For your insurance needs, take a plain vanilla term plan and for your investments do invest in pure investments products like stocks, PPF, mutual funds, bank FD’s, NPS, etc, and keep things simple.

How I survived a Credit Card fraud today! – Experience Sharing

One of my Twitter followers Mr Ravi shared with me a potential credit card fraud attempt that he survived. I would like to share that with you all with his permission.

RBL Bank Credit Card OTP-Fraud

Here is goes

I hold an RBL Bank Credit Card along with a couple of others.

Today, I got a call from a mobile number 6391504865. The person was speaking fluent English and claimed to be from the RBL Bank. He asked me – at the time of getting the card whether I was told if this card is lifetime free or there will be a joining fee. Then he asked if I was actually given the credit limit which I was told. Till this point, I answered the questions.

Then he told me that the bank is offering me a credit limit increase of 1 lakh if I want. And then asked – “Please confirm if the PAN number I am telling is correct.” Then he told me my correct PAN number. He further proceeded saying that he was sending an OTP which should be shared with him for authorisation of this limit increase. Here comes the scary part. I received an OTP from the legit RBL messaging service (VK-RBLBNK) from which I usually receive the transaction messages. The content of this SMS was as following:

“234567 is OTP (one time password) for updating your RBL Bank Credit Card settings.”

Just to ensure that this is indeed a fraud, I asked him to tell me my existing card limit before I share the OTP. He couldn’t answer it well and started beating around the bush. I told him unless the SMS mentions that this OTP is for credit card limit increase, I will not share the OTP. I asked him to send me an email from his RBL email id about this. He said yes and hung up the phone.

Mr Ravi, soon after the fraud call connected with RBL bank customer care (fraud detection department) and came to know that it was indeed a fraud call.

Here is one more similar kind of incident

RBI credit card fraud

PAN and Credit Card Leaked

It’s very clear that all his details were with the fraudster.

No one asks for any OTP for increasing the credit card limit. It’s always informed to you by SMS, or you get to see that message when you log in to your banking portal. The OTP which was generated was surely for some other purpose (like transferring money or authorising some purchase).

So beware if you get a call for increasing your credit card limits and the other side has your PAN, Card details, Card current limits, etc. They might be a fraudster

Make sure you never share the OTP with anyone overcall. There are many youngsters who may be new to how a credit card works and fall for this fraud. Looks like Jamtara Gang is back with new tricks.

His original sharing was posted here and some part of it is reproduced with his permission

Have you faced any kind of credit card fraud ever? Can you share in the comments?