Luck or what

Luck or What?

Normally people like to talk about there success stories, especially if they are related to how they scored over a hot chick or how they doubled or tripled their money by picking a hot stock.

Let me do just the opposite. Since I am yet to find a ten bagger (a stock that multiples 10 times after you buy it) let me tell you about one I missed.

In early 2002 I was fairly convinced that the market for watches in India is going to expand and people will be paying a premium for good quality fashionable watches. My logic was that nobody buys a watch to look time as they can look time in there mobile phones easily so what is the point of buying a watch. (Personally I have never bought a watch). Since watches ceased to be a utility item the manufacturers had no option but to move towards positioning there watches as a premium lifestyle item. Anything that is positioned as a premium is bound to fetch higher margins for the company selling it.

So I decided to go and buy stocks in watch companies. At that time I identified 2 companies as worthy of investment

A) Titan Industries

B) Timex Watches.

I invested equal amount in both the companies and almost forgot about the same. I needed some money after 2 years and decided to sell Titan and retain stocks of Times. Rest as they say is history. Titan went on to become one of the biggest gainers in next 8 years multiplying money more than 30 times. Mind you Timex also did fairly well and multiplied money 3 times over next 8 years. But 30 times is definitely many times more than 3 times. The difference is phenomenal and one wonders how much individual genius was in the whole process and how much part was played by luck in this whole saga. I some time wonder what would I have done had I sold Timex and retained Titan? Sour grapes? Maybe, but next time I will try to be more careful try not to sell my winners too soon.

Thanks for reading, please do leave a comment.