(I started writing this post a while ago, i had thought would finish it in one go, as it is very apparent i did not, so there are quite a few chronological errors. My request: bear with them :P)
Its been a while, since i posted here. Life has been peculiarly busy. College, on the academic front, has been totally chilled out though. Hardly any classes, and loads of events happening round the clock,I have had my share of fun this term.(5th term at MDI)
The idea for this post came last night, at the customary drinking spree we(The Gunda Group) indulge in, to celebrate each and every feat. Making almost a clean sweep at the Mahindra War Room called for something more than a simple drinking session at the hostel roof top. But the celebrations will have to wait till the moolah arrives.
After a couple of pegs, everyone feels like the most knowledgeable person on any given topic, and is ready to put his/her debating skills to test at the drop of a handkerchief. The topic of debate turned out to be Prof. Sanjay Bakshi. Given the limited readership of my blog, i would skip the great man's introduction and cut straight into the details.
The question was, is the Great Man more hype than substance?
Everybody chipped in, someone said Value Investing is just a school of thought and he should be treated at par with other subjects. What he is teaching aint no silver bullet to making money. Everybody lamented the fact that his classes are a monologue and they would have been more engaging and thought provoking had he been a little interactive. Everybody said that the way senior batch projected him as, next to the Almighty, is totally untrue. One of the possible reasons people gave for people idolising him and arguing for him(rather against, which was the tone of the discussion) was Social Proofing. Is it true? Why then nobody in the group could say that he is no good at all. Why did everyone started or finished an argument with I know he is very good and very knowledgeable? Discussion then turned to whether he is just not a good teacher, and that led the group to nowhere.
If there is one thing for everyone to see, its the fact that the guy is successful, and a big deal at that. He has made loads of money putting into action what he teaches, and thus nobody can question the amount of hard work and experience that has gone into every theory he has learnt and every gimmick he has orchestrated, which he now teaches his students fervently.
There is another interesting thing i noticed in the discussion which diverted my attention to another aspect of this guy and led me to ask myself, 'Is this guy selling hope (just like Obama did so successfully last year)??'. His can be a classic rags-to-riches story. From selling burgers at a burger joint in England to support himself and his wife(his wife too had the same job) during his stint at the London School of Economics, to now driving the swankiest of cars and enjoying the most exotic of holidays. He openly professes that he came across Buffet and his school of thought through chance, romanticism involved in writing to Buffet and getting his set of letters mailed back, learning everything along the way, his theories always refute the idea of people being geniuses(common sense and mental models is all he says are needed) and him always ridiculing the conventional way of education and thus conventional thinking makes people believe that there is hope no matter what. There is hope that you can earn money by the tonnes even if you have been the bottom most performer in every class you have been to all your life, you can still beat the market and others at this game and there might be a better chance of you doing so, if you do not know what the CAPM stands for. That does fill you up with hope, why shouldn't it?
But that is where the catch was, the above things applied when the discussion took place. When his classes dealt with only mental models and people making and losing money through common sense and actual value investing had not entered the picture. Things changed after that, attendance in his lectures dropped sharply. Most people who attended found it difficult to stay awake and those who did stay awake found it difficult to comprehend what was being taught. The 'hope' argument had taken a back seat.
I wonder still, has he been made larger than life? Is it all hype?
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