Last year when I stepped down as the CEO of nearbuy - I was a classic case of paper wealth with no cash in hand.

I had stupidly over indexed on equity, made terrible mistakes with money (see thread the end of this thread) and had no other income stream.
I realized the biggest mistakes I had made was investing in largely illiquid assets - startups and real estate. With extremely poor liquidity.

So while I had "wealth" I did not have any income.

The last year I have been working on changing that.
1. Term Insurance
A decade back I bought a term insurance plan for 25 years, for 10Cr.

Which means if I die in the next 25 years (by the time I am 55), my family will get 10Cr (over and above my ongoing loans).
If I don't die, I get nothing.
My logic at 30 was that by 55 I should be able to get to the 10Cr mark myself.
Until then I rely on an insurance plan.

This amount I believe takes care of all current and future needs of my family.

This gives me mental peace, should something happen to me ever!
Of the disposable income I have (after paying for my bills and needs) I split it into 40:40:20

The first 40% goes into buying stocks of individual companies; split into 25% and 15%.
25% in US stocks - I pick market leaders in emerging tech. So the 4 stocks I have currently are
Shopify
Square
Zoom
Tesla

Indians can invest upto $250,000 every year in international stocks (public + private), which is way more than I will ever have :)
I use @INDmoneyApp for investing - it is incredibly easy to use and helps me track.
Highly recommended.
The remaining 15% goes into Indian company stock. Again, I pick market leaders, but instead of emerging tech I go for established sectors.

My current picks are
ITC
HDFC
Reliance
Spicejet
Indian Hotels
Shree Cement
I use @zerodhaonline for all my stock investing. It is such an incredible product to use and while it is known to suffer from outages, it doesn't affect me since I do not actively trade.
Next 40% of savings rides on experts, who know their stuff :)
I am not a big fan of Mutual funds because of the opacity with which they operate.

So I started to use @smallcaseHQ
Think of it like a mix of stocks as per a strategy, where an expert is telling you what to buy/sell
I follow Momentum investing strategy on smallcase - which rides on stocks that are on an upward momentum.

The ones I picked were
Capitalmind Momentum
https://t.co/yvxGWXFvnH
and
Weekend Investing Momentum
https://t.co/vzijXXCDoE
I invest every month and if there is any surplus generated then as a one-time investment as well.
The last 20% is reserved for startup investing.
It is where I have lost my most money and made my most money as well.

I would not call myself an angel investor, since I do not have the capital depth to invest in all the good ideas I come across.
So I rarely invest directly in a startup (unless highly recommended or a founder I absolutely loved interacting with)

I mostly invest in startups through @AngelList
You can follow syndicates on AL, through which you get a deal flow. And most allow you to invest starting $1,000
I am yet to see any gain come through AL - this is more of a wild bet on my part.
In summary:
25% in US tech market leaders - with a 15 year horizon, through @INDmoneyApp
15% in Indian traditional market leaders - with a 15 year horizon, through @zerodhaonline
40% in momentum Indian stocks, through @smallcaseHQ
20% in startups, through @AngelList
PS:
I do not have any Fixed Deposits (hate them!)
I haven't invested in any debt funds (frankly, they arent that bad, but I am willing to take on risk)
My only liability is a (BIG) home loan
My investment strategy is aggressive for a 40 year old with a family of wife, 2 kids and 2 parents.
But that is just me.

This should ideally be the investment strategy for someone in their 20s
30% US Stocks + 40% Indian stocks + 30% Indian Debt (no startups please)
Here is a thread I wrote on mistakes I made with my money
https://t.co/yyvpkvNOv6

It has been converted into an eBook (thank you @shreyashah23)
https://t.co/mRdLJEtn5Y
PLEASE do not blindly copy this strategy - for that matter anyone's
Take inspiration from others - but eventually build your own.

Oh - almost forgot - the longest word in english language
mutualfundsaresubjecttomarketriskpleasereadtheofferdocumentscarefullybeforeinvesting
Ask me anything on the strategy or guide me further if you have some feedback

More from Ankur Warikoo

10 ways I am running my current startup differently from the ones before

A thread...

Difference #1
Bootstrapped as against raising money

https://t.co/RKWB3KfMZt was a venture funded company. We raised $43Mn from top investors, but I couldn’t give them a return that I would be proud of. In the process, learning how raising money works but also doesn’t work

My current startup is bootstrapped.
I do not intend to raise money for it.
It has been profitable from Day 1 and that is the way I hope it remains.

I have raised money from customers.

Difference #2
Slow and small

For the past decade, I was in the mode of fast and big.
Being fast was the only thing that mattered.
And you either go big or go home.

Today, I am taking it slow.
Slow to add costs, slow to take decisions that are irreversible.

I am patient because all good things in life take time!
How I created content in 2020

A thread...

Back in Aug 2016, I started creating content to share my experiences as an entrepreneur.
Over 3 years I had put out 1,200+ hours of content - posting every week without


Little did I know that something I started almost 4 years back would give my life an entirely new direction.

At the end of 2019, my biggest platform was LinkedIn with ~700K followers.

In Jan 2020, I decided to build a team that would help me with the content.

I ran a month long recruitment drive to hire a team of interns.

It comprised 4 detailed rounds - starting with my loved 20 questions, then an assignment, then a WhatsApp video round and finally F2F.

Through 1,200+ applications, I finally selected 6 profiles, starting March.

I am a firm believer in @peterthiel's one task, one person philosophy
So the team was structured such that everyone was responsible for ONLY one task

1. Content ideas
2. Videography
3. Video editing
4. LinkedIn (+TikTok) distribution
5. FB+IG distribution
6. YouTube distribution

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I’m torn on how to approach the idea of luck. I’m the first to admit that I am one of the luckiest people on the planet. To be born into a prosperous American family in 1960 with smart parents is to start life on third base. The odds against my very existence are astronomical.


I’ve always felt that the luckiest people I know had a talent for recognizing circumstances, not of their own making, that were conducive to a favorable outcome and their ability to quickly take advantage of them.

In other words, dumb luck was just that, it required no awareness on the person’s part, whereas “smart” luck involved awareness followed by action before the circumstances changed.

So, was I “lucky” to be born when I was—nothing I had any control over—and that I came of age just as huge databases and computers were advancing to the point where I could use those tools to write “What Works on Wall Street?” Absolutely.

Was I lucky to start my stock market investments near the peak of interest rates which allowed me to spend the majority of my adult life in a falling rate environment? Yup.
@franciscodeasis https://t.co/OuQaBRFPu7
Unfortunately the "This work includes the identification of viral sequences in bat samples, and has resulted in the isolation of three bat SARS-related coronaviruses that are now used as reagents to test therapeutics and vaccines." were BEFORE the


chimeric infectious clone grants were there.https://t.co/DAArwFkz6v is in 2017, Rs4231.
https://t.co/UgXygDjYbW is in 2016, RsSHC014 and RsWIV16.
https://t.co/krO69CsJ94 is in 2013, RsWIV1. notice that this is before the beginning of the project

starting in 2016. Also remember that they told about only 3 isolates/live viruses. RsSHC014 is a live infectious clone that is just as alive as those other "Isolates".

P.D. somehow is able to use funds that he have yet recieved yet, and send results and sequences from late 2019 back in time into 2015,2013 and 2016!

https://t.co/4wC7k1Lh54 Ref 3: Why ALL your pangolin samples were PCR negative? to avoid deep sequencing and accidentally reveal Paguma Larvata and Oryctolagus Cuniculus?