Basant Maheshwari Does A Peter Lynch – Promises To Reveal Secrets To Finding Multi-bagger Stocks

Basant Maheshwari, of Basant Top 10 and the equitydesk.com, has a long list of multi-bagger stocks to his credit. He is credited with being among the first ones to spot the huge opportunity in Pantaloon, TV18, Page Industries, Titan, Hawkins etc. Investors who followed his stock recommendations have made a lot of money.

Basant’s success in stock picking appears to be replicated by his stock advisory service ‘Basant Top 10’ as well if one goes by the 78% return posted for 2 years till November 2013.

Now, like Warren Buffett and Peter Lynch, Basant Maheshwari has also been bitten by the literary bug. He wants to document his progress as an investor and explain all the techniques involved in stock picking so that present and future legions of investors can benefit from his learning and experience.

Basant Maheshwari’s book is titled “The Thoughtful Investor: A Journey to Financial Freedom Through Stock Market”. According to the publicity material, “The Thoughtful Investor isn’t just about creating wealth but also about retaining it. The book takes the reader across the various aspects of investing which would help him in identifying the winning stocks and avoid the losing ones. Every reason to buy a potential multibagger comes with a counter argument, but those stocks will still have to be bought if an investor wants to make serious outsized gains. This book deals with all such issues and a lot more so that the focus remains not just on the speed of the return but also on the size of the gain”. It is also claimed that the arguments in the book are backed by examples on Indian companies taken out of the Indian stock market. This makes the content more relevant for the Indian investor. It is also stated that the underlying theme revolves around evaluating when to hold a stock and when to fold it, with a recurring focus on not just the Return on Capital but also the Return of Capital.

Also, in an email, Basant Maheshwari promised that “This book pretty much defines all that I know about stocks, I have not kept back anything for myself as the idea was to spread the message of investing across, rather than hold it back. In other words, I do not know anything about stocks that hasn’t been discussed in this book. For those of you who know me from the start of The Equity Desk either through discussions or by reading old posts please be assured that the content is of the highest possible order. I remain confident of meeting up to the expectations“.

“The Thoughtful Investor” is now available for pre-booking. The price of the book is Rs. 999. This is not cheap when you compare it with the price of Peter Lynch’s “One Up On Wall Street” (Rs. 315) and “Beating the Street” (Rs. 290) or Philip A. Fisher’s “Common Stocks and Uncommon Profits” (Rs. 468). Benjamin Graham’s best-seller “The Intelligent Investor” is available for Rs. 438. It, however, compares favourably with Mohnish Pabrai’s “The Dhandho Investor” which retails for Rs. 1,201. Of course, in absolute terms, Rs. 999 is a pittance and not worth paying attention to. Even if one or two passages in the book send you on the right path, you would’ve more than recovered your investment.

Now, what we have to see is whether Basant Maheshwari is able to match the success that Peter Lynch and Philip Fisher got. These books are popular amongst investors because instead of plain theoretical knowledge, they give you practical examples drawn from real life experiences on what you should do when buying stocks. Peter Lynch made popular the concept of “Buy what you know” while Philip Fisher gave a ready-made check-list of issues to watch out for while buying stocks.

I have pre-ordered a copy of “The Thoughtful Investor”. We will soon know whether Basant Maheshwari is able to successfully bridge the gap between a successful investor and a successful author. Watch this space till then!