Portfolio Update – September 2022
Much water has flown under the bridge since my last portfolio update 3 months back and yet not much has changed if I look at the markets/PF from a YTD perspective. 2022 is the year of no returns and getting through to the end of 2022 without being badly bruised or damaged could be counted as the success of an investor this year.
“India shining” was a political campaign at the start of a multi-year bull market from 2004. 18 years later, despite the extremely dark grey macroeconomic clouds in US and Europe – I can confidently say India is truly shining on the global stage with strong economic growth reflected in the equity market outperformance and currency markets. However, no magnitude of economic growth will salvage us if the US economy were to tailspin into a severe recession. We will all be hit by it, but just to a lesser extent because of a strong domestic economy.
Overall, it has been interesting to observe the strength in the broader markets. With Nifty near a ~10% correction from ATH, the Mid and Small Cap indices are also only down by that much . Generally, they have a multiplier effect both on the upside and downside. But given their resilience so far, I don’t think there are too many cheap throwaway valuation companies in the current market.
From a portfolio standpoint, there has been a strong recovery in Q3CY22 similar to the market, however it has only brought us close to parity for the year. Stocks like ICICI Bank, Polycab, Prataap Snacks, Macpower which are near all-time high / 52wk high have helped protect the downside along with a decent recovery in the financials. In recent times, I have mainly been adding high dividend yielding companies (4-5% yields) with a reasonably strong growth outlook. If there is any sharp decline or adverse news, the div yields should protect the downside and also act to minimize opportunity cost of cash in the bank at 4-5%.
Portfolio Updates
I’m now down to exactly 30 stocks in the PF. I have made 2 changes – exited Tips Industries and Jubilant Ingrevia.
The exit in Tips Industries at 1900 (doubler in 1 year for me) was explained here and seems like a decent decision with stock having corrected 20% from there 
The exit in Jubilant Ingrevia was due to the multiple negative publicity of various chemical companies plant fires/incidents (Valiant Organics, Deepak Nitrite, etc.) and Jubilant Ingrevia already has a bad track record of environmental compliance, very well covered in that thread.
Portfolio Holdings
| Name | Current % |
|---|---|
| HCLTECH | 8.28% |
| RPPL | 7.62% |
| MACPOWER | 7.37% |
| HDFC | 6.47% |
| BETA | 6.33% |
| ISEC | 6.10% |
| ICICIGI | 4.31% |
| GLS | 3.94% |
| MASFIN | 3.83% |
| ICICIPRULI | 3.78% |
| ICICIBANK | 3.74% |
| KOTAKBANK | 3.74% |
| MOMOMENTUM | 3.61% |
| GOLDIAM | 2.81% |
| HDFCLIFE | 2.72% |
| RADIOCITY | 2.50% |
| MAFANG+ ETF | 2.23% |
| VAIBHAVGBL | 2.18% |
| VALIANTORG | 2.10% |
| APOLLOPIPE | 2.03% |
| POLYCAB | 1.97% |
| DIAMONDYD | 1.95% |
| NEULANDLAB | 1.76% |
| MUTHOOTFIN | 1.74% |
| INOXLEISUR | 1.70% |
| VMART | 1.46% |
| SWARAJENG | 1.07% |
| ACRYSIL | 1.03% |
| CERA | 0.97% |
| SOLARA | 0.70% |
On a side note, I’m seriously toying with the idea of starting a small momentum portfolio. The back test results are quite conclusive in terms of the outperformance vs indices both in up and down markets. I’m actually looking for app/ways on how to execute trades automatically on Zerodha or ICICI Direct to completely take out the manual / emotional element of investing.
Festive season’s greetings to all VPers 
