As equity markets still reach new heights, there’s no dearth of voices advising caution. the ecu Securities and Markets Authority, as an example , said, “The materialisation of event-driven risks (such as Gamestop, Archegos, Greensill), also because the inflation and volumes traded on cryptoassets, raise questions on increased risk-taking behaviour and possible market exuberance. Hence, concerns about the sustainability of current market valuations remain, and current trends got to show resilience over an extended period of your time for a more positive assessment.”

When one sees venerable institutes like Russia’s State Hermitage Museum selling NFTs of Leonardo and Kandinsky works for cold, cash or real-world businesses like D&G securitise and monetise their IP by selling digital apparel for digital avatars, one has got to ponder whether this is often only the rapidly inflating fringe of a bubble or the beginning of a true , sustainable parallel economy within the ‘Metaverse’ being thought up by the likes of Mark Zuckerberg.

Even “traditional” asset managers, like Invesco, are offering investors the chance to venture into territory where VCs and angels fear to tread.

The euphoria is occurring against a background of recovery from the pandemic and therefore the lockdowns on the one hand and rising risks to business arising from multiple disruptions on the opposite . Consider the carnage in Chinese tech stocks as a results of Xi Jinping’s hammer blows, with “big capitalists” and show business “sissy-boy stars” being castigated in what some believe is an echo of the Maoist era. the newest manifestation of China’s noose around India is seen in its rail link with Myanmar. Then there are the concerns over what the Fed’s tapering of bond purchases would do to bloated financial markets. the danger of a 3rd wave remains out there, with the festival season before us. Our recovery tracker showed mixed trends during the week, with falling unemployment and increasing demand, but the tepid sales of two-wheelers cast some doubt over the agricultural revival story. What’s more, although the monsoon has improved, the low increase in minimum support prices for the rabi crop, at a time when input costs are rising, could limit farm income and dampen rural demand. Indeed, fertiliser and agrochemical companies face multiple headwinds. With state governments cash-strapped, their development spending may get affected.

With pandemics, de-globalisation, negative interest rates, record debt burdens, new age platform businesses, the web of things, AI , demographic change and rising geopolitical concerns, an age of disruption threatens us. In banks and fintech, the disruption is already evident.

One number looms over all, just like the Eye of Sauron over Mordor – 1.5°C. it’s widely expected that even with drastic decreases in carbon emission, we’ll exceed that number and within the event that temperatures rise by 2 or 3 degrees, we may reminisce wistfully at a time when only markets wont to get overheated.

It’s no wonder then that we recommended booking profits on several stocks in the week , or expecting a correction before buying. These include Coforge, up 55 per cent within the last four months, Dhanuka Agritech, Saregama—up 327 per cent year so far , SRF and Nuvoco Vistas. We also advised investors to accumulate the Clean Science and Technology stock on declines. the priority with high valuations also played call at HDFC Life’s acquisition of Exide’s insurance business, which we analysed intimately both from Exide’s and HDFC Life’s point of view.

But is it really time to sell? We checked out arguments on each side of the talk , but there’s a more fundamental issue with decisions to sell stocks. during a recent NBER working paper titled, ‘Selling Fast and Buying Slow: Heuristics and Trading Performance of Institutional Investors’, the researchers found that while investors display clear skill in buying, their selling decisions not only fail to beat a no-skill random selling strategy, they consistently underperform it by substantial amounts. the rationale , say the researchers, is psychological — portfolio managers think differently about and allocate different amounts of effort towards the 2 decisions. The paper says: “Extensive interviews suggest that they seem to focus totally on finding subsequent great idea to feature to their portfolio and consider selling largely as how to boost cash for purchases.” briefly , while buy decisions are agonized over and yield superior outcomes over applicable benchmarks or random buying strategies, sell decisions are cognitive step-children and are made using quick, heuristic of thumb criteria. But is that basically true in raging bull markets, when the mantra seems to get on buying indiscriminately?

Thankfully, there are several stocks that met our stringent buying criteria. These include KEI Industries, SIS, Zensar and a clutch of defence stocks. The boom within the markets is a chance for brokerages and asset management companies.

There are other themes: we had a bit on the last decade high aluminium prices and whether it had been time to shop for Hindalco; on Adani Ports taking advantage of the recovery in exports; and on what’s next for Ujjivan Small Finance Bank. We made the bullish case for India outperforming the remainder of the planet . In an interview with us, Carborundum Universal MD N Ananthaseshan said the corporate has lined up capex for the present year and is hospitable acquisitions. and that we said ITC could learn a thing or two from Zomato to enhance its valuations.

Finally, within the context of the Taliban taking up Kabul, armed only with Kalashnikovs and their beards, let’s check out another piece of research. This year’s Ig Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to college of Utah researchers for a study exploring whether beards may serve an evolutionary purpose to guard the jaw during a fistfight. No wonder the Taliban, who love an honest scrap, have all that fuzz.

Closer inspection, though, shows this view of beards could also be incorrect. After all, none aside from Darwin , the daddy of recent evolutionary biology, wrote within the Descent of Man: “It appears that our male ape-like progenitors acquired their beards as an ornament to charm or excite the other sex.”