India’s Most Revered Investor : Mr. Rakesh Jhunjhunwala

“Growth comes out of chaos."

This is what he had to say when someone asked him whether they should invest or not if the market was bearish. Having started real stock investing in the early 2000s when he anticipated that the markets would grow profoundly, Rakesh Jhunjhunwala has come a long way since then and has now earned massive fortunes due to his ability to pick great shares, which more often than not have proved to be great investments. His net worth amounts to billions, and this has not happened overnight. His company made its breakthrough in the market in 2003, when Titan was relatively new, and he bought 3 crores of shares at Rs 3. This was a turning point for him, as it only motivated him to invest more heavily. The only regret he has had throughout his investing career is that he sold his shares of Cirithi, which is a pharmaceutical company. Although the exact amount of the loss cannot be said in exact numbers, it is however estimated to be around 800-900 crores of rupees.

Rakesh Jhunjhunwala was born on July 5, 1960, in Mumbai. His father worked as an income tax officer, which later in life helped him a lot in managing his finances, as he acknowledged. He grew up to become a chartered accountant, and during that time his interest in investing in the market grew. He made his first big profit in the year 1986, when he earned Rs 0.5 million by selling shares of Tata Tea at Rs 143, whereas he bought the shares at a low price of Rs 43 just three months earlier. In total, he made a profit of Rs 20–25 lacs between 1986 and 1989, and there was no stopping him now. He is labelled by many as the Warren Buffet of India. India Today gave him the title of "pin-up boy" of the current bull run in India. He currently manages his own portfolio at his asset management firm, which goes by the name Rare Enterprises. The name of his firm is derived from his wife’s first name, which is Rekha. "Rare" actually has "Ra" for Rakesh and "Re" for his wife Rekha. This was in honour of his wife because she played a major role in his life as she acted as his support system in times of distress or when he would lose large sums of money.

Another person without whom his life would be incomplete is another billionaire stock investor, Radha Kishan Damani. Mr. Damani had anticipated the Harshad Mehta scam before it actually happened, and he was one of the few who made large profits from the scam at a time when most people were fighting for insolvency. Radha Kishan Damani is the guru, and Rakesh Jhunjhunwala is the disciple. The mantra to success in the stock market can be summed up by this: don’t invest where everyone else is investing, but invest where no one else is looking. Rakesh Jhunjhunwala started investing in 1985, when he was 15–16 years old. He initially started with a small capital of Rs. 5,000, but he knew he had to have the patience to earn money, which he did.

I would like to end by saying that investing in the stock market is risky, so you should invest in the business, not the company, because any time of the day, it’s the business that matters, not the company.

By Rahul Gupta