Thread by @passivefool

Thread

It's a beautiful Saturday on this Corona plagued planet. We're all going to die, but it's still a good time to rant about some #FinancialWankery. I know, I'll be pilloried for this but this is wankery at its best. So here goes...

I wrote this post with my experiences and what I knew about terrible financial advice and places where it's peddled and the players. But I missed one - mutual fund advice shows and newspaper columns.
nakedbeta.com/musings-rants/…

You might have seen those absolutely dumb shows where an investor calls in and an "expert" just doles out advice on what funds to buy/sell/hold instantly in a couple of minutes. HOWWW? How can these guys just give out advice without knowing anything about the investor?

No questions are asked about the investor's ability to stomach risk, his horizon, asset allocation, assets, liabilities, dependents, income, cash-flows, nothing!!

"HAAllo sir/Madam, I have XYZ funds, what should I do?"

Thanks for calling, this fund is blah, blah, blah, blah.

Sell fund X, hold fund X because it is awesome and sell fund X. HOWWW? Let's take a simple example. There was this one show where an "expert" recommended some debt funds. Now the thing is, most Indians are overexposed to debt - EPF, PPF, VPF, NPS, shitty insurance - you name it.

This "so-called expert" says buy X debt without finding out if the investor needed more debt exposure? What retarded advice is that? The newspaper columns are even worse than that. Look at the SHITTY advice. A person writes with overexposure to mid-caps. The advice - "Diversity"

Here's a gem.
Q: Can I invest in ELSS?
A: Yes, but you haven't given us any details. But you can invest in 2 more schemes. Not just that, here are some recommendations even though we don't know anything about you. Here are the links to the mutual fund app we have invested in.

To top it off. The platform has links both to direct and regular MF plans. If you invest in direct plans, we make nothing and that's tough luck. But, if you invest in, regular mutual fund without knowing what they are, we'll make a good ~1% as long as you are alive.

And what's worse, these people are not even fiduciary advisors, they are "distributors" or salesman to be more exact. I have absolutely no clue on what basis they give out advice. What makes this worse is that thousands watch this show and will make dumbass mistakes.

I don't know if CNBC ET, other Hindi Biz channels pay these guys or what the incentive structures are, but this is despicable. These people are messing with the financial security of 100s of people and they'll gladly engage in #financialwankery without a care in the world.

And investors aren't blameless in this. These idiots will go and listen to the other expert idiots without using an iota of sense. What's wrong with you fricking idiots? But there's also the wrinkle that in a country like India, literacy levels are low, forget financial literacy.

To all the "so-call called experts" AKA SALESMAN. You are hurting people and possibly ruining the financial futures of people. STOP, you're hurting them. Would you be okay if some moron on TV gave terrible advice to someone you know? No! You'd be busy tagging on twitter.

Investors,

You idiots. There's no easy shortcut to getting your personal finances right. Thinking about money, saving, investing is hard. But if you don't, you'll be homeless, possibly your wife and kids. Spend time, there are enough resources online where you can

learn how to Do It Yourself (DIY). If not hire an advisor - an actual advisor, not a salesman who gets ~1% commission for recommending mutual funds, not a LIC Uncle, and definitely not on some random guy on TV!!!!

Having said all this. I know this tweet is absolutely pointless and isn't even worth the effort I put into typing it.