Evan Harp sat down with Haren Bhakta, CFA, of Inside Ownership to discuss investing, Exchange, and why Warren Buffett is his inspiration.
Evan Harp: Please tell us about your practice.
Haren Bhakta: We like to work with clients who think long term. It’s the only way we know they will stick with the plan when the markets go crazy as they do every so often. We want clients who understand markets are volatile. And we can use that volatility to our advantage, and even celebrate major dips in the market because it gives us more opportunity to allocate capital at cheaper prices.
Avoiding the Fool's Errand
Harp: What is your investment philosophy?
Bhakta: We believe market timing and stock picking is a fool’s errand. Investors are much better off not forming strong opinions on the direction of the market, and focus on the long term. We strongly believe dollar-cost-averaging into the stock market using index funds over a long term will produce better results than 90% of other investors who try to time the market and those who pick stocks.
Bhakta on Maturing as an Investor
Harp: What is the biggest challenge you had to overcome, and how did you do it?
Bhakta: The biggest challenge I had was having long underperforming periods as an investor. In my younger years, when I thought I was smarter than the market, I made a large bet on a stock and I was extremely wrong. I think every young investor has to go through this in order to figure out that index funds and avoiding market timing is the prudent thing to do. Prudence is courage, is what I tell myself.
Bhakta on Exchange
Harp: What are you most looking forward to at the Exchange conference?
Bhakta: I’m looking forward to connecting with peers and colleagues. I believe having in-person get-togethers is how big things happen. By collaborating and networking, we get to leverage this synergy that may lead to bigger things.
Harp: Who is a finance professional who inspires you?
Bhakta: There are so many I learned from over the 15 years in this business, I can’t just name one. No one has done more for me than Warren Buffett. He truly inspires me. Something he said at the last annual meeting really resonated with me. He said he loves making money for other people and having them trust him. He feeds off of that, and this is exactly how I feel. I love having the trust of my clients and I really feed off of that.
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