Reporting from Dalal Street

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Scene 1: The year was 2004...I was working for a Hindi news channel. The Sensex was hovering around the 4500 mark. Reporting on the markets was then a quite unexciting job. No bull run. .. No 500 point upward movement in one day .. No record landmarks... It was under such circumstances that one of my colleague wrote a market story with a outlook of Sensex crossing over 5500 in the next fortnight. I still remember the furore we created and asked him to scale down his exuberance.

Scene 2: If this was not enough, a senior official from a govt department made a comment on the sidelines of a seminar in 2005 stating that the market would soon reach 18000 mark. All hell broke loose since the markets had not even tested the 8000 levels. The media highlighted the statement...And the poor official got a tight rap from his seniors and the finance ministry for making speculative statements.

Scene 3: A very well known star investor said in 2005 that the markets would soon touch 25000. Everyone including me laughed at him for making such a irresponsible statement .. But within few months, the markets started its bull run and did not stop till this carnage.

All three situations highlight how much interest is generated in predicting the movement of the index. And rightly so, till the recent carnage in the market, all these individuals were proved right. Nothing seemed to be going wrong for the market. Record highs for the index practically every month in the last two years projected a image that this market can only go up. Maybe as investors we all forget that unless someone sells, there is no profit to be made.

But my thoughts are for those who have entered into this market without doing any research. Anyone with a few thousands to spare and a online demat account can call themselves a investor. The only reason to buy into any stock was to check its current movement. So RNRL, Nagarjuna Fertilizers, Essar Oil, RPL, Nocil were lapped up thoughtlessly. But history has proved that what goes up without reason has to come down to square one. And a quick look at these stock prices in the current scenario will give enough indication why to stay away from mere speculative stocks.

One of the investors on Dalal street gave me a very classic formula on how retail investors fall for the greed to make money. He said that there is first hope on seeing a bull run from the sidelines. Hope leads to excitement when a investor makes his first profit. But instead of cashing out with decent profits, he stays put or makes additional investments. This is called greed. And finally greed leads to utter despair when the markets crash like nine pins.

But all hope is not lost. Maybe we should listen to what one veteran investor told me based on his 40 years of experience in the markets. "When you make profits of over 80-100 per cent on a stock during a bull run, atleast have the stomach to bear a loss of 25-50 per cent during a bear phase. Nothing remains static. What goes down will go up one day if you have invested in fundamentally good stocks." Amen to that.

Signing out with the hope that better days will return to the market.