An interesting fact which Dr. Duvvuri Subba Rao mentions in his book, ‘Who moved my Interest Rate’ – The only RBI Governor who calibrated the Interest Rates for 23 times (Raising the rates 13 times & reducing them 10 times) during his tenure, between 2008 – 13.
Having appointed as the RBI Governor, just a week into the peak of the 2008 Global Financial Crisis, he mentions that, ‘Unprecedented Times required Unprecedented Actions’.
I would have been happy to keep a track of every analyst’s estimate on the interest rate movement during his tenure. It would have been a factual eye opener on, how bad can their ‘calls’ go.
And imagine what if, an Investor ‘Churned / Re-balanced’ his portfolio 23 times during the same period of 5 years ?, reacting to every move by the Governor. The result – An “Absolute Portfolio Disaster”.
He signs off a chapter saying, ‘I hope no other Governor faces such a challenging time’. It was not in his hands, he had to (pro)react to the Global world.
Thankfully, an Investor ‘Need Not’ react to the Domestic & Global scenarios as many times as he ever had to.
And Unprecedented Times require Unprecedented Actions from an Investor, too. Yes ?, but in the form of BUYING & not SELLING.