In this edition of the reader story, we have a sequel to My Journey to a Ten Crore Portfolio. Arun digs deep and shows us how long it took for his portfolio to increase by one crore to a 15 Crore portfolio today.
Opinions published in reader stories need not represent the views of freefincal or its editors. We must appreciate multiple solutions to the money management puzzle and empathise with diverse views. Articles are typically not checked for grammar unless necessary to convey the right meaning and preserve the tone and emotions of the writers.
If you would like to contribute to the DIY community in this manner, send your audits to freefincal AT Gmail dot com. They can be published anonymously if you so desire.
Please note: We welcome such articles from young earners who have just started investing. See, for example, this piece by a 29-year-old: How I track financial goals without worrying about returns. We have also started a new “mutual fund success stories” series. This is the first edition: How mutual funds helped me reach financial independence. Now, over to the reader.
Bull run after the march 2020 crash has created lot of crorepatis in stock market. As the mood is buoyant, everyone is churning out articles and videos on how easy life gets once we cross first crore mark on the portfolio level. Let us review one real life case.
Disclaimers
- I am sharing my personal journey. This is not to brag or highlight any special talent (I have none!). Just sharing the PF growth over the years, primarily to inspire young earners to save and invest over long period and there is reasonable chance of being successful for average joes like us (salaried with no special talent).
- Personal finance is truly personal. One can achieve FI using Real estate or Fixed income or create 100Cr PF with small caps stocks in 4 years (As seen recently in AIFW Group). As long as, your goals are achieved with risks and volatility you can stomach, be happy.
- My FIRE number was much smaller when originally planned, but then life has been kind and hence followed along with gratitude. In no way I am claiming having X number of crore is the measure of success. If your goals are met, you are successful. If you make more than that, be grateful and be extra happy.
- Most of this achievement is gift of market and purely luck. My contribution is only to invest max amount possible consistently over long period. Have a reasonable plan and stay at as long as you can, it is the only advice I could give (If I must give one).
- If you are going through tough financial situation or in a state of despair, I can only pray and hope that things get better, and your train gets back to track soon to reach your goals. Good luck.
- Some of the numbers like recent investment amount may look unreal for normal investor. There is no incentive for me to fake as I am not on any SM or selling any course. If you have asked me few years back if this is possible, I would have laughed myself. So, trying to be as truthful as I can be.
Below is the growth of the portfolio and the no of months it took to reach the milestone (from previous one)
| Crore No | Amount | No of Months | Total Months |
| 1 | 10000000 | 110 | 110 |
| 2 | 20000000 | 24 | 134 |
| 3 | 30000000 | 15 | 148 |
| 4 | 40000000 | 26 | 174 |
| 5 | 50000000 | 12 | 186 |
| 6 | 60000000 | 5 | 191 |
| 7 | 70000000 | 3 | 194 |
| 8 | 80000000 | 5 | 199 |
| 9 | 90000000 | 9 | 208 |
| 10 | 100000000 | 7 | 215 |
| 11 | 110000000 | 2 | 217 |
| 12 | 120000000 | 5 | 222 |
| 13 | 130000000 | 2 | 224 |
| 14 | 140000000 | 4 | 228 |
| 15 | 150000000 | 1 | 229 |
The amount only considers what is invested in Mutual Funds and Direct Equity. Other asset classes such as real Estate, gold etc. not considered in this.
- 1st Crore mark was reached in 110 months since I started investing in capital market. Primarily in mutual fund and direct equity during this period is miniscule. This is typical journey of IT guy who starts at Software Engg. salary and working his way up (with some onsite income/allowance thrown in). Nowadays, pay scale of FAANG / start-up etc. have reduced this to 3-4 years at least for the talented and lucky ones. For other folks, 9 to 10 years of consistent effort is the norm.
- 2nd Crore was done in about 24 Months. Significant reduction from previous mark. So, it does feel much easier. Also, very high investments. 65% of previous investment done in 110 months was pumped in during this 24 month. Here is when I realized 1000rs SIP is not enough.
- 3rd Crore took about 15 months. Not a big change from previous milestone
- 4th Crore took about 26 months. Primarily due to market crash of 2020. Market return or crash plays a significant role.
- 5th crore took about 12 months. By this time market is in recovery mode. Moved to next milestone in a year.
- 6th Crore took about 5 months. PF size + Good market up move working in tandem.
- 7th Crore took only 3 months. PF size + Good market up move working in tandem. May and Jun 21 had a huge upward movement.
- 8th Crore took about 5 months. Continuous 1-2 % up move per month enough to move PF to next milestone.
- 9th Crore took about 9 months. Lot of monthly decline during the period so took longer but still under single digit month.
- 10th Crore took about 7 months. Some negative and few positive months in between. Important milestone of 10 Crore achieved.
- 11th Crore took about 2 months. Lowest so far. May, Jun, Jul 2023 had huge up move propelling PF to next milestone in shortest period.
- 12th Crore took about 5 months. Moderate monthly gains during this time
- 13th Crore took about 2 months. Huge up move in Nov and Dec 2023.
- 14th Crore took about 4 months. Slow monthly growth and election volatility. However, month closed with next milestone.
- 15th Crore took 1 month. Finally move to next crore in a month. Was already on halfway mark Prev month itself. Despite budget surprise, happy to reach the milestone in Jul 2024
Some statistics for the data enthusiasts
- Total Investments for the first 12 Months was 44,000 Rs.
- Total Investments in the last 12 months was about 73 Lakhs. Agree this is insane for an avg investor.
- For an Additional investment of 86 Lakhs after 10 Cr mark, PF is at 15 Cr. So, PF working harder than the additional investments supported by bull market.
- PF has a large portion of Debt MF (22%). While PF falls less than the market and always gains less than the market. Despite huge debt allocation, growth is phenomenal in this type of bull run.
- PF was 3.28 Crore at the end of Mar 2020 and by Jul 2024, value jumped to 15+ Cr.
- It took 215 months to reach 10Cr. Next 5 Cr came in 14 months. Gift of market or compounding, I am not sure.
- Highest single month drop so far is around 62.6 Lakhs and highest single month gain is around 78.3 lakhs so far.
In Summary,
- Moving to next crore is mostly dependent on the market movement. While a large portfolio surely helps to move to next milestone quicker, but a long sideways market can make it take longer.
- Market is on steroids since Mar 2020 is making it look so easy, but I consider it just a bull market outcome.
- Large monthly additional investment does help but again without market support, it does not go up drastically.
- Since 2020, we have not seen a monthly downward movement of more than 2.5% (At PF level). So would attribute this to the bull run and not sure when the music will stop.
- Finally seen 1 Crore jump under a month. Surely will see multi crore crash in a single month in the times to come.
- As I am salaried, Invest the max amount possible in SIP mode is the simple plan I follow. I have no plan to time or pause and wait or come up with some other strategy.
- Regular dull boring SIP irrespective of market condition have worked so far. No plan to change my approach going forward. Not planning to venture into PMS, AIF, Fractional RE etc. Will stick to this simple plan.
- As of now I do regular monthly SIPs via MF central / MFU mostly in Index funds. If any lumpsum due to sale, I redeploy over a 6-month additional sip. There is some Direct Equity buying in SIP mode as well.
- I am far away from a simple portfolio due to buying over a long period. Still lot of clutter to clean up. That is an area I need to focus on in the coming years considering the capital gain impact.
Reader stories published earlier:
As regular readers may know, we publish a personal financial audit each December – this is the 2022 edition: Portfolio Audit 2022: The Annual Review of My Goal-based Investments. We asked regular readers to share how they review their investments and track financial goals.
These published audits have had a compounding effect on readers. If you would like to contribute to the DIY community in this manner, send your audits to freefincal AT Gmail. They could be published anonymously if you so desire.
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