[IAC#RG] Fed up with Investment Advice e-mailers

Dear IAC members

Apparently many members of this list, and some other RTI mailing lists, are regularly receiving emails from financial consultants.

for eg. a Mumbai based investors network of social activists etc. claims past returns ranging from 36% to 72% per annum since 2012 (with the caveat that returns going forward are likely to be significantly lower).

Attractive titles typically used in the emails (I've used the Mumbai network's titles for convenience) run like this:-

• Just 15 minutes to reshape your investment scientifically
• Revealed: A system of actually buying more at market lows
• Investing Success Comes From The Right Method
• Warning: Don't make this fatal investing mistake
• Stop wasting time knowing about financial products.
• Is Investing That Simple?
• How to fix your finances without ruining your weekends

Being curious, I decided to ask them more about it with a pointed question like :-

I'm very seriously interested in this and would like to compare your program versus my own investment algorithms, My code / data is also from 2002 when the NIFTY essentially started. Could you give me the weekly / monthly  buy /sell calls generated by your Investment tool without benefit of back testing.since 2002. - Sarbajit Roy, New Delhi.

Usually, they had no reply except to say I should first subscribe to their "system" to know more about it.

Now it is very likely that due to broker nexus and insider trading / tips etc. spectacular results / returns can be generated for a few years.

However, do your due diligence thoroughly, since it seems that public email lists like ours are being scraped for email IDs and especially ex-faujis and retirees etc .are being tempted with unsustainable returns.

PS: If anyone has invested in such schemes, please contact me off-list.

Sarbajit