Be a Better Investor

‘And alternative investments provide access to risk-and-return sources you wouldn't ordinarily get through traditional portfolios’ – Equilibrium CIO Kamini Naidoo.

Company valuations drew her from the outset, so after a great deal of study, Derinia Mathura found herself a young professional managing the Melville Douglas Global Equity Fund.

You might become a portfolio manager at Sanlam Private Wealth – after trying your hand as a casino dealer, English teacher, lecturer and film producer. Thato Mashigo tells us his story.

In investments you learn that you need to make logical decisions and stay away from the emotive things, says the deputy chief investment officer for alternative investments at Alexforbes Investments.

'Accumulating those small margins is how you become successful and build up a good track record and good return for yourself': Richo Venter, Inn8 Invest’s head of portfolio management.

Malawi-born Kondi Nkosi progressed from doing ‘business studies’ at school in then Bophuthatswana to being Country Head at Schroders SA today.

If my first ‘went to four cents, I sold it. When it came back to two cents, I bought it again.’ That' s how then teenager and now CIO at Sasfin Asset Managers, Arno Lawrenz, started.

‘Don’t just read about investments, read more history; and watch cash flow – if you have growth and you've got that cash flow, when any exogenous event hits the company and it's down 30, 40, 50%, you can buy more’: Sumesh Chetty, portfolio manager at Ninety One.

It’s 'utter nonsense’ that you as the retail investor mustn't even try your hand at it. It’s not rocket science. But it does offer only one ‘free lunch’.

Saneliswile Tofile’s career progressed from investing with friends to becoming deputy CIO and a portfolio manager at All Weather Capital.