chowyonghan Author

Insurance is an inverse freemium model

(Extracted from Business Model Generation by Alexander Osterwalder and Yves Pigneur) In the freemium model a small base of customers paying for a premium service subsidizes a large base of non-paying customers. The...

April 15, 2020| Inversion, Strategy Read More

Investors are overconfident that they won’t lose everything

(Excerpt from The Interesting Times: Reality Has a Surprising Amount of Detail by Taylor Pearson, 10 Apr 2020) People starting businesses tend to assume that losing everything is a real possibility. People investing in...

April 13, 2020| Overconfidence Bias Read More

You win by focusing on making fewer mistakes

(Excerpt from Extraordinary Tennis Ordinary Players by Simon Ramo) In expert tennis, about 80 per cent of the points are won; in amateur tennis, about 80 per cent of the points are lost. In other words, professional...

April 11, 2020| Inversion, Via Negativa Read More

You win by losing less

(Excerpt from University of Berkshire Hathaway by Daniel Pecaut and Corey Wrenn) He Charlie Munger claimed that his best ideas haven’t done better than others’ best ideas, but he’s lost less on his worst...

April 11, 2020| Fallibility, Inversion, Investing, Via Negativa Read More

Cynical Worldview

With historical data, you said it is history and of no use. With projected numbers, you said not reliable. With a quantitative approach, you said not all things can be explained with numbers. With a qualitative...

March 31, 2020| CYH Read More

Are you an investor or a market commentator

When times are good, you said share prices are high and would come down. When share prices are low, you said times are bad and share prices would go lower. Are you an investor or a market commentator?...

March 31, 2020| CYH Read More

Globalisation introduces volatility spikes

(Excerpt from “The Interesting Times” email 21 Mar 2020 by Taylor Pearson) As a thought experiment, imagine 100 ladders lined up against a long wall. Each has a 10% probability of falling over. If the...

March 22, 2020| Entropy, Investing, Nonlinearity, World Read More

A mistake is made if you had legit confidence about something but you fail to act big

(Extracted from University of Berkshire Hathaway by Daniel Pecaut and Corey Wrenn) Munger observed that the most extreme mistakes in Berkshire’s history show up as opportunity costs. … In his younger...

March 20, 2020| Circle of Competence, Investing, Kelly Criterion, Life Read More

Ovarian lottery’s role in success is often under-attributed

(Extracted from University of Berkshire Hathaway by Daniel Pecaut and Corey Wrenn) Buffett launched into an intriguing thought problem he called “the ovarian lottery.” You are to be born in 24 hours. You...

March 19, 2020| Luck Read More

Young and old me

When I was younger, I wanted to change the world. Now that I am older, I try to change myself. When I was younger, I wanted to be better than everyone. Now that I am older, I try to be better than the me yesterday. When...

March 15, 2020| CYH Read More

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