1. The Rise Of The West
Once upon a time, China and India were the dominant world economies. They accounted for easily 40% of global GDP.
However, approximately 500 years ago, the West began to rise. The driving force behind it was science and technology. I have experience dealing with Chinese, Indians, Westerners, etc. Based on my observation, no one single race is more superior than the others. Everybody is more or less equal, when comes to intellect.
If that is the case, how did the West pull ahead of everybody to emerge as the dominant force in the world ? It is the system. They have developed a platform and method that facilitated development of science and technology, thereby significantly increasing their productivity.
To have a feel of what I am trying to say, let's first look at our own Chinese way of handling technology. The West was not the only people that deployed technology. The Chinese keenly studied various natural phenomenon and harness their power for economic gain. Apart from Compass, Gun Powder, Paper, Printing, etc, there are numerous other things invented by the Chinese. This included medicine, special usage of material, etc.
However, this was where the Chinese differed from the West. For Chinese, inventions were trade secret. You don't disclose the full amount to your disciples, unless he is part of your family. Due to the above practices, things were regularly invented in China, but they failed to blossom and propel the nation into a modern state.
2. Two Critical Components
500 years ago, the West developed an academic system that contained two critical components :
(a) Objectivity - Speaks with facts and truths, not propagandas, beliefs or ideologies. Whatever academic papers presented by scholars will be vetted by independent and neutral academic peers. Nobody can force things down other people's throat. If you want to do that, you will simply be ignored and excluded from the process. Professionalism was the order of the day.
(b) Openess - Discoveries no more shielded with secrecy. The merit based system didn't provide financial rewards for new discoveries. Instead, credits was given to the publishers of the papers, recognition was accorded to the academics for contribution they made in advancing the particular field of studies. Keep your academic discoveries in a locker ? You got to be kidding !!! The moment the paper has been finalized, the academics will rush to release their findings so as to identify themselves as the person that pioneered the concept. If you are a bit slow and somebody undertaking similar study released ahead of you, you ten years of hard work will go down the drain.
The combination of above two factors created a force so powerful that science and technology took off, creating the modern world that we lived in now.
3. i3 As A Platform For Information Sharing and Expertise Development
I have been in the market for a long time. Overall, my track record was ok. I managed to grow my wealth. However, there was a limit on how well I can do. In certain period, my performance was erratic and I was not on the top of the food chain, so to say.
I joined i3 in 2014. Since then, I was exposed to various information and concepts provided by forum members. That benefited me a lot. I now have better feel of the market, various stocks and strategies. My performance had improved a lot as a result.
In my opinion, I was not the only person that benefited. Over the past two years, through sharing of information, fine tuning of concepts and reasoning, I notife i3 members as a whole have improved and matured by a lot. Really a lot.
For example, when I first started blogging, I was frequently pestered for Target Price. "What is the Target Price ? Write a lot of nonsense but did not give a Target Price. £€+*^%#¥". But now, nobody said that to me anymore. Most of the forum members now know what to do with the info I provided them. They correctly treated my articles as source of insights and information, not so much recommendations.
Another evolution I notice was the concept of Margin of Safety. Back in 2014, whenever I wrote that this company has strong balance sheets (low borrowing and most importantly, surplus cash), forum members will go crazy and rush in to buy. But nowadays, I notice that forum members no more reacted to such details with eagerness. I would attribute this to gradual acceptance that future earning is the key price driver (Uncle Koon) and stockmanmy's frequent lashing out on the concept of margin of safety through balance sheet strength. I believe that have an effect on forum members subconscious, causing them to change their perspective in a subtle way.
The reasons I brought up the above two examples are to indicate the academic system pioneered by the West as mentioned above seemed to be well and working in i3. i3 is now a forum for members to share information openly and discuss issues objectively.
As a result, it has evolved into a very EFFECTIVE platform for stock market investing.
That is why I named this article "The Evolution of i3 Into a Super Investor". I believe that when come to portfolio return, many i3 members must be at the top of the echelon, beating even analysts and fund managers.
Dont believe me ? Just look at the return of various forum members for month of March for Stockpick 2017. Of course, the market in general has done well. But if you look at the stock picks, you will notice that many are ver well chosen, reflecting insights, skills and understanding of what they were doing.
We have benefited a lot from this platform. Let's try to do our parts to preserve and enhance this eco system through sharing of information and ideas in a productive way.
Have a nice day.
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