I Want To Be Doing This 40 Years From Now

A Note From Sudhir Pai

Where my diversification education began

From the start of my career, my money lived in both the United States and India. Not because a model told me to, but because my life did. Two economies, two currencies, two very different sets of risks. Long before I could have defined the word properly, I was learning what diversification actually is: arranging your financial life so that no single outcome can sink it.

This is my 30th year in business and my third year owning and managing MyTimeEquity. Thirty years sounds like a long time. It doesn't feel like one.

When I look at investors like Warren Buffett and Ray Dalio, what stands out isn't a single trade. Neither of them predicted market cycles. They stayed in the game and managed risk through the stretches when they were wrong, and that gave compounding the decades it needed to work. Longevity itself was the edge.

That is increasingly how I think about investing, and about building MyTimeEquity.

America is already my biggest bet

Look at my own financial life: public equities, retirement accounts, real estate, ownership in businesses, private equity and venture investments, digital assets, metals. Nearly all of it carries exposure to the continued success of America and its capital markets. I'm happy with that exposure. Over the long term I remain a believer in American entrepreneurship, innovation, and wealth creation.

But I can't control the economy, interest rates, Washington, geopolitics, or what the S&P 500 does tomorrow. The one thing on that list I do control is how I manage risk. That's where I want to spend my time.

Many holdings can still be one bet

If most of your investments only pay off when stocks go higher, you can own many different securities and still be making essentially a single bet. I don't want my financial future, or the philosophy we build at MyTimeEquity, to depend on one outcome.

So I'm increasingly interested in strategies that draw returns from different sources: public and private markets, structured investments, real estate, income-producing strategies, tax-aware strategies, digital assets, metals, and approaches designed to behave differently across market environments. They won't all work at the same time, and that is fine. Owning more investments is not diversification. Diversification is when your investments can succeed for different reasons.

The goal is longevity

Sometimes the most important thing in investing, and in business, is simply staying in the game. You don't have to win every trade or know where the S&P 500 will be next month. You do have to manage risk well enough to survive the periods when you're wrong. Live to fight another day.

I'm not building MyTimeEquity for the next quarter or the next market cycle. I want to be doing this 40 years from now. I want to be at dinner decades from now, telling a young investor about the extraordinary markets we lived through: the dot-com crash, the Global Financial Crisis, COVID, the day oil traded below zero, inflation, AI, crypto, and whatever crises and opportunities are still ahead. And the lesson I hope to pass on won't be about one incredible investment. It will be about managing risk, adapting, and staying in the game long enough for time to become your greatest advantage.

Get in Touch

If you'd like to discuss how a genuinely diversified portfolio can be built around your goals, reach out at wealth@mytimeequity.com and we'll set up a time to discuss your investment strategy.

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Disclaimer: MyTimeEquity is a state-registered investment adviser. Information shared is for educational and informational purposes only and should not be construed as investment, legal, tax, or accounting advice, or as a recommendation to buy or sell any security. Views expressed are subject to change without notice.