I have this rather untested theory about stock market crashes. Every time you spot Bengalis becoming active and investing in the stock market, you are pretty much near the peaks. I actually witnessed this to some extent during the Harshad Mehta induced 1993 crash when it was common for a Bengali in a crammed Calcutta mini bus beam happily – “ACC book kore dilam dada” (just booked some ACC stocks. Curiously they used the word “booked” instead of buy – a hangover from the license raj where one had to get into a queue even to get cooking gas).
So are the Bengalis buying stocks now? I am not entirely sure since I have moved away from Calcutta. However, I have started gathering observations around another hypothesis of mine. Watch out for the “Sir, personal loan sir” guy outside my office building. If he is there frequently enough just short the stocks with high PE ratios. It is sad that I don’t run a hedge fund – else, I could have pioneered the “Human behavior relative value” strategy. Watch this space to see how my strategy does!

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