{"id":21895,"date":"2011-06-23T10:52:34","date_gmt":"2011-06-23T14:52:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.investmentu.com\/?p=21429"},"modified":"2011-06-23T10:52:34","modified_gmt":"2011-06-23T14:52:34","slug":"follow-carlos-slim-and-fatten-your-portfolio","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/fx\/2011\/06\/23\/follow-carlos-slim-and-fatten-your-portfolio\/","title":{"rendered":"Follow Carlos Slim and Fatten Your Portfolio"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a class=\"post_title\" href=\"http:\/\/www.investmentu.com\/2011\/June\/carlos-slim-investing.html\">Follow Carlos Slim and Fatten Your Portfolio<\/a><\/p>\n<p>by  <a href=\"http:\/\/www.investmentu.com\/investment-experts\/carl-delfeld.html\" >Carl Delfeld<\/a>, <em>Investment U<\/em> Senior Analyst<br \/>\nThursday, June 23, 2011: Issue #1541<\/p>\n<p>Do  you know anyone who could be fined in the morning for a cool $1 billion for  &#8220;monopolistic practices&#8221; and still have a great day?<\/p>\n<p>I  do.<\/p>\n<p>He  has built a portfolio of companies worth an estimated $80 billion, representing  an incredible 40 percent of the value of Mexico&#8217;s entire stock market!<\/p>\n<p>This  makes Carlos Slim the world&#8217;s wealthiest individual by a comfortable margin  over laggard Warren Buffett. You&#8217;ll soon see that Mr. Slim and Mr. Buffett share more than  just living in homes purchased 40 years ago and driving their own cars&#8230; <span id=\"more-21429\"><\/span><\/p>\n<p><strong>Carlos Slim&#8217;s Telecom Empire <\/strong><\/p>\n<p>At  the core of the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.investmentu.com\/2010\/December\/carlos-slims-america-movil.html\" >Carlos Slim&#8217;s empire<\/a> are two companies that have a lock on Mexico&#8217;s telecom  market.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>America Movil<\/strong> (NYSE: <a href=\"http:\/\/www.google.com\/finance?q=NYSE:AMX\" >AMX<\/a>) is Latin America&#8217;s largest telecom company by  assets.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>Slim also controls <strong>Telmex<\/strong> (PINK: <a href=\"http:\/\/www.google.com\/finance?q=PINK:TMLSF\" >TMLSF<\/a>), acquired for only $1.7 billion.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>These companies are being merged,  setting the stage for his next move.<\/p>\n<p>But  this snapshot only gives us part of the story. More importantly, where is Mr.  Slim headed next and how we can follow his wealth-building model to grow our  own portfolios?  And you can become a   better investor just by paying attention to a few simple wealth-building lessons   that I learned by observing him.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Five Wealth-Building  Lessons From Carlo Slim<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>We can all become better investors by paying attention to a few simple <a href=\"http:\/\/www.investmentu.com\/2010\/March\/building-wealth-3.html\" >wealth-building lessons<\/a> that I learned by observing Carlos Slim&#8230;<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Follow  the Growth &#8211; <\/strong>Mr.   Slim was lucky in being born a citizen of an emerging nation with plenty of  room for growth. It&#8217;s unlikely that he would&#8217;ve built his giant fortune on such  a scale, and so rapidly, in a well-developed market like Canada or America.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Follow  the Monopolies &#8211; <\/strong>We  all learned in Economics 101 that most monopolies are bad &#8211; unless you&#8217;re an  investor. Slim takes Warren Buffett&#8217;s &#8220;economic moat&#8221; strategy to the extreme,  going for outright control. America Movil dominates the cellphone business  through Telcel, while Telmex controls 80 percent of Mexico&#8217;s landline market.  Because of many emerging countries&#8217; politics, culture and business practices,  opportunities to invest in monopolies are much higher in emerging markets than  western ones.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Follow  the Consumer &#8211; <\/strong>Slim&#8217;s  companies are focused on the simple needs of consumers. Most of his companies  provide a platform for people to communicate with each other &#8211; how simple is  that?It  seems his strategy for future growth is to smartly move up the food chain and  target the rising emerging middle-class demand for value-added services such as  internet content and video.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Follow  Diversification &#8211; <\/strong>While  Slim&#8217;s telecom holdings get all the attention, he has been careful to build a  widely diversified portfolio. Real estate, hotels, banking and finance,  department stores, tobacco and even a 6.4 percent stake in <em><a href=\"http:\/\/www.investmentu.com\/2011\/May\/three-reasons-to-buy-the-new-york-times.html\" >The New York Times<\/a><\/em> all have a place in his portfolio.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Follow  the Numbers and Be Mindful of Value &#8211; <\/strong>Getting  the big picture right is important, but it must be coupled with old-fashioned  number crunching. Slim&#8217;s ability to quickly read a balance sheet is legendary  and his hobby of mastering baseball statistics speaks volumes about his  inclination for cold-hard facts.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>How Carlos Slim Keeps His Eyes on the Prize <\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Keeping  his eye on the numbers also prevents Slim from letting his emotions get in the  way of common sense. While many are pulling back from emerging markets due to  their pullback and volatility, Slim keeps his eyes on the prize recently  stating:<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Anyone  who is not investing now is missing a tremendous opportunity.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>But  his optimism about betting on the future of Latin America&#8217;s consumer is  tempered by being very mindful of value and opportunistic in a time of crisis.  One example is his plunge into <a href=\"http:\/\/www.investmentu.com\/2010\/May\/telefonica-and-brazils-telecom-rumble.html\" >Brazilian telecoms<\/a> in 2002 as its stock market  was crashing.<\/p>\n<p>You  and I may never top the <em>Forbes<\/em> wealth derby, but we can learn from those  masters, like Mr. Slim, who show us the way.<\/p>\n<p>Good  investing,<\/p>\n<p>Carl  Delfeld<\/p>\n<div class=\"feedflare\">\n<a href=\"http:\/\/feeds.feedburner.com\/~ff\/InvestmentU?a=5Q-ge3T0kWE:JdNcEGkH82o:yIl2AUoC8zA\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/feeds.feedburner.com\/~ff\/InvestmentU?d=yIl2AUoC8zA\" border=\"0\"><\/img><\/a> <a href=\"http:\/\/feeds.feedburner.com\/~ff\/InvestmentU?a=5Q-ge3T0kWE:JdNcEGkH82o:V_sGLiPBpWU\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/feeds.feedburner.com\/~ff\/InvestmentU?i=5Q-ge3T0kWE:JdNcEGkH82o:V_sGLiPBpWU\" border=\"0\"><\/img><\/a> <a href=\"http:\/\/feeds.feedburner.com\/~ff\/InvestmentU?a=5Q-ge3T0kWE:JdNcEGkH82o:qj6IDK7rITs\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/feeds.feedburner.com\/~ff\/InvestmentU?d=qj6IDK7rITs\" border=\"0\"><\/img><\/a> <a href=\"http:\/\/feeds.feedburner.com\/~ff\/InvestmentU?a=5Q-ge3T0kWE:JdNcEGkH82o:gIN9vFwOqvQ\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/feeds.feedburner.com\/~ff\/InvestmentU?i=5Q-ge3T0kWE:JdNcEGkH82o:gIN9vFwOqvQ\" border=\"0\"><\/img><\/a> <a href=\"http:\/\/feeds.feedburner.com\/~ff\/InvestmentU?a=5Q-ge3T0kWE:JdNcEGkH82o:F7zBnMyn0Lo\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/feeds.feedburner.com\/~ff\/InvestmentU?i=5Q-ge3T0kWE:JdNcEGkH82o:F7zBnMyn0Lo\" border=\"0\"><\/img><\/a>\n<\/div>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/feeds.feedburner.com\/~r\/InvestmentU\/~4\/5Q-ge3T0kWE\" height=\"1\" width=\"1\"\/><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.investmentu.com\/2011\/June\/carlos-slim-investing.html\">Follow Carlos Slim and Fatten Your Portfolio<\/a><\/p>\n<p>by  <a href=\"http:\/\/www.investmentu.com\/investment-experts\/carl-delfeld.html\" target=\"_blank\">Carl Delfeld<\/a>, <em>Investment U<\/em> Senior Analyst<br \/>\nThursday, June 23, 2011: Issue #1541<\/p>\n<p>Do  you know anyone who could be fined in the morning for a cool $1 billion for&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-21895","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/fx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21895","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/fx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/fx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/fx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/fx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21895"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/fx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21895\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/fx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21895"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/fx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21895"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.investmacro.com\/fx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21895"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}