“I've had a Bloomberg terminal since university. I sleep next to one! At Concordia, we had early access through the John Dobson-Formula Growth Investment Room.”
Vishal Patel started at Dynamic Funds with an internship while at Concordia’s Kenneth Woods Portfolio Management Program. What has kept him there for his entire career of more than 16 years has been the ability to craft his own style as a portfolio manager.
“It’s one of the few places where you don’t have to follow anyone else’s footsteps or be molded into someone else’s style,” says Patel, who as Toronto-based vice-president of Scotiabank’s 1832 Asset Management L.P. division, oversees a small group of analysts managing more than $6 billion.
His investment style
“I would consider myself a quality-growth investor. The reason why we've done well, have good assets and good performance really comes down to a strong investment process that incorporates both quantitative and qualitative tools.”
Man versus machine investing
“I love stocks, and I love the market.
“In a world where everything is being done by a computer, there is an idea that jobs like mine will go away because artificial intelligence is just going to pick your stocks. I'm not so sure about that.
“We are using computers, but then you’ve got to complement that with the qualitative factors which are softer, and harder to determine. It goes back to this idea of Iron Man where if you can use man plus machine, I think you have better outcomes.”
Pandemic challenges
“To identify strong businesses and strong business leaders, you’ve got to think about company culture. The best way to identify company culture is to actually go out and visit companies.
“This is the qualitative piece, the softer piece you get to by meeting in person, shaking hands, going to conferences and having conversations.”
Favourite investing quote
“Benjamin Graham said, ‘In the short term, the market is a voting machine. In the long term, it's a weighing machine.’”
His most useful technological tool
“I've had a Bloomberg terminal since university. I sleep next to one! At Concordia, we had early access through the John Dobson-Formula Growth Investment Room. This idea of using quantitative tools on Bloomberg and learning that earlier on has been very valuable.”