Ashvin B. Chhabra

The Chief Investment Officer of Merrill Lynch Wealth Management explains why goals, not markets, should be the primary focus of your investment strategy—and offers a practical, innovative framework for making smarter choices about aligning your goals to your investment strategy. Today all of us bear the burden of investing wisely, but too many of us are preoccupied with the wrong priorities—increasing returns at all costs, finding the next star fund manager, or beating “the market.” Unfortunately conventional portfolio theory and the grand debates in finance have offered investors only incomplete solutions. What is needed, argues Ashvin B. Chhabra, is a framework that shifts the focus of investment strategy from portfolios and markets to individuals and the objectives that really things like protecting against unexpected financial crises, paying for education or retirement, and financing philanthropy and entrepreneurship. The Aspirational Investor is a practical, innovative approach to managing wealth based on key goals and the careful allocation of risks rather than responding to the whims of the financial markets. Chhabra introduces his “Wealth Allocation Framework,” which accommodates the three seemingly incompatible objectives that must underpin every sound wealth management the need for financial security in the face of known and unknowable risks; the need to maintain current living standards over time despite inflation; and the need to pursue aspirational goals for wealth creation. Chhabra reveals some surprising facts about wealth creation, reinterprets the success formulas of investing greats like Warren Buffett, and closes the gap between theory and practice by simplifying our understanding of key asset classes and laying out a concise roadmap for identifying, prioritizing, and quantifying financial goals. Raising the bar for what we should expect from our investment portfolios—and our financial advisors— The Aspirational Investor sets us on a path to more confident and fulfilling financial lives.

Investing is not about beating the markets. It should be about your life’s be it achieving safety for your family, a better life for your children, starting or expanding a business or creating wealth. Unfortunately, today, we are often preoccupied with the wrong priorities—like increasing returns at all costs or finding the next star fund manager.In The Aspirational Investor, chief investment officer of Merrill Lynch Wealth Management Ashvin B. Chhabra offers a practical, innovative framework for making smarter choices about aligning your investment strategy to your life’s goals. What investors need, argues Chhabra, is a framework that shifts the focus of investment strategy from portfolios and markets to individuals. He reveals some surprising facts about wealth creation, reinterprets the success formulas of investing greats like Warren Buffett,and lays out a concise roadmap for identifying, prioritizing and quantifying financial goals.Raising the bar for what we should expect when we decide to invest, The Aspirational Investor sets us on a path to more confident and fulfilling financial lives.