Patel is no analyst, but a tuition teacher and a homemaker—one of the new entrants to the stock market in 2007.

In a year, which saw the Sensex touching a record 20,000, with a percentage rise of 47.1, and with returns in many cases—diversified equity funds—over 70 per cent, Patel, who lives in Dahisar, “could not resist taking the plunge. After all, it was money”.

After years of experiencing “conservative returns from conservative investments which just about made ends meet”, in August—when the Sensex was at 12,000—she felt it was the perfect time to enter the market. She began with Rs 28,000 in varied scrips from different sectors and still considers herself a “newcomer in this market where stories change every day”. She says while the “risk and the excitement is there”, one needs “to match it with good research and diligent watch”.

Patel, who completed her Masters in commerce from Gujarat two decades ago, starts her day scanning the markets and commodities section in the pink papers, and feels that “having one’s ear to the discussions on TV between 9.30-10 am is crucial to understand the general mood in the market”.

As she prepares her 12-year-old son for school, and helps her husband with the lunch-box, the rest of the chores are done as a “television channel (kept on mute) plays the scroll” during market hours.

Patel enjoys TV serials, but not at the cost of the market news. And since August, she’s given up her afternoon nap.

Her knowledge of the market is sharp: while she is upbeat about derivatives for 2008, she is careful not to enter intra-day trading and “scrips without foundation” or with “misguided information from agents eating commissions”.

She is also a little amused about the market jargon that has entered her vocabulary. “I am concerned at times for my son and hope he does not catch this habit,” she says.

As a newcomer, Patel has booked profits between 20-60 per cent in various scrips that she bought and sold at the “right time”. Her basket covered everything from power to infrastructure to real estate and banking, though she stayed away from technology sectors as she explains: “the dollar was under pressure”.

“I rotate money. I don’t like keeping it idle. I enter when the scrip is at a low price and based on the market situation go for the time period. I usually book profits and then try to enter the same scrip,” she explains. “Fridays are lean days in the market so I try to prioritise other home-related functions on that day and weekends.”

Her biggest challenge now is to convert her husband—to enter the stock market. “He sometimes stands behind me and says don’t hold on to the stock, just sell it. I remain firm and hold on to it. I tell him, in the stock market you have to take risks. It’s money, after all.”