Deep value makes you rich and sick in equal measure. Add one calming rule and it becomes a strategy you could actually keep.

Rank companies by cheapness and by how little their price bounces around, and buy the ones that do well on both. It made about 20% a year against the market's 13.9%, turning ₹10 lakh into roughly ₹58 lakh. That is only a little behind raw deep value, but it earned it in a completely different way, and left you a completely different portfolio to hold.

Most of the return, a fraction of the pain

Here is the whole point of the screen, in one chart. Where pure deep value fell about 70% at its worst, adding the calm filter cut that to roughly 49%. Still a serious fall, but a survivable one, and far gentler than the strategies that chase cheapness alone. You gave up a few points of return and bought, in exchange, a ride you might actually stay seated for.

And it owned names you could hold without wincing

The calm filter changed the portfolio's character entirely. Raw value drags you into obscure, volatile micro caps. This screen leaned into large, cheap, steady businesses: Coal India, Power Grid, Oil and Natural Gas, NTPC, the big cash generative utilities and energy names. Around a quarter of the money sat in genuinely large companies, not the speculative fringe. It is deep value with the anxiety filtered out.

The version of value most people should actually consider

Raw deep value posted bigger numbers, but bigger numbers you abandon at the bottom are worth nothing. Defensive value is the quieter, wiser cousin: nearly as much return, in nearly household names, with a fall you have a real chance of holding through. For most investors the best strategy is not the highest returning one on the page, but the highest returning one they will still own after a terrible year. This is a strong candidate for that, and the only way to know if it is yours is to sit with its worst year before you commit real money to its best.

So we took it to Krest, and ran it through the whole test.