Latest / Money And Wealth With John Hope Bryant / Money & Wealth w/ Alexander Roepers

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Money & Wealth w/ Alexander Roepers · Money And Wealth With John Hope Bryant

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Welcome the Money in Wealth with John O'Bryant, a production
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: of the Black Effect Podcast Network and iHeartRadio. Hey, Hey
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: is John Hobryant, And this is Money and Wealth. This
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: is another exciting week of conversation. As you see, I'm
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: wearing a suit today with those who are viewing this
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  Speaker 1: versus listening to this, that means I've got a proper
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: guest in front of me and Michael Milkin and my
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: other friends who I don't wear suits around. You can
• 0:38
  Speaker 1: interpret that however you like. This is a guy that
• 0:41
  Speaker 1: I just met and I was impressed with him so
• 0:45
  Speaker 1: much on an initial meeting, probably the only time I've
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  Speaker 1: ever done an interview with anybody where literally on just
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  Speaker 1: meeting them versus having a long term relationship, I said,
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  Speaker 1: you have got to get on tape like you. The
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  Speaker 1: world needs to hear. And it was a very improbable meeting. Well,
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  Speaker 1: let me tell you who he is first. Alexander Rupers
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  Speaker 1: and he will correct me if I'm not pronouncing his
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  Speaker 1: name precisely correct. Is a founder and chief investment officer
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  Speaker 1: of one of the most important investment companies in America.
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  Speaker 1: He is on Wall Street and a running Atlantic investment
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  Speaker 1: management which has a global impact but based in New
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  Speaker 1: York City. He has forty two years of experience in investment,
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  Speaker 1: thirty six years its founder and CEO CIO Chief Investment
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  Speaker 1: Officer CIO is more important than CEO in his space
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  Speaker 1: chief executive officer versus chief investment officer at Atlantic, which
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  Speaker 1: he founded in nineteen eighty eight. He was private previously
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  Speaker 1: with a couple other corporations and investment houses. Masters of
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  Speaker 1: Business Administration Harvard Business School in nineteen eighty four, a
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  Speaker 1: Bachelor of Business Administration at the Netherlands School of Business
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  Speaker 1: in nineteen eighty It's fluent Dutch, German, French and finance.
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  Speaker 1: It is the fluency in finance that we want to
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  Speaker 1: talk about today. I am honored to welcome someone that
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  Speaker 1: I'm going to call a new friend onto this podcast
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  Speaker 1: platform so he can educate you and how we make
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  Speaker 1: smart sexy. Alex, you're a pretty cool guy. I know
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  Speaker 1: because I read people very well and it's one of
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  Speaker 1: my few gifts. And do you remember the conversation that
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  Speaker 1: we had in the Hamptons that stumped me?
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, I know, I do. It was part of a
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  Speaker 2: panel for the Mike Milkin Hampton dialogues with the title
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  Speaker 2: Minister as a force for good. First of all, thanks
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  Speaker 2: for having me and great to be with you.
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  Speaker 1: Well, I'm honored to have you with me. I'm honored
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  Speaker 1: to have met you through Michael Milkin, and I love
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  Speaker 1: the way you lead. And I don't just even I
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  Speaker 1: don't just love your cool house. It is exactly my
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  Speaker 1: style or your very cool wife who is a wonderful
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  Speaker 1: soul and spirit. I loved your energy and soul and spirit.
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  Speaker 1: But I really loved our conversation, not just because you're
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  Speaker 1: normal and being in the world of finance and high finance,
• 3:34
  Speaker 1: some people are just arrogant, they're obnoxious, they're self absorbed,
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  Speaker 1: they're in a different world because I think they're uncomfortable
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  Speaker 1: in their own skin. That's a whole different podcast on
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  Speaker 1: spirituality we're not going to do today. But somehow you
• 3:45
  Speaker 1: became reasonably comfortable in your own skin. Maybe we'll talk
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  Speaker 1: about that as it relates to sort of unpacking your background.
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  Speaker 1: But you and I had two separate conversations. One was
• 3:57
  Speaker 1: briefly at your house and another one was at a
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  Speaker 1: neighbor of yours home, and you laid some philosophy about
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  Speaker 1: the world down to me, do you remember that conversation.
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  Speaker 2: It was tied to the subject matter of the panel
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  Speaker 2: session that we had at my house in terms of
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  Speaker 2: education to the broader public out there, in terms of
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  Speaker 2: basic finance and basic running your your household, more importantly
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  Speaker 2: saving for the future, and how important that is, and
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  Speaker 2: how that actually feed us right into investment management on
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  Speaker 2: Wall Street and certainly the way the Atlantic investment that
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  Speaker 2: we go about picking our stocks. It's really at the
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  Speaker 2: household level of simplicity. People forget that when they buy
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  Speaker 2: a car, or dishwasher or a home, they do a
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  Speaker 2: ton of research. Actually I do too. I would you
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  Speaker 2: buy a dishwasher for eighty thousand dollars when you can
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  Speaker 2: buy it for four dollars? This is I'm saying this
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  Speaker 2: crazy number because when people buy stocks, they don't do
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  Speaker 2: the homework, and they just fine because somebody told them
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  Speaker 2: it's a good idea because it's going up, and they
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  Speaker 2: hurt some key phrase like artificial intelligence, and therefore they
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  Speaker 2: should be involved and they should just buy it, and
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  Speaker 2: they just fail to do any analysis. But yet we
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  Speaker 2: all are value investors. When you're buying a car a dishwasher,
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  Speaker 2: you have a sense of what it should cost, and
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  Speaker 2: if you don't, you go on you know, on the website,
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  Speaker 2: you go to a dealer or a retailer and you
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  Speaker 2: figure out what do things go for it, take a
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  Speaker 2: look at them. In the end, you compare to the shop.
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  Speaker 2: You be educated, and you can get educated in one
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  Speaker 2: minute or ten minutes or an hour, depending on how
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  Speaker 2: much time you want to spend on it. And then
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  Speaker 2: you make a decision if you need one of these
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  Speaker 2: things based on the quality of the product and the
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  Speaker 2: product you get it. This is the same way you
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  Speaker 2: should have approach selecting stocks. If this is what you
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  Speaker 2: want to do with some of your money. If you
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  Speaker 2: want to be in the stock market, you can do
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  Speaker 2: it through an ETF, which is an exchange traded fund.
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  Speaker 2: Simple way of saying, this is a daily, actively traded
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  Speaker 2: vehicle that can capture the index or a sector that
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  Speaker 2: you're interested in, so you don't have to stock pick.
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  Speaker 2: He just kind of get broad exposure through the ETF.
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  Speaker 2: Or if you want to pick an individual stock, then
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  Speaker 2: you need to roll up your sleeves a little bit
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  Speaker 2: and take a look at you know, what is the
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  Speaker 2: value and do a little more analysis. But that might
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  Speaker 2: be too much time and beyond the reach of a
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  Speaker 2: lot of people and the interest So then an ETF
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  Speaker 2: kind of makes sense to get broad exposure to the market.
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  Speaker 2: But I do recalls talking about this area where you
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  Speaker 2: kind of bring it down to, you know, get basically
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  Speaker 2: educated and do your homework when you buy stuff you
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  Speaker 2: need for the home, for your life, and then once
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  Speaker 2: you have some savings, it certainly behooves you to put
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  Speaker 2: it in inequities in my view, because if you have
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  Speaker 2: a long term view, the return on equities has been
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  Speaker 2: between eight and ten percent on the indexes over a
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  Speaker 2: long period of time with volatility, but that far exceeds
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  Speaker 2: the return you've been able to get cash or on
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  Speaker 2: fixed income investments.
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  Speaker 1: So I want to back up and as we go
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  Speaker 1: through this, and you hit a little bit about the
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  Speaker 1: magic of what I want to talk about, we're going
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  Speaker 1: to explain as we go things that you never have
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  Speaker 1: to explain. We're gonna explain what volatility means. We're gonna
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  Speaker 1: explain what an intex mean. I mean, we shouldn't assume
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  Speaker 1: there's no home economics class anymore, Alex in school, there
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  Speaker 1: are people who are highly sophisticated advanced degrees PhDs, masters degrees,
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  Speaker 1: white and black Latino women higher high who have not
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  Speaker 1: a clue what we're talking about here because no one
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  Speaker 1: taught them, and they fake it. They they don't admit
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  Speaker 1: that they don't understand how money works. A quarter of
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  Speaker 1: those who make two hundred and fifty thousand dollars a
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  Speaker 1: year a living Patieck to paycheck, half of those making
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  Speaker 1: one hundred thousand dollars a year a living Pagett to paycheck.
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  Speaker 1: Of course, seventy percent of America is living Patchett to paycheck.
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  Speaker 1: But I'm getting ahead of myself. I want to come
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  Speaker 1: back to our conversation because what you just said just
• 8:29
  Speaker 1: underscores that you're a decent human being. You're concerned about
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  Speaker 1: the least of these gods children. You understand that even
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  Speaker 1: though you know we were in the Hampton's where you
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  Speaker 1: know it is a very privilege. We'd all admit that's
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  Speaker 1: the very privileged environment. If you own a home there,
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  Speaker 1: you even blessed with the American dream and the fact
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  Speaker 1: that you can live in that world. She'll understand another
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  Speaker 1: world and have compassion for it and empathy for it.
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  Speaker 1: Says a lot about you and your character and who
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  Speaker 1: you are. That's the reason that you're on my podcast
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  Speaker 1: is I think you're a great, a cool guy. It's
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  Speaker 1: not a smart one, but is what you said to
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  Speaker 1: me when we talked. You explained to me in mathematical, numerical,
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  Speaker 1: statistical terms, your business philosophy, your investment in philosophy. Do
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  Speaker 1: you remember that conversation.
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  Speaker 2: Well, I'll try to recall the things we talked about,
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  Speaker 2: but maybe in a nutshell. I mean you already gave
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  Speaker 2: it in your introduction. I came from the Netherlands, which is,
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  Speaker 2: you know, a very nice small country in Europe to
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  Speaker 2: grow up, but I wanted to definitely move out from there.
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  Speaker 2: This is in the late seventies when the country is
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  Speaker 2: quite socialist and tax rates for sixty seventy percent, and
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  Speaker 2: a lot of young folks wanted to get out there
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  Speaker 2: out of the air. My hope was to come to
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  Speaker 2: the United States, which I managed to do by applying
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  Speaker 2: to an MBA program. Applied to a variety of them,
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  Speaker 2: because lucky to get into a really good one. But
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  Speaker 2: I came across I remember one way flight on the
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  Speaker 2: cheap airline fin Air, with two thousand bucks in my pocket,
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  Speaker 2: ended up in Bingham to New York on snowy January
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  Speaker 2: fifth and nineteen eighty one and went to the car
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  Speaker 2: dealership and bought an Oldshmeel Starfire nineteen seventy six. Was
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  Speaker 2: my pride and joy and that gave me wheels. And
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  Speaker 2: I had a job which paide you know, uh okay,
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  Speaker 2: but just paid the bills for the cheap apartment. And
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  Speaker 2: that's how I got started with a nice job with
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  Speaker 2: the company that was an industrial machinery maker that helped automate,
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  Speaker 2: you know, the manufacturing of what made computers and TV
• 10:39
  Speaker 2: stick you printed circuit boards. So anyway, a nice couple
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  Speaker 2: of years there, went on to business school and from
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  Speaker 2: there I was lucky to find an employee in New
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  Speaker 2: York in the field that I wanted, which is in finance,
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  Speaker 2: and learned a bunch of things during the first four
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  Speaker 2: years in that job that made me come up with
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  Speaker 2: an idea to start Atlantic at a pretty early h
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  Speaker 2: I was twenty eight at the time. Wow had a
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  Speaker 2: good salary in those years after business school, but you know,
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  Speaker 2: nothing outrageous. Certainly didn't have any start capital for my business,
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  Speaker 2: didn't any investment capital from either family or friends. All
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  Speaker 2: I had was experienced six years at this point, two
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  Speaker 2: years before business school, four years after. I learned a
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  Speaker 2: few things about analyzing investments and companies in those years
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  Speaker 2: and decide to take that toolbox, if you will, or
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  Speaker 2: the lessons I learned formulate specific specific investment strategy which
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  Speaker 2: we still do to this day, which is a bottom up,
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  Speaker 2: you know, value analysis kind of what I described earlier
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  Speaker 2: with your dishwasher in your car analysis. I don't know
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  Speaker 2: any other way to getting comfortable with an investment other
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  Speaker 2: than sticking to a known area. You know, I don't
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  Speaker 2: go into areas you don't understand. In my case, all
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  Speaker 2: of technology, I don't understand it. I mean, I like
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  Speaker 2: to use technology products like we all do. But to
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  Speaker 2: invest in a company that sells technology, whether it's software,
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  Speaker 2: chips or high tech products, I'm uncomfortable with it because
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  Speaker 2: I don't know how it will change and how that
• 12:23
  Speaker 2: will affect the business. So I want to invest in
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  Speaker 2: companies that are very analyzable and understandable, that make products
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  Speaker 2: that we all use and that we see and can
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  Speaker 2: touch and have been around for a long time. And
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  Speaker 2: then you pick companies that are leaders in those areas,
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  Speaker 2: and then you wait until they're cheap enough, and so
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  Speaker 2: I decided to pick a strategy that is very comfortable
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  Speaker 2: for me in terms of competence and experience I've had,
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  Speaker 2: and also to avoid risk areas. You not to go
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  Speaker 2: into areas like biotech and high tech, which for your audience,
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  Speaker 2: there's a lot of money to be made in these areas.
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  Speaker 2: I'm just personally uncomfortable with it, and I think if
• 13:02
  Speaker 2: you invest in these areas, you have to take that
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  Speaker 2: into account, and quite often it's better to go with
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  Speaker 2: very large companies that we all know, like Apple and Microsoft,
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  Speaker 2: which are very very big names within the universe. But
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  Speaker 2: back to the approach that I started with, it was
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  Speaker 2: basically middle sized industrial products and service companies where we
• 13:24
  Speaker 2: could gain an edge by doing our investigation, our study,
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  Speaker 2: our review of these companies, meeting with managements, and then
• 13:33
  Speaker 2: put together a selection of ten or fifteen names that
• 13:37
  Speaker 2: we liked for our clients. So that's how Atlantic started
• 13:40
  Speaker 2: with that idea. And the idea was that through our
• 13:43
  Speaker 2: stock picking and our focus, we could outperform i e.
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  Speaker 2: Do better than the index. We need to because if
• 13:51
  Speaker 2: we don't, we have no right to exist. You can
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  Speaker 2: simply buy, my clients can buy. Of course, the index
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  Speaker 2: back to the exchange trade fund that anybody who's listening
• 14:02
  Speaker 2: to this call, if you have some savings, you can
• 14:04
  Speaker 2: buy an ETF, which is a way to participate in
• 14:08
  Speaker 2: the US stock.
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  Speaker 1: Market's an ETF.
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  Speaker 2: An exchange traded suns. So it's like a stock, it's available,
• 14:17
  Speaker 2: it's liquid. Does a symbol like sp y? Spy is
• 14:23
  Speaker 2: the name of the spiders they call them. Is the
• 14:26
  Speaker 2: S and P five hundred, which is the largest stock
• 14:29
  Speaker 2: index that most pension funds use and many other players
• 14:33
  Speaker 2: used just to get access and exposure to the US
• 14:36
  Speaker 2: stock market.
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  Speaker 1: So let's go back here. Because I've started, I've introduced
• 14:41
  Speaker 1: you in a very luminous terms which are appropriate. Youve
• 14:46
  Speaker 1: gone to the best schools, all that kind of stuff.
• 14:48
  Speaker 1: It came from the Netherlands and the Nordic region. And
• 14:52
  Speaker 1: people might assume that you again, you had a trust fund,
• 14:55
  Speaker 1: you had you had inherited money. And what I heard
• 14:59
  Speaker 1: is you came here on a cheap ticket. You had
• 15:02
  Speaker 1: you had a few thousand dollars and you went and
• 15:05
  Speaker 1: got some The most important thing you got was an education.
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  Speaker 1: Is that right?
• 15:09
  Speaker 2: So far?
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  Speaker 1: So you did not get a hook up, as we
• 15:12
  Speaker 1: say in my neighborhood. You didn't have a trust fund,
• 15:14
  Speaker 1: you didn't have daddy's money or grandpa's. It was it
• 15:18
  Speaker 1: was just hustle, correct number one? All right, you work
• 15:21
  Speaker 1: for somebody else if you got your education to get
• 15:24
  Speaker 1: some experience, and then you started in your own investment
• 15:28
  Speaker 1: house at twenty eight years Oh is that right? Correct? Okay?
• 15:34
  Speaker 1: And that investment house, without getting too much into your business,
• 15:40
  Speaker 1: is now several hundred million dollars under management, correct, correct?
• 15:47
  Speaker 1: So you really built yourself literally up from nothing to
• 15:51
  Speaker 1: become an American success story. Let's just say again, without
• 15:55
  Speaker 1: getting in his business, he is a half a billion
• 15:57
  Speaker 1: dollars under management in a company that he controls, no
• 16:02
  Speaker 1: complicated management structure. He's the chief investment officer and he's
• 16:07
  Speaker 1: been running it since he was twenty eight years old.
• 16:09
  Speaker 1: I get that right, correct? All right? And it's a
• 16:13
  Speaker 1: very simple business plan. Simpleness is that you're very focused. So,
• 16:18
  Speaker 1: as I understand your investment philosophy, you've been known as
• 16:21
  Speaker 1: your concentrated approach, your value driven investment approach. Talk a
• 16:26
  Speaker 1: little bit about how you developed this strategy and how
• 16:30
  Speaker 1: it's evolved over the years. And at some point during
• 16:33
  Speaker 1: this interview. You're going to go start as we say
• 16:35
  Speaker 1: in music, You're gonna start rapping, riffing, and you're going
• 16:38
  Speaker 1: to naturally go into that thing. Say the thing you
• 16:41
  Speaker 1: told me when I mention that blew me away, which
• 16:43
  Speaker 1: was literally just a mathematical, statistical outline of how you
• 16:48
  Speaker 1: go about really a science in investing that I thought
• 16:54
  Speaker 1: was brilliant. But what is your approach and how does
• 16:57
  Speaker 1: you develop and how's it evolved over time?
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  Speaker 2: Roaches to first define your investment universe. So I've decided
• 17:05
  Speaker 2: to be just in public equity. There's many ways to invest.
• 17:09
  Speaker 2: People can invest in real estate, people can invest in
• 17:12
  Speaker 2: small or bigger companies if they have an opportunity. That's
• 17:15
  Speaker 2: called private investing. So I'm only dealing with public investments.
• 17:21
  Speaker 2: And then within public investments, I want reasonable liquidity, so
• 17:25
  Speaker 2: I don't go for very small companies. But I also
• 17:27
  Speaker 2: want access to management in order to talk to them
• 17:30
  Speaker 2: about the business and to give suggestions where it makes sense.
• 17:35
  Speaker 2: And so we focus in the two billion at the
• 17:38
  Speaker 2: minimum to twenty billion dollar sized companies. These are very
• 17:41
  Speaker 2: large numbers, of course, but within the public equity market
• 17:44
  Speaker 2: it's considered smaller, mid gap large gap is much larger companies,
• 17:52
  Speaker 2: as you know, Apple, Microsoft are north of three trillion
• 17:55
  Speaker 2: dollar market value, so we don't deal with these companies
• 17:58
  Speaker 2: at all. Also, we like to focus on companies where
• 18:02
  Speaker 2: we have an understanding of the business and where the
• 18:05
  Speaker 2: risk factors of the business are reduced, and so we avoid,
• 18:10
  Speaker 2: as I mentioned before, high tech and biotech because of
• 18:13
  Speaker 2: the risk of what they're called difficult work technological obsolescence risk,
• 18:19
  Speaker 2: meaning that new products can come out that make the
• 18:22
  Speaker 2: old products obsolete. We've seen so many technology changes, including
• 18:26
  Speaker 2: everybody in the audience, I'm sure we'll be very familiar
• 18:28
  Speaker 2: with with all the technological advancements we're all enjoying. Well,
• 18:32
  Speaker 2: those things have tremendous impact on the profitability of a
• 18:37
  Speaker 2: technology product that is being replaced or being made obsolete
• 18:41
  Speaker 2: by the next invention. So we stay away from high
• 18:43
  Speaker 2: tech and biotech for those reasons. That's just us. Many
• 18:47
  Speaker 2: other people love to invest in those areas, not Atlantic,
• 18:50
  Speaker 2: and then we stay away from areas where we find
• 18:52
  Speaker 2: transparency to be an issue. And with all due respect
• 18:56
  Speaker 2: to banks, there are many many great banks out there
• 18:59
  Speaker 2: you can invest in, but we stay away from them
• 19:01
  Speaker 2: because we find that the transparency of a bank is
• 19:05
  Speaker 2: difficult to assess, and so we don't invest in the area.
• 19:09
  Speaker 2: So now you have an idea of these areas. So
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  Speaker 2: two to twenty billion dollars in size, enough liquidity, ability
• 19:16
  Speaker 2: to access management with meetings, and stay away from certain
• 19:19
  Speaker 2: risk areas. And within that, we want companies with good
• 19:23
  Speaker 2: balance sheets. A balance sheet is at home. You have
• 19:26
  Speaker 2: your your assets, you have some cash, you have some
• 19:30
  Speaker 2: things you bought, you have a house hopefully, and then
• 19:33
  Speaker 2: you have a mortgage that's a liability. So you look
• 19:35
  Speaker 2: at the balance sheet. Companies have the same if you will,
• 19:39
  Speaker 2: with cash and property and receivables and nayables, et cetera.
• 19:46
  Speaker 2: And so we want good balance sheets. You can evaluate that.
• 19:49
  Speaker 2: It doesn't take a degree to figure out what's a
• 19:54
  Speaker 2: good and a bad balance sheet. It's a quick lance
• 19:56
  Speaker 2: at what's publicly available to see if a company has
• 20:00
  Speaker 2: affordable amount of debt, not too much debt. And so
• 20:04
  Speaker 2: we make sure that our companies have good balance sheets
• 20:07
  Speaker 2: and that they've always been profitable. One way to make
• 20:10
  Speaker 2: sure of that is you look at a ten year
• 20:13
  Speaker 2: history of a company. Again, all of this is easily
• 20:15
  Speaker 2: available online, and you can see if they ever lost money.
• 20:19
  Speaker 2: A simple idea is, you know, if you take a
• 20:22
  Speaker 2: company that builds ships or does coal mining, or is
• 20:26
  Speaker 2: a pure chemical commodity company, they are very cyclical. Cyclical
• 20:31
  Speaker 2: means that if the economy goes down, their revenues go
• 20:34
  Speaker 2: down a lot, then they'll probably lose money. And so
• 20:37
  Speaker 2: we really are avoiding deep cyclical companies because we don't
• 20:41
  Speaker 2: want the company that ever loses money, even during a
• 20:45
  Speaker 2: financial crash like O eight or during the COVID disaster
• 20:49
  Speaker 2: off the beginning of twenty twenty. And so we look
• 20:53
  Speaker 2: for solid, profitable companies in a familiar area that we
• 20:58
  Speaker 2: can analyze or a size that we can get our
• 21:00
  Speaker 2: hands around it and meet with management to do further
• 21:04
  Speaker 2: due diligence. And then we want to wait, very much
• 21:08
  Speaker 2: like patient folks looking for a certain target, we wait
• 21:14
  Speaker 2: until the share price falls down. In our lap, we're
• 21:18
  Speaker 2: basically tracking a whole bunch of companies. It's not that many.
• 21:22
  Speaker 2: I mean, it's obviously in our field. With our business.
• 21:25
  Speaker 2: We have computer models, we have screens. Don't expect anybody
• 21:28
  Speaker 2: to do that. You can be much more focused than
• 21:30
  Speaker 2: we are. Even but then you look for companies that
• 21:32
  Speaker 2: you track for a while that you watch the share
• 21:35
  Speaker 2: price and what they say, and you look for them
• 21:37
  Speaker 2: to fall in your lap, meaning they come to a
• 21:40
  Speaker 2: price level, valuation level that is very very attractive, that
• 21:46
  Speaker 2: is typically the bottom where they trade. And now we're
• 21:49
  Speaker 2: talking about valuation multiples, and I don't want to get
• 21:53
  Speaker 2: too far into it, but ideally we buy something at
• 21:57
  Speaker 2: ten times earnings, Okay, net earnings, that's a good guide
• 22:05
  Speaker 2: for our kind of entry level purchase for a company.
• 22:09
  Speaker 2: Ten times net earnings or one times revenues is about
• 22:15
  Speaker 2: the area in which we are interested.
• 22:17
  Speaker 1: So let me break this down a little bit. So
• 22:20
  Speaker 1: if the company had one thousand dollars of net earnings
• 22:24
  Speaker 1: net meaning minus the expenses and all of the overages
• 22:30
  Speaker 1: that's tied to that particular enterprise, So net the money
• 22:35
  Speaker 1: that flows to the shareholders and the management team for
• 22:39
  Speaker 1: the company, that is one thousand dollars, you would buy
• 22:41
  Speaker 1: it in that case, were as much as ten thousand dollars,
• 22:45
  Speaker 1: is that right?
• 22:46
  Speaker 2: That is correct?
• 22:47
  Speaker 1: Ten times net or in that particular case, that business
• 22:51
  Speaker 1: might have ten thousand dollars in revenue, so one time
• 22:55
  Speaker 1: one time's revenue, right, yeah, right, correct, And that's part
• 22:59
  Speaker 1: of your due diligence for those who listening. Due diligence
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: means that he's basically gonna do his research. They're gonna
• 23:05
  Speaker 1: unpack this company, gonna un They're gonna they're gonna peel
• 23:07
  Speaker 1: the layers back. Transparency means he wants to be able
• 23:10
  Speaker 1: to see through to the other side. He doesn't like
• 23:13
  Speaker 1: Wall Street, doesn't like fall, He doesn't like a lot
• 23:15
  Speaker 1: of noise. They want to be able to be quiet
• 23:17
  Speaker 1: and elegant and simple and you can see through it.
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: You want glasses that are all fogged up. You know,
• 23:22
  Speaker 1: it's not good to drive on a foggy day, not fast,
• 23:25
  Speaker 1: So you want to slow it down so you have
• 23:27
  Speaker 1: clear view, uh transparency to what you're looking at. And
• 23:33
  Speaker 1: he talks about this stuff. By the way, this is
• 23:35
  Speaker 1: all He's been very basic. He's breaking this stuff down.
• 23:38
  Speaker 1: But they talk about this stuff in such a language
• 23:40
  Speaker 1: on Wall Streets. People that are there, people are intimidated
• 23:43
  Speaker 1: to read the Wall Street Journal, for God's sakes, because
• 23:46
  Speaker 1: it's all these uh terms that no one unpacks. So
• 23:49
  Speaker 1: I wanted to slow down for a minute now. He mentioned,
• 23:53
  Speaker 1: he ain't even things to fall in his lap. And
• 23:57
  Speaker 1: I'm not gonna mention this company's name. Although you can
• 24:00
  Speaker 1: listeners can probably figure this out. But today a company
• 24:04
  Speaker 1: that I believe is a good company, he's not a
• 24:05
  Speaker 1: company he would track us too big market cap wise.
• 24:08
  Speaker 1: They had a health situation that I think is episodic.
• 24:12
  Speaker 1: In other words, it was something that dealt with the
• 24:15
  Speaker 1: public and they had an episode, a little bit of
• 24:18
  Speaker 1: an outbreak, and the stock price dipped as a result
• 24:22
  Speaker 1: of that. My sense was this was not the company's fault,
• 24:26
  Speaker 1: that this was just something could have happened to any company,
• 24:28
  Speaker 1: And my sense was it was going to happen once
• 24:30
  Speaker 1: and it was done, one and done. It was just
• 24:32
  Speaker 1: one of these unfortunate situations the delivery truck or whatever
• 24:35
  Speaker 1: or something, and the stock dived. I bought it, so
• 24:40
  Speaker 1: that fell in my lap. It's not the company. There's
• 24:42
  Speaker 1: nothing wrong with the company. The company didn't do anything wrong.
• 24:44
  Speaker 1: It's otherwise a great company, great brand. But I was
• 24:47
  Speaker 1: able to get a fifteen percent discount. I believe it
• 24:49
  Speaker 1: was because I bought it today, and that stock at
• 24:53
  Speaker 1: some point will recover because the cash flows, the profits,
• 24:57
  Speaker 1: the brand, the company itself was very strong. So I
• 25:00
  Speaker 1: wanted to just sort of give people a bit of
• 25:02
  Speaker 1: summary wrap of what some of what you just what
• 25:05
  Speaker 1: you just said. And the one thing I think people
• 25:08
  Speaker 1: must find fascinating, Alex, is that you say you talk
• 25:11
  Speaker 1: to management. Now, when people listen listening to this, are
• 25:15
  Speaker 1: the average American or average citizen wherever they're watching this
• 25:17
  Speaker 1: in the world. They're thinking about going to the manager
• 25:21
  Speaker 1: at the retail store or the grocery store, and they're hard.
• 25:24
  Speaker 1: They can't get by the retail clerk they're trying to
• 25:27
  Speaker 1: They're trying to get to the manager or a supervisor.
• 25:29
  Speaker 1: They have a conversation that person is blocking them. We're
• 25:31
  Speaker 1: talking to when you're talking about management. They might find
• 25:34
  Speaker 1: it fascinating it here that you literally pick up the
• 25:37
  Speaker 1: phone and called the chief executive officer, chief financial officer,
• 25:42
  Speaker 1: maybe a board member or two of the whole enterprise,
• 25:45
  Speaker 1: and you're able to get these people on the phone
• 25:47
  Speaker 1: because they want your investment dollars. Is that right? Uh?
• 25:52
  Speaker 2: Correct? But we are very respectful of how the people's signs.
• 25:56
  Speaker 2: So unless we are seriously interested to be a large
• 25:59
  Speaker 2: investor in that company, we will first go as a
• 26:03
  Speaker 2: known institutional investor in the market to the investor relation
• 26:08
  Speaker 2: person and I'll have my handless talk to the investor
• 26:10
  Speaker 2: relation person. Once we get up to a certain level
• 26:13
  Speaker 2: of comfort and conviction through our due diligence, and back
• 26:17
  Speaker 2: to your unpacking of that work. Due diligence is everybody
• 26:20
  Speaker 2: on this podcast is doing due diligence, just a fancy
• 26:23
  Speaker 2: wall set work for doing your homework, you know, checking
• 26:27
  Speaker 2: things out. You all do that, looking at your purchase
• 26:31
  Speaker 2: of anything you're doing. You check things out, compare prices
• 26:35
  Speaker 2: on the shelf. So whatever you're doing, that's due diligence,
• 26:37
  Speaker 2: going to the store, kicking the tires. But anyway, we
• 26:40
  Speaker 2: get these conversations because we're in in business for a
• 26:43
  Speaker 2: long time, we're respectful. We go first through the investor
• 26:45
  Speaker 2: relation side, and once we are in a position to
• 26:49
  Speaker 2: make this a large investment for us, we will request
• 26:54
  Speaker 2: for a meeting, first a call, then a meeting with
• 26:56
  Speaker 2: the CFO, and yes we meet with CEOs as well.
• 27:00
  Speaker 2: But again you don't We don't want to do that
• 27:03
  Speaker 2: unless we are a sizeable investor potentially, and also that's
• 27:06
  Speaker 2: one of the reasons we don't want to go above
• 27:08
  Speaker 2: a certain size, which is in our case, twenty billion.
• 27:12
  Speaker 2: I'm not going to call it. Tim Cook from Apple.
• 27:14
  Speaker 2: I have no chance to ever get a meeting with him, frankly,
• 27:18
  Speaker 2: because it's a huge company and we're never going to
• 27:21
  Speaker 2: be any size investor in Apple. So we want to
• 27:23
  Speaker 2: stay with these companies where we have a chance to
• 27:25
  Speaker 2: meet with top management. For a normal retail investor, for
• 27:30
  Speaker 2: anybody in the podcast, you're not going to get these
• 27:33
  Speaker 2: conversations here with a CEO or a CFO of a
• 27:36
  Speaker 2: public company, But you don't need to. You can do
• 27:38
  Speaker 2: a lot of your homework, a lot of hug due
• 27:41
  Speaker 2: diligence by yourself with your friends. Maybe you make a
• 27:44
  Speaker 2: little investment group and educate yourself and bring in occasionally
• 27:48
  Speaker 2: a podcast like this, or a friend or who is
• 27:51
  Speaker 2: in the business to have a chat to have an
• 27:54
  Speaker 2: hour long conversation about stocks or the investment world in general,
• 27:58
  Speaker 2: and so suggest. But you can do a lot on
• 28:01
  Speaker 2: your own looking online, typing in the name of a
• 28:05
  Speaker 2: company or incident or the one that you mentioned, which
• 28:08
  Speaker 2: a lot of people will know if you would mention it.
• 28:10
  Speaker 2: I guess we're not getting into it. That's a perfect example.
• 28:14
  Speaker 2: We all know this company, it's a great company, and
• 28:16
  Speaker 2: something unfortunate happened. They'll iron it out, and I'm very
• 28:20
  Speaker 2: convinced that this particular air pocket you want to call
• 28:26
  Speaker 2: that you know where the stock falls like this will
• 28:28
  Speaker 2: be corrected over time if it is indeed a one
• 28:31
  Speaker 2: off situation, which I think you're right in your assessment.
• 28:34
  Speaker 2: But that's the kind of thing where everybody in this
• 28:37
  Speaker 2: podcast can pick a number of companies where they are
• 28:40
  Speaker 2: customers in their daily life, where they know the company,
• 28:44
  Speaker 2: they're inst in the company. Maybe it's five or ten
• 28:46
  Speaker 2: that you track a little bit, and you'll find, like yesterday,
• 28:50
  Speaker 2: like wow, if this is one of them, look at
• 28:52
  Speaker 2: that fifteen percent discount, Just like somebody on the corner saying,
• 28:57
  Speaker 2: is this watcher you've been looking at for a year,
• 29:00
  Speaker 2: suddenly we're having a off sale. Do you rush over?
• 29:04
  Speaker 2: You buy it? Right? Same with stocks, no difference.
• 29:08
  Speaker 1: That's right. And uh he mentioned another phrase, folks, He
• 29:11
  Speaker 1: mentioned conviction that what he what that translates is unless
• 29:15
  Speaker 1: I know I'm really serious. In other words, I've been
• 29:18
  Speaker 1: dating you. I mentioned in a dating app we were dating.
• 29:22
  Speaker 1: You're cute, you know, you're fine, and I we've had
• 29:25
  Speaker 1: a good time, but I'm not sure I want to
• 29:27
  Speaker 1: marry you. But if if I propose to you if
• 29:31
  Speaker 1: I if I give you a wedding ring, an engagement ring,
• 29:34
  Speaker 1: and we set a date, well, I've got conviction. And yes,
• 29:38
  Speaker 1: I may not get to the maybe something might have happened.
• 29:41
  Speaker 1: Two percent of the time you don't get to uh
• 29:43
  Speaker 1: through the ceremony because something I don't know, something weird happens.
• 29:46
  Speaker 2: Uh.
• 29:47
  Speaker 1: But most times, when you get to that point and
• 29:49
  Speaker 1: you got an engagement ring and you got a date,
• 29:51
  Speaker 1: there's a lot of conviction there. You told the family,
• 29:54
  Speaker 1: everybody's all invested in this thing. You have a comfort.
• 29:57
  Speaker 1: So when he's comfortable, when he's got that level of
• 29:59
  Speaker 1: con fiction, then he might go beyond the investor relations person.
• 30:04
  Speaker 1: Now I'm gonna tell you each a little bit of
• 30:05
  Speaker 1: a secret here, and he wouldn't even Now Alice is
• 30:07
  Speaker 1: so sophisticated in the way he operates, he wouldn't think
• 30:10
  Speaker 1: about this. But I'm sure you would agree with it.
• 30:12
  Speaker 1: If you want to have some fun with your kids
• 30:15
  Speaker 1: at Christmas, about two months to two months before Christmas,
• 30:18
  Speaker 1: go and try and find buy one share of stock
• 30:21
  Speaker 1: and get one get one of these these uh, these
• 30:23
  Speaker 1: companies that give you certificates and they'll they'll frame them
• 30:26
  Speaker 1: for you and send it to your companies to do that.
• 30:29
  Speaker 1: They don't. These companies don't don't don't do physicals share
• 30:31
  Speaker 1: certificates anymore, most of them. But you can get a
• 30:33
  Speaker 1: company to send you a certificate. I have one and
• 30:35
  Speaker 1: put it on the wall. Give your kid a share
• 30:37
  Speaker 1: stock for Christmas. Anyway. The point of that is once
• 30:39
  Speaker 1: you own one share stock of any publicly traded company.
• 30:42
  Speaker 1: When you talk about public equities, he mean publicly traded company.
• 30:47
  Speaker 1: When you have one share of stock, you have the
• 30:48
  Speaker 1: rights to all their financials. Hello, So you get to
• 30:52
  Speaker 1: you get to look at into the under their hood
• 30:54
  Speaker 1: of any company that's publicly traded with only one share
• 30:57
  Speaker 1: of stock. Now, uh, the investor relations if you want to.
• 31:03
  Speaker 1: I shouldn't tell you this, but because not only by
• 31:05
  Speaker 1: writing letters to boards and members and the board directors
• 31:07
  Speaker 1: you get upset with some company, you have a real
• 31:09
  Speaker 1: serious issue. Now much about suing them. You just want
• 31:11
  Speaker 1: them to know that there they could do better. And
• 31:13
  Speaker 1: you can't find the board of directors anywhere. You can't
• 31:16
  Speaker 1: find the management level either. It's a big retail company.
• 31:20
  Speaker 1: Just go down on the website to investor relations. His
• 31:25
  Speaker 1: investor is something right when you go there and you
• 31:28
  Speaker 1: open that up. My god, it's like opening the hood
• 31:30
  Speaker 1: of a Ferrari. Right, everything's in there, including the board
• 31:34
  Speaker 1: and their most recent financial report. So I just wanted
• 31:37
  Speaker 1: to he'll so he goes and deals with the investor
• 31:39
  Speaker 1: relations departments out of respect, and he only goes one
• 31:42
  Speaker 1: step further if he's got conviction. Did I get that right, Alex.
• 31:49
  Speaker 2: It's one hundred percent correct. And again it goes back
• 31:52
  Speaker 2: to I want to see your personal life. We went
• 31:55
  Speaker 2: to the dishwasher example, but went through the you know, girlfriends, engagements,
• 32:01
  Speaker 2: wife example. One needs to in any development in life,
• 32:07
  Speaker 2: you know, develop conviction that the decision you're going to
• 32:10
  Speaker 2: make is the right one. And there's no shortcut to
• 32:13
  Speaker 2: doing your homework. And it's just time and effort. And
• 32:20
  Speaker 2: depending on how big the decision or how big the
• 32:23
  Speaker 2: purchase is, if it's something material, the more you need
• 32:27
  Speaker 2: to roll up your sleeves you have a T shirt on.
• 32:29
  Speaker 2: You just leave it the way it is. But you
• 32:31
  Speaker 2: get busy and you talk to people, and you walk
• 32:34
  Speaker 2: around blocks and you go to stores and or you
• 32:37
  Speaker 2: in the case of a personal situation, you talk to
• 32:39
  Speaker 2: more people. You talk spend more time together, you talk
• 32:43
  Speaker 2: to their friends, meet the family, et cetera, et cetera,
• 32:47
  Speaker 2: all the obviousself.
• 32:57
  Speaker 1: When I first started investing, I would buy what I
• 33:01
  Speaker 1: what I liked. You know, I like Walmart. I'd BUYT Walmart.
• 33:03
  Speaker 1: I like whatever the company was, Uh, you know, whatever
• 33:07
  Speaker 1: I was wearing, whatever I was using. I looked around
• 33:10
  Speaker 1: my household, like what am I using? What am I wearing?
• 33:12
  Speaker 1: What do I trust? And you know, Apple was an
• 33:15
  Speaker 1: easy one. We Alrea talked about Tim Cook. I buy
• 33:18
  Speaker 1: I buy Apple stock, whatever it is. If I liked it,
• 33:21
  Speaker 1: my friends like it, and we're comfortable with it, probably
• 33:24
  Speaker 1: a good, pretty good retail investment. And by the way,
• 33:26
  Speaker 1: anybody listening to this, if you have a four one
• 33:28
  Speaker 1: K plan an investment account, if you work for somebody
• 33:31
  Speaker 1: and they're matching your four one K, get as much
• 33:34
  Speaker 1: of that as you can because that's free money, right
• 33:37
  Speaker 1: as as as jay as jay Z would say, I'm
• 33:40
  Speaker 1: gonna give you a main dollars worth of worth of
• 33:41
  Speaker 1: worth of advice or nine ninety nine. This is no
• 33:43
  Speaker 1: ninety nine because you're not paying a dime for it.
• 33:46
  Speaker 1: But if your employer is matching your four in one K,
• 33:50
  Speaker 1: that is free money. Now before we get on to
• 33:54
  Speaker 1: I'm gonna run through the other questions pretty quickly because
• 33:57
  Speaker 1: I because I want to make sure you have a
• 33:59
  Speaker 1: chance to answer each one of them. But on this
• 34:01
  Speaker 1: investment philosophy, which I think is so important, do you
• 34:04
  Speaker 1: have a numerical statistical numeric? Is there a model that
• 34:10
  Speaker 1: you use for your investment? Something you wanted to share?
• 34:16
  Speaker 2: We use first to find the companies. We use pretty
• 34:19
  Speaker 2: sophisticated screens that are available. You know, Bloomberg is a
• 34:24
  Speaker 2: well known terminal we used for screening. But having done
• 34:27
  Speaker 2: this for so long, we pretty much know all the targets.
• 34:30
  Speaker 2: We have wake up calls literally on prices and valuation
• 34:34
  Speaker 2: levels that bring them to our attention once they come to.
• 34:37
  Speaker 1: Our What a wake up call, I'm sorry, wake up calls.
• 34:41
  Speaker 2: Let's say take a stock of a company that you
• 34:43
  Speaker 2: just talked about without the name, but that just fell down.
• 34:47
  Speaker 2: Let's say the stock was at one hundred bucks went
• 34:50
  Speaker 2: up to one hundred and ten. You're interested, but you said,
• 34:53
  Speaker 2: you know, I'm really insted at eighty bucks, and so
• 34:55
  Speaker 2: you put a price limit in your computer. You can
• 34:57
  Speaker 2: do this actually at home fairly quickly. Of the various
• 35:01
  Speaker 2: financial websites, and you can put a like a wake
• 35:04
  Speaker 2: up call. Okay, let me know when the stock reaches
• 35:09
  Speaker 2: eighty you know, boom. So you don't have to watch
• 35:11
  Speaker 2: the news all the time. You just look at your computer.
• 35:14
  Speaker 2: And I said, look at this, it's like motting a
• 35:16
  Speaker 2: fishing line out and a little bellow went off. I
• 35:19
  Speaker 2: think there's a hook there. Let's start, you know, yanking
• 35:21
  Speaker 2: on that line and see what's on the other end
• 35:23
  Speaker 2: of it. So that's that's it. So you do the
• 35:26
  Speaker 2: alerts are important, and then once we are alerted to
• 35:29
  Speaker 2: the situation, we will roll up our sleeves the good
• 35:32
  Speaker 2: old homework and due diligence we talked about. And yes,
• 35:35
  Speaker 2: we have financial models. So now we have taken and
• 35:39
  Speaker 2: downloaded all the financials that you can get from the
• 35:42
  Speaker 2: company website, from the financials in it, you know, Excel
• 35:45
  Speaker 2: spreadsheets and out get sophisticated. We do modeling. We look
• 35:50
  Speaker 2: on we make estimates as to where the business is
• 35:52
  Speaker 2: likely to go. These estimates are determined based on our
• 35:56
  Speaker 2: conversations with the management, with other people that know the company,
• 36:00
  Speaker 2: with competitors, and then we come up with predictions and
• 36:05
  Speaker 2: based on the predictions and based on where the share
• 36:07
  Speaker 2: price is. We have very set discipline as to what
• 36:12
  Speaker 2: valuation level we're willing to buy. This. Back to the
• 36:16
  Speaker 2: example used earlier, Let's make it a restaurant. They can
• 36:20
  Speaker 2: relate to a restaurant. Let's say in the neighborhood, a
• 36:23
  Speaker 2: restaurant that you know around the corner becomes available for sale.
• 36:27
  Speaker 2: Let's say they do a million dollars in revenues a
• 36:30
  Speaker 2: year and they make one hundred thousand dollars in profit,
• 36:34
  Speaker 2: and they say it's available, and you know, maybe you
• 36:36
  Speaker 2: don't have the money, but maybe a group of you
• 36:39
  Speaker 2: are inserted in buying into it because it's such a
• 36:41
  Speaker 2: great place. You all go there anyway, and maybe you
• 36:43
  Speaker 2: can run it better. And he said, okay, how much
• 36:47
  Speaker 2: does the seller, the restaurant owner want for this. Let's
• 36:51
  Speaker 2: say he says twenty million dollars. He said, you've got
• 36:55
  Speaker 2: to be out of your mind. That's twenty times revenues.
• 36:59
  Speaker 2: That is two hundred times earnings. It's crazy to go away.
• 37:03
  Speaker 1: So this is a great example. Everybody, listen, now, listen,
• 37:07
  Speaker 1: he just gave you. By the way, everybody's in the
• 37:09
  Speaker 1: private equity business, if you're investing in your cousin's nail
• 37:12
  Speaker 1: salon for five hundred dollars. That's private equity, private equity, right,
• 37:17
  Speaker 1: So he's just doing it at a much sophisticated with
• 37:19
  Speaker 1: higher level. So if somebody's coming to you and they
• 37:23
  Speaker 1: want to sell you a business or invest in a business,
• 37:26
  Speaker 1: he just gave you a formula and he told you
• 37:29
  Speaker 1: what's ridiculous and what's crazy when it falls outside of
• 37:32
  Speaker 1: that box. He told you, no more than ten times
• 37:35
  Speaker 1: net is a net income or net. I want to
• 37:37
  Speaker 1: share you it is your.
• 37:38
  Speaker 2: Times net income and maybe one times revenue is a
• 37:41
  Speaker 2: good measure for a pretty stable, nice business. I'm not
• 37:45
  Speaker 2: talking about a high growth business. I'm talking about it.
• 37:48
  Speaker 2: Say a restaurant business has this good solid has been around,
• 37:52
  Speaker 2: and if they offer you a debt for sale for
• 37:54
  Speaker 2: like a million dollars, that's reasonable. Now we can talk
• 37:58
  Speaker 2: about it. They say twenty million dollars, it's a joke.
• 38:01
  Speaker 2: Five million dollars is a joke. The funny thing is
• 38:04
  Speaker 2: in the stock market, people are buying things that are
• 38:09
  Speaker 2: based on what their friends told them at a barbecue
• 38:12
  Speaker 2: or what they've heard on TV as something great about
• 38:16
  Speaker 2: technology or artificial intelligence, and they just buy it. I
• 38:20
  Speaker 2: mean to put it in perspective, the greatest company everybody
• 38:23
  Speaker 2: talks about these days is Navidio, which makes the plumbing
• 38:27
  Speaker 2: for AI. You know the chips that already needs that, Microsoft, Apple, Amazon, Google,
• 38:33
  Speaker 2: These guys need it for their AI artificial intelligence. So
• 38:38
  Speaker 2: in the videos, trading at three and a half trillion dollars,
• 38:42
  Speaker 2: which is about twenty five times revenues. Now that's ridiculously expensive.
• 38:49
  Speaker 2: I wouldn't touch it. But of course it's done very well,
• 38:52
  Speaker 2: and it continues to go up because more and more
• 38:54
  Speaker 2: people want to buy it, and they do perform very
• 38:56
  Speaker 2: very well. But it is extremely expensive and nothing can
• 39:01
  Speaker 2: go wrong in terms of the growth slowing down or
• 39:05
  Speaker 2: anything else. So that is to me speculative. And yet
• 39:08
  Speaker 2: it's one of the largest market caps in the world
• 39:12
  Speaker 2: if in fact, it's number two right now buying Apple.
• 39:15
  Speaker 2: And so I challenge, or I ask everybody, do your
• 39:20
  Speaker 2: homework when it comes to stock market investing, as well
• 39:23
  Speaker 2: as you do your homework when you buy a house,
• 39:25
  Speaker 2: a car, or a dishwasher, or if you're offered an
• 39:28
  Speaker 2: opportunity to invest in a nail salon or a restaurant
• 39:31
  Speaker 2: around the corner. Compare it the purchase pride or whatever
• 39:36
  Speaker 2: they're asking or whatever the stock is, trading it against
• 39:39
  Speaker 2: the total revenues and against the earnings that they have
• 39:43
  Speaker 2: and then assess if this makes any sense to you.
• 39:47
  Speaker 1: So one thing that I'm going to push back on
• 39:50
  Speaker 1: Alex and he won't mind it because he's he has
• 39:52
  Speaker 1: no self esteem problem. What is Alice already knows. One
• 39:54
  Speaker 1: of the reasons why people are Google gaga about Nvidia
• 39:58
  Speaker 1: and why it's it doesn't make any sense on the numbers,
• 40:02
  Speaker 1: is at the moment they're perceived to be the primary backbone.
• 40:06
  Speaker 1: He already said it for artificial intelligence, which is a new,
• 40:09
  Speaker 1: the new, the new you know, uh d jure sexy
• 40:13
  Speaker 1: investment and opportunity for the next five years. And it's
• 40:16
  Speaker 1: not twenty of them, there's not one hundred of them.
• 40:18
  Speaker 1: It's not a restaurant around the corner. It's not a
• 40:20
  Speaker 1: nail saloon around the corner. There's there's there's not even
• 40:23
  Speaker 1: an attorney. There's hundreds of attorneys, thousands, hundreds of thousands
• 40:26
  Speaker 1: of attorneys, law firms. It's one of these, so you
• 40:29
  Speaker 1: can decide whether you want to invest in it or not.
• 40:31
  Speaker 1: But that's why there's a lot of hype around this
• 40:33
  Speaker 1: particular investment, which is why he calls it speculative, which
• 40:38
  Speaker 1: is correct. Bitcoin could be the bitcoin, sorry, cryptocurrency could
• 40:42
  Speaker 1: be the same kind of conversation. You can get lucky
• 40:45
  Speaker 1: with a bitcoin, but you might get unlucky with the
• 40:48
  Speaker 1: thousands of other cryptocurrencies which are completely speculative. So just again,
• 40:55
  Speaker 1: it comes back to do your homework. You know, I've
• 41:00
  Speaker 1: about Alex being this very successful guy, and he's got
• 41:04
  Speaker 1: this beautiful home I was in. He doesn't spend time
• 41:07
  Speaker 1: in most of those rooms of his house, as I
• 41:09
  Speaker 1: don't either. We spend time a lot of time in
• 41:11
  Speaker 1: one room, our office, and it's it's late in the
• 41:15
  Speaker 1: day in Manhattan. He's in his office. He's not at
• 41:17
  Speaker 1: I don't know what your perception as a successful people
• 41:19
  Speaker 1: look at that desk behind them. But those who are
• 41:21
  Speaker 1: watching this on video, after you listen to it on
• 41:23
  Speaker 1: the audio, and if you listen to an audio, go
• 41:25
  Speaker 1: and watch this clip also in video. Behind his desk
• 41:27
  Speaker 1: is nothing but papers, documents, stacks of analysis and best
• 41:33
  Speaker 1: I can tell, there's a highlight marks on the different reports.
• 41:37
  Speaker 1: If I'm seeing this properly, and there's a pen that's yours.
• 41:40
  Speaker 1: There's a newspaper, there's a Wall Street Journal. You're looking
• 41:43
  Speaker 1: at the market for today. There's a remote for the TV.
• 41:46
  Speaker 1: You're looking at CNBC or some are Bloomberg or whatever
• 41:49
  Speaker 1: to see what's going on in the markets. In other words,
• 41:51
  Speaker 1: this guy's not relying on other people and sit around
• 41:54
  Speaker 1: Struggan cocktails, whatever your perception is of highly successful people.
• 41:57
  Speaker 1: This guy is hustling and he's working. I have that right, Alex,
• 42:01
  Speaker 1: Are you working today?
• 42:02
  Speaker 2: I think so? You got it right? Absolutely?
• 42:06
  Speaker 1: So those were those documents behind you. That's not your assistant,
• 42:09
  Speaker 1: that's not your chief of staff, that's your desk. Is
• 42:12
  Speaker 1: that right?
• 42:13
  Speaker 2: That's correct? And you're looking at a whole bunch of
• 42:17
  Speaker 2: screens on this side, including the one you and I
• 42:19
  Speaker 2: are talking on. And when we're done, I turn around
• 42:22
  Speaker 2: to go back to my reports that I'm reading on companies,
• 42:27
  Speaker 2: cashw models and papers, et cetera.
• 42:31
  Speaker 1: So you don't trust anybody else to do that analysis
• 42:33
  Speaker 1: one investing hundreds of millions of dollars or even tens
• 42:36
  Speaker 1: of millions, you make sure, as chief investment officer and
• 42:39
  Speaker 1: a CEO, you do it yourself. Is that right? Yeah?
• 42:44
  Speaker 1: So let's now cut to the current situation, the current
• 42:46
  Speaker 1: environment we we you know, there's there's political, socio instability
• 42:52
  Speaker 1: and change and environmental and the world's going we perceive
• 42:57
  Speaker 1: bonkers these days a little bit. But what do you
• 43:01
  Speaker 1: what's your view on the current economic environment, and what's
• 43:04
  Speaker 1: your advice for aspiring investors on on opportunities if you
• 43:10
  Speaker 1: want to call it that broadly defined for the future.
• 43:14
  Speaker 2: I think, first of all, we're all very lucky to
• 43:16
  Speaker 2: live in the United States of America, number one democracy
• 43:20
  Speaker 2: to capitalistic society. It's the American dream. A lot of
• 43:24
  Speaker 2: people want to come here. In fact, a lot more
• 43:28
  Speaker 2: people want to come here then we can, you know,
• 43:31
  Speaker 2: reset at any given time. But I came here. I'm
• 43:34
  Speaker 2: an immigrant and I left you know, beautiful Europe if
• 43:38
  Speaker 2: you will. But also I came here for opportunity. Many
• 43:42
  Speaker 2: people do the same thing, and so we're all lucky
• 43:45
  Speaker 2: to be in a country where you can educate yourself,
• 43:48
  Speaker 2: you can work yourself up, even if you have modest
• 43:51
  Speaker 2: means or very little means, you can. Really there's a
• 43:55
  Speaker 2: place everywhere for a job, for learning and for advancing yourself.
• 43:59
  Speaker 2: The Keith thing is be disciplined, be focused, try to
• 44:05
  Speaker 2: avoid taking on debts where you can first pay down
• 44:10
  Speaker 2: debt as much as you can, and then try to
• 44:12
  Speaker 2: save and always try to put somebody away. When you
• 44:15
  Speaker 2: get going and things are going well, always say, but
• 44:18
  Speaker 2: the sooner the better. The younger you are, the better.
• 44:21
  Speaker 2: And if you work hard and you get the controllable
• 44:27
  Speaker 2: variables right, So what is a controllable variable. You can't
• 44:32
  Speaker 2: control you know what the weather will be like, you
• 44:35
  Speaker 2: can't control what all the others will do. What you
• 44:37
  Speaker 2: can control is what you can do. You can be
• 44:41
  Speaker 2: on time, you can be reliable, you can be trustworthy,
• 44:46
  Speaker 2: you can be hard working. These are the things you
• 44:51
  Speaker 2: can control. Always control them. Don't mess up, don't you know?
• 44:58
  Speaker 2: Be reliable ninety percent of the time. Be reliable hundred
• 45:02
  Speaker 2: percent of the time. The example I use is when
• 45:05
  Speaker 2: somebody comes for an interview in a nice white shirt
• 45:08
  Speaker 2: and there's a pizza staying right here. It will be
• 45:12
  Speaker 2: where the eye of the potential employer will go. Even
• 45:17
  Speaker 2: though nine your shirt is perfectly white, there's a pizza
• 45:21
  Speaker 2: staying and kind of wonder the employer wonders, like, why
• 45:24
  Speaker 2: didn't you remove that? And why don't you change your
• 45:26
  Speaker 2: shirt before you got there, same with the typo in
• 45:29
  Speaker 2: your resume. These are controllable variables. You need to get
• 45:33
  Speaker 2: that stuff right, spend the extra time to review stuff,
• 45:37
  Speaker 2: to be on time. And once you have a job,
• 45:40
  Speaker 2: you know, be on time, be reliable, work hard, do
• 45:43
  Speaker 2: the right thing, and be patient. You know, it takes
• 45:47
  Speaker 2: three years to get three years of experience. It's that's
• 45:52
  Speaker 2: very obvious. But people, particularly in this generation, think they
• 45:56
  Speaker 2: want it all right now, and it takes a while.
• 46:00
  Speaker 2: You know, if you look at my business started at
• 46:02
  Speaker 2: twenty eight. The first three years I didn't do very
• 46:06
  Speaker 2: well at all. I had to borrow money for my
• 46:09
  Speaker 2: brother after three years in business to pay the rent.
• 46:12
  Speaker 2: He charged me ten percent.
• 46:13
  Speaker 1: Very nice of him, your brother, I love it.
• 46:17
  Speaker 2: I'll mind you. At the time industry were about eight percent,
• 46:19
  Speaker 2: so you figured he needed to charge your premium. You know,
• 46:22
  Speaker 2: if there junk at Mike Milkine might relate to that.
• 46:25
  Speaker 2: So I bought ten grant and this is now, I'm
• 46:29
  Speaker 2: thirty one. I got my MBA. I've been working for
• 46:32
  Speaker 2: other people and I was to spend whatever savings I
• 46:35
  Speaker 2: had on the first two or three years to keep
• 46:37
  Speaker 2: my business going. And the business didn't go well. I
• 46:41
  Speaker 2: had setbacks, and I just stayed with it and persistence.
• 46:46
  Speaker 2: You know, if you if you stay with something that
• 46:49
  Speaker 2: makes sense, whether it's a job or a new business
• 46:52
  Speaker 2: that you're trying, if you know it makes sense and
• 46:55
  Speaker 2: you know you didn't get the breaks you wanted or
• 46:58
  Speaker 2: the tailwind that you're looking for, stay with it, you know,
• 47:02
  Speaker 2: keep at it. I mean, I'm certainly an example of
• 47:05
  Speaker 2: that where you know, ten years into it, finally things
• 47:09
  Speaker 2: started to go my way, and even then you got
• 47:12
  Speaker 2: to watch it. So stay paranoids, meaning have the fear
• 47:16
  Speaker 2: of failure as an entrepreneur. Always have the fear of
• 47:20
  Speaker 2: failure that will keep you from falling into the complacency trap.
• 47:25
  Speaker 2: Never get complacent unless you step out of the game.
• 47:28
  Speaker 2: Then step out. And if you've achieved everything you wanted
• 47:31
  Speaker 2: and you want to just play golf or sit on
• 47:34
  Speaker 2: a bench or go for walks, that's fine too. But
• 47:38
  Speaker 2: then you can be complacent. But if you're alive, meaning
• 47:42
  Speaker 2: like we're live on this podcast, if you're alive in
• 47:44
  Speaker 2: a business or in a career, never get complacent. Always
• 47:48
  Speaker 2: have the fear of failure. Be one hundred percent reliable,
• 47:50
  Speaker 2: one hundred percent on time, and these are the controllable variables.
• 47:54
  Speaker 2: Then you can still have set backs, but you can
• 47:56
  Speaker 2: also put yourself with that in a position to suddenly
• 47:59
  Speaker 2: reap the benefits of your experience, your patience to make
• 48:04
  Speaker 2: some real good progress and money when the tide turns
• 48:08
  Speaker 2: your way.
• 48:19
  Speaker 1: So I want people as we wrap this up, I
• 48:21
  Speaker 1: want the audience to listen very carefully, rewind this and
• 48:25
  Speaker 1: listen to the last twenty minutes of this podcast. In particular,
• 48:28
  Speaker 1: I really want you to get into this and I
• 48:29
  Speaker 1: want you to remember what he just said. Now, controllable
• 48:34
  Speaker 1: variables are things that are within your obviously control. I
• 48:39
  Speaker 1: would say that this way, most success is tied to
• 48:44
  Speaker 1: good habits and execution. Good habits and execution execution means
• 48:52
  Speaker 1: doing things. Good habits is having a set of standards
• 48:56
  Speaker 1: about things that are consistent and do that consistently over time,
• 49:00
  Speaker 1: which is another way of what he just said. My
• 49:02
  Speaker 1: wife Shascher, would say that most behavior is learned behavior.
• 49:06
  Speaker 1: So you want to be nosy about everything, but certainly
• 49:11
  Speaker 1: the right things. When Alex and I met, one thing
• 49:14
  Speaker 1: was obviously about both of us. We not talked about
• 49:17
  Speaker 1: any of this, by the way, beforehand, we were both
• 49:19
  Speaker 1: nosy I mean, God gave you two ears in one mouth.
• 49:22
  Speaker 1: If you listen twice as much as you talk. I
• 49:24
  Speaker 1: was nosy about his business in his life. He was
• 49:26
  Speaker 1: nosy about my business's life. He was so nosy about
• 49:29
  Speaker 1: inclusive economics, inclusive capitalism. We hosted the meeting in his house.
• 49:33
  Speaker 1: That's how nosy he was. And he didn't hold them,
• 49:35
  Speaker 1: host the meeting and leave. He holds the meeting a
• 49:37
  Speaker 1: set in the audience with a notepad to take notes,
• 49:41
  Speaker 1: because he wanted to learn. Who knows whether he's going
• 49:44
  Speaker 1: to end up investing in a business that that may
• 49:47
  Speaker 1: be tied to an underserved neighborhood or community, their huge
• 49:50
  Speaker 1: market opportunity. But he, whatever his reason was, he was
• 49:54
  Speaker 1: just passionate about education. Something else that wants you to
• 49:57
  Speaker 1: notice again, I'm not gonna get any of his business
• 49:59
  Speaker 1: about net words, none of your business either. Let me
• 50:01
  Speaker 1: say let me just say this. My man has done
• 50:04
  Speaker 1: very well for himself. He's very comfortable. Now. If he
• 50:07
  Speaker 1: walked down the street, you would never notice he's got
• 50:10
  Speaker 1: a We didn't. We didn't talk about this. We can
• 50:12
  Speaker 1: talk about our wardrobe. My guess is how he dresses
• 50:15
  Speaker 1: every day. He's got a powder blue shirt maybe light gray,
• 50:19
  Speaker 1: light blue. He's got it buttoned up to the second button. Uh,
• 50:25
  Speaker 1: he probably has no fancy jewelry on, no watch or anything.
• 50:28
  Speaker 1: I'm sure he doesn't have any fancy rings that stuff.
• 50:31
  Speaker 1: I want me to see your hands, Alex, I just
• 50:32
  Speaker 1: I'm just curious. Let me see.
• 50:35
  Speaker 2: Okay, here we go.
• 50:36
  Speaker 1: No, it's a beautiful if you don't watch it. But
• 50:39
  Speaker 1: he's got his wedding ring on. What's the other hand
• 50:41
  Speaker 1: on the other hand or ring?
• 50:42
  Speaker 2: This is like, you know, no commercially but uh, a
• 50:45
  Speaker 2: ring front that's.
• 50:48
  Speaker 1: Look at that. No jewelry right now, He's had nothing
• 50:51
  Speaker 1: and there's nothing. He wants you to see him. He
• 50:55
  Speaker 1: wants you to focus. If you're an investor, if you
• 50:57
  Speaker 1: think about coming in his office and giving him some
• 50:59
  Speaker 1: of your money to invest, he doesn't want you to
• 51:01
  Speaker 1: focus on that other stuff. He wants you focused on him.
• 51:03
  Speaker 1: He also doesn't want you to think that if you
• 51:06
  Speaker 1: give him some money, he's going to waste that money
• 51:10
  Speaker 1: on stupid stuff. So it's a very simple mestha. So
• 51:13
  Speaker 1: you don't so the creative class that's listening to this,
• 51:17
  Speaker 1: you get paid for being loud. It's jewelry it's sunglasses
• 51:22
  Speaker 1: at night? Is you know broach?
• 51:24
  Speaker 2: Is?
• 51:24
  Speaker 1: Is you know? Is fancy cars? I get it, I
• 51:26
  Speaker 1: get it. But if you want to know from cashing
• 51:29
  Speaker 1: the check to writing it, and you want to become
• 51:33
  Speaker 1: from a consumer to an investor, if you want a
• 51:36
  Speaker 1: job at if you're if you just forget the creative,
• 51:40
  Speaker 1: those are successful and creative, God bless you. But if
• 51:43
  Speaker 1: you want to go to working at an investment house,
• 51:46
  Speaker 1: don't walk in his office or anybody else's office with
• 51:48
  Speaker 1: a lot of stuff on. That distracts people from the
• 51:51
  Speaker 1: one thing they're buying. Your brilliance, your intellect, your good habits,
• 51:56
  Speaker 1: the things he just mentioned. He wants to folks he
• 51:59
  Speaker 1: wants to So you're going to be focused on his
• 52:01
  Speaker 1: clients advancement period. It's very simple, good habits executed over time. Alex,
• 52:09
  Speaker 1: Did I get in that wrong?
• 52:11
  Speaker 2: No? You got it all right.
• 52:13
  Speaker 1: So let's uh, let's wrap this up. Let me ask
• 52:16
  Speaker 1: as a closing question, people are listening to this now
• 52:20
  Speaker 1: that they feel more successful. I'm so they feel more
• 52:22
  Speaker 1: comfortable that they can approach somebody like you, that you're
• 52:24
  Speaker 1: you're talking the language they understand. You've demystified Wall Street
• 52:28
  Speaker 1: and finance. And by the way, just for those who
• 52:32
  Speaker 1: don't know, an investment house like Alex's is not FDI
• 52:37
  Speaker 1: and CE ensure it like a bank would be. A
• 52:39
  Speaker 1: bank is the only basically government backed business in America,
• 52:43
  Speaker 1: backed by the full faith and credit of the federal government.
• 52:44
  Speaker 1: You don't care which bank you put the money in
• 52:47
  Speaker 1: is guarantee. When he what he's done is much more
• 52:49
  Speaker 1: much difficult, much more difficult because he had to get
• 52:52
  Speaker 1: private capital to invest in an investment house on theoretically
• 52:56
  Speaker 1: is at risk. And so what he's done is he's
• 52:59
  Speaker 1: got to be very very precise and very very clear
• 53:03
  Speaker 1: on the numerical the numbers of the KPIs key performance indicators,
• 53:07
  Speaker 1: because he's gonna be judge on everything. He can't afford
• 53:09
  Speaker 1: a moment of mistake. So it's really create what he's built.
• 53:15
  Speaker 1: As you're looking, Alex at the future twenty twenty five,
• 53:21
  Speaker 1: twenty twenty six, people here listen. They have become more comfortable,
• 53:24
  Speaker 1: They feel like they know you a little bit. What
• 53:27
  Speaker 1: advice do you have for them about are there any
• 53:30
  Speaker 1: we're the last term we're gonna unpack to day. Is
• 53:35
  Speaker 1: is it a is it a bullish environment? Or a
• 53:37
  Speaker 1: bearish environment. Can you please explain what that means? And
• 53:41
  Speaker 1: if you believe it's an environment that's opportunistic, meaning there's
• 53:45
  Speaker 1: opportunity in all the chaos. Are there two or three
• 53:49
  Speaker 1: or four categories areas industries that you encourage people to
• 53:52
  Speaker 1: look at. And then I have one last question for
• 53:54
  Speaker 1: you before we wrap.
• 53:56
  Speaker 2: Okay, So bullish means everything is looking positive, everything is
• 54:00
  Speaker 2: looking up, the economy is good. Therefore you know the
• 54:04
  Speaker 2: stock market may do well. Bearish is when people are
• 54:08
  Speaker 2: very worried. We trench, companies, hire less people, people spend
• 54:13
  Speaker 2: less money, the economy contracts, the earnings of the companies
• 54:17
  Speaker 2: go down, and therefore the stock market goes down. So
• 54:20
  Speaker 2: that's bearish versus bullish. I'm a bullish guy. I'm always
• 54:23
  Speaker 2: optimistic pretty much all the time. So I'm looking at
• 54:27
  Speaker 2: the next couple of years again with great optimism. Why
• 54:31
  Speaker 2: we have fortunately very low unemployment overall. Of course, there
• 54:36
  Speaker 2: are pockets where it's difficult as always, but in general
• 54:39
  Speaker 2: it's a pretty good environment. We have interest rates which
• 54:43
  Speaker 2: were high recently, but they're coming down as well, so
• 54:47
  Speaker 2: that's positive. We've had a lot of uncertainties and we
• 54:50
  Speaker 2: continue them some, but I think they will go and
• 54:54
  Speaker 2: become less uncertain as time goes on. You know, for instance,
• 54:57
  Speaker 2: the US presidential election, we'll have certainty on that. Soon,
• 55:01
  Speaker 2: we'll have geopolitical issues that might bother people that are
• 55:07
  Speaker 2: and all of us that will suddenly be less of
• 55:11
  Speaker 2: an issue. These things do resolve themselves over time, So
• 55:14
  Speaker 2: I'm looking optimistic to twenty twenty five and twenty six
• 55:18
  Speaker 2: particular areas of interest. Of course, there's a tremendous amount
• 55:22
  Speaker 2: of excitement in the technology area, but again, buyer beware,
• 55:27
  Speaker 2: beware of what you pay for certain stocks in these areas.
• 55:31
  Speaker 2: In general, I think there's going to be an upturn
• 55:34
  Speaker 2: in housing and automotive from very low levels we've seen
• 55:38
  Speaker 2: because of the higher interest rates and mortgages. Mortgage rates
• 55:42
  Speaker 2: decline in existing home sales. People don't want to move
• 55:46
  Speaker 2: from one home to the next. And therefore, if you
• 55:49
  Speaker 2: don't move from one home to the next because you
• 55:52
  Speaker 2: have a low mortgage rate, that was locked in and
• 55:56
  Speaker 2: you don't want to make the move. So right now,
• 55:58
  Speaker 2: existing home sales are as low as they were in
• 56:01
  Speaker 2: the crash of two thousand and eight two thousand and nine,
• 56:04
  Speaker 2: they pick up. You see a pickup in applying sales
• 56:10
  Speaker 2: in paint and carpets and all the things that people
• 56:14
  Speaker 2: do when they get a new house. They renovate it,
• 56:17
  Speaker 2: they freshen it up, they make it look like their house.
• 56:20
  Speaker 2: And so existing home sales are at the bottom. They're
• 56:23
  Speaker 2: likely to move up as interest rates come down in
• 56:26
  Speaker 2: the coming year. So those are areas of interest, if
• 56:28
  Speaker 2: I may.
• 56:29
  Speaker 1: And the companies and the companies that make paint, and
• 56:32
  Speaker 1: the companies that make fenses, and the company that make
• 56:35
  Speaker 1: you know, turf, and the companies that sell that stuff,
• 56:38
  Speaker 1: those might be might be also moving up with them.
• 56:41
  Speaker 1: Continue Alex, sir.
• 56:42
  Speaker 2: Correct. So as a message to everybody on the podcast,
• 56:46
  Speaker 2: I think, as maybe parting notes, you're all about education
• 56:51
  Speaker 2: and financial literacy, and I think everybody needs to take
• 56:56
  Speaker 2: that to heart and do this at home as much
• 56:59
  Speaker 2: as possible. Unfortunately, in school, they don't teach kids basic economics,
• 57:05
  Speaker 2: and we're not talking about sophisticated stuff. We're talking about
• 57:08
  Speaker 2: the checkbook, balancing, balancing your checkbook, credit card spending, mortgages,
• 57:16
  Speaker 2: all these basic things. You can just in the words,
• 57:19
  Speaker 2: get simple educational information that you can discuss at the
• 57:24
  Speaker 2: dinner table with everybody. With yourself, with your spouse, with
• 57:28
  Speaker 2: your loved one, with your young kids. Talk about balance sheets.
• 57:33
  Speaker 2: What is an asset, what's a liability, what's depth? What
• 57:37
  Speaker 2: is a mortgage? How do we save money? How do
• 57:40
  Speaker 2: we grow money? Give, if possible your kids when they're twelve, thirteen,
• 57:45
  Speaker 2: fourteen years old and an account. I'm not saying any particular,
• 57:50
  Speaker 2: but e trade accounts, some account where you can buy stocks,
• 57:54
  Speaker 2: and then for Christmas or birthdays, or for whatever holiday
• 57:58
  Speaker 2: you celebrate, give another one hundred dollars or two hundred
• 58:01
  Speaker 2: dollars or whatever you can give to this account instead
• 58:06
  Speaker 2: of another toy, and let them pick their own stocks,
• 58:10
  Speaker 2: or let's discuss those stocks together. I've done it with
• 58:13
  Speaker 2: my kids. And at one point, you know, if you
• 58:16
  Speaker 2: start at twelve or thirteen, maybe at age twenty five,
• 58:19
  Speaker 2: twenty six, it could be a meaningful amount. And then
• 58:21
  Speaker 2: you have your job as a young person. But you
• 58:23
  Speaker 2: also have your savings account. You shouldn't touch that and
• 58:27
  Speaker 2: keep growing it. And as you said, you're four to
• 58:29
  Speaker 2: one K, which you might get from the company if
• 58:31
  Speaker 2: they match it. Maximize it for sure, and then make
• 58:35
  Speaker 2: sure it's invested properly. And if you have choices, try
• 58:38
  Speaker 2: to put it into equities. I think those are good points.
• 58:44
  Speaker 1: So I'm gonna I've never done this before. I'm honored
• 58:46
  Speaker 1: when I get a chance to meet a guy like
• 58:47
  Speaker 1: you who's so successful and so approachable. I have a
• 58:51
  Speaker 1: book that's financial literacy for all number one business finance
• 58:54
  Speaker 1: in the country for the last eight months. I'm gonna
• 58:57
  Speaker 1: say to anybody watch this podcast if you were inspired
• 58:59
  Speaker 1: by Alex and you're wondering, like, I'll never meet a
• 59:02
  Speaker 1: guy like this, Like I'll never run into him on
• 59:04
  Speaker 1: the street. I'll never run into in the elevator. He's
• 59:07
  Speaker 1: probably got security. Whatever I never run in, I'll never
• 59:09
  Speaker 1: be in the Hamptons. I just would love to spend
• 59:11
  Speaker 1: thirty minutes with a guy like him and ask him
• 59:14
  Speaker 1: questions and be inspired and may and maybe even pitch
• 59:17
  Speaker 1: him for an internship for me or my son or
• 59:20
  Speaker 1: daughter or whatever. But I love to just have thirty
• 59:22
  Speaker 1: minutes with this guy. I'm making a commitment for him
• 59:24
  Speaker 1: that hopefully he won't hate me for. But if you
• 59:27
  Speaker 1: write me a note, write it to Senate Bill dot Fair,
• 59:30
  Speaker 1: Bill dot Fai R at Operation NOPE dot Org, my
• 59:33
  Speaker 1: deputy chief of staff, and make a case for why
• 59:37
  Speaker 1: you should have an audience with Alex and his firm.
• 59:41
  Speaker 1: Why you think that you are worth thirty minutes or
• 59:46
  Speaker 1: forty five minutes of his time? The top ten people,
• 59:49
  Speaker 1: but the letters I get. I'll give nine of them
• 59:51
  Speaker 1: a copy of my book Financial Literacy for all just
• 59:53
  Speaker 1: to write in the letter at the top ten and
• 59:56
  Speaker 1: the number one best one I'm gonna recommend to Alex
• 1:00:00
  Speaker 1: he actually meets with you for thirty to forty five
• 1:00:03
  Speaker 1: minutes and give you, you know, just give you an audience,
• 1:00:06
  Speaker 1: one on one, and hopefully that might inspire you to
• 1:00:09
  Speaker 1: change the course of your life. Alex, would you mind
• 1:00:12
  Speaker 1: doing that.
• 1:00:13
  Speaker 2: Note at all?
• 1:00:14
  Speaker 1: There we go, pleasure closed mouths, don't get fit, as
• 1:00:18
  Speaker 1: they would say. And I knew you'd say that because
• 1:00:20
  Speaker 1: Alex is a great guy. So we've gone over. Thanks
• 1:00:23
  Speaker 1: for your time. Quick question, how'd you get so decent?
• 1:00:27
  Speaker 1: It's a quick question, just and I know it makes
• 1:00:29
  Speaker 1: you uncomfortable. I know you're a humble guy, but like
• 1:00:32
  Speaker 1: you're just normal, like you're just parents. You know.
• 1:00:36
  Speaker 2: It's I think if the parents have good values and
• 1:00:40
  Speaker 2: teach you all the controllable varials we just talked about earlier,
• 1:00:44
  Speaker 2: that you know is something that stays with you from
• 1:00:47
  Speaker 2: an early age. So lead by example. My parents led
• 1:00:50
  Speaker 2: by example, and hopefully I'm leading by example for my kids.
• 1:00:56
  Speaker 2: I think picking your friends is important. If you're three
• 1:01:01
  Speaker 2: brilliant people or fund people, you're probably going to be
• 1:01:03
  Speaker 2: the fourth one. If you're around three really nuts, good
• 1:01:06
  Speaker 2: people that are slacking off and hanging out, you're probably
• 1:01:09
  Speaker 2: going to be the fourth one. So pick your friends carefully.
• 1:01:13
  Speaker 2: You can't pick your family. And if you don't have
• 1:01:16
  Speaker 2: the values from home, try to get it from somewhere else.
• 1:01:18
  Speaker 2: Get it from people that inspire you. Read books about
• 1:01:23
  Speaker 2: people that were very successful. There's so many out there
• 1:01:25
  Speaker 2: where people who write memoirs or write about them. And
• 1:01:30
  Speaker 2: read how these folks started and how they got somewhere,
• 1:01:33
  Speaker 2: and you'll learn that most all of them recommended or
• 1:01:38
  Speaker 2: did the things that we were talking about today about
• 1:01:42
  Speaker 2: the values and the variables you can control.
• 1:01:45
  Speaker 1: Amen, I tell you Ambassador Andrew Young's as a quote, Alex,
• 1:01:49
  Speaker 1: coincidence is God's way of remaining anonymous. And you said
• 1:01:56
  Speaker 1: something that you would never know, You would have no
• 1:01:58
  Speaker 1: idea that that makes you my brother. You said that
• 1:02:02
  Speaker 1: if you hang around four or five successful people, you
• 1:02:04
  Speaker 1: might become the fourth or the fifth one, right, third, fourth,
• 1:02:07
  Speaker 1: fifth one. I often say, if you hang around nine
• 1:02:09
  Speaker 1: broke people, you'll be the tenth. And those are the
• 1:02:13
  Speaker 1: bookends of our lives. Watching you hang around, watch what
• 1:02:16
  Speaker 1: you do, watch your your habits. What these are your
• 1:02:18
  Speaker 1: controllable variables, some of them. And as Michael Milk and
• 1:02:23
  Speaker 1: our mutual friend who introduced us would say, that we
• 1:02:26
  Speaker 1: are all born with even our equal potential and equal
• 1:02:31
  Speaker 1: intelligent intelligence. For that potential, for that intelligence if you
• 1:02:34
  Speaker 1: grow it, but not equal opportunity. Thank you Alex for
• 1:02:38
  Speaker 1: being a beacon and a lighthouse for equal opportunity.
• 1:02:43
  Speaker 2: Thank you John, and thanks to everybody for listening to
• 1:02:45
  Speaker 2: the podcast. And it was my pleasure.
• 1:02:49
  Speaker 1: Ladies and gentlemen, this has been Money and Wealth. You've
• 1:02:51
  Speaker 1: been listening to alec Roopers, who is a chief investment officer,
• 1:02:56
  Speaker 1: effectively that c EO in the investment terms of Atlantic
• 1:03:02
  Speaker 1: investment management. Go change your life. It's all in your hands.
• 1:03:21
  Speaker 1: Money and Wealth with John O'Brien is a production of
• 1:03:24
  Speaker 1: the Black Effect Podcast Network. For more podcasts from the
• 1:03:27
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• 1:05:01
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