21st Century Thoughts

Few notes to start the week... Football Great weekend again. Fully convinced the playoffs have been the best ever out of every major sport. So many good games and easy teams to root for. Young stars and the game continues to grow. Remember when it was dying 10 years ago due to concussions and lack of offense? Yeah, we are past that for sure. In other news, Tom Brady didn't(?) retire and the city of Los Angeles is moving homeless people from the stadium area and allowing no masks for the game. Yay science! Market Rebounding Do not invest in smaller stocks. Not in this market. Apple roaring, blue-chips jumping. The only protection against this awful economy and COVID. Crypto is still down as well. Buyers market just like March of 2020... if you play the long game. Rafa I do not care if you like tennis or not, that match was incredible. I lived during the best years of the game with three GOAT's all competing. Just so awesome to watch and see. Still so many young stars too. It is ...

My favorite stories from this week due to either being hilariously funny or shocking: Business FaceBook sold their "stable" crypto to a private equity crypto bank for $200 million. Those same assets were valued 3x higher just 3 months ago. No comments on their Bitcoin holdings though, which makes me wonder what their plan truly is. I think the latest sell-off is once again pushed by the media and elites for more control. If the rich aren't selling, neither should you. Cost-Dollar strategy people! Sports No HOF for Bonds or Clemons. To be very honest, good. I understand how good they are but they cheated openly. There are guys busting their ass everyday to get called up or promoted and they took away from other guys' careers for publicity, then lied to everyone and blamed everyone. What is truly sad is neither needed 'roids to get in. I am never going to debate Bonds as a top 5 player (probably top 3) but the cheating will always be there. Same with McGwire and Sos...

Few quick notes... Office time can be beneficial. The day absolutely flies and you can socialize about anything. Less work done due to more small talk, but time absolutely flies. Its the commute and wasted time that suck. 2.5 hours for lunch and driving that you can nothing from. Podcasts are fine but 2 hours of driving is still awful. High speed trains would be nice or a time machine. Either works to get that wasted time back... Other point, my office hates crypto. Hates it. Gives it no chance. They are wrong and here is why: they don't know it. They think they know it. Am I an expert? No. But I can put bias aside and see the potential paths. If your knowledge is Bitcoin and NFT cards, it's dumb. I get it. But there is so much more to blockchain and the world of crypto. There is a book on my radar (in Italian sadly) but it is a book dedicated to blockchain, not Bitcoin. Great read. Once the potential is understood, you will become exposed in some way to crypto and the idea is ...

Quick NFT thought... use them for contracts. Secure, can not be changed without public knowledge, established to the blockchain rather than some filing cabinet. You can also use for a license, vaccine card, etc. What is the difference between putting that information on your phone vs the blockchain? At least one is fully secure. And do not complain about privacy, if you have any social media that argument is over as they are the kings of data collection. I think there is a future here in this market. Secure contracts with public access to the paper-trail. If we are gonna go all out, go all the way. Also, office tomorrow (branch location but still) so no blog as I will not have time. Nice to meet new faces and bosses. Just hopefully no COVID this time...

Markets Continuing to fall. Yikes. Lots of gains wiped out overnight for me. This economy is weak now on both Main and Wall Street. Maybe we will get the wake-up call we need (I doubt it). Political Ukraine is gone. Remember when Biden was tougher on Russia than Trump? I'm sure Democrats and Biden voters should have no problem telling the people of Afghanistan and Ukraine that, right? Taiwan is next by the way. China sees us as weak and ineffective, good luck everybody else. At least we have more "equity" or whatever that is now! Sports Best weekend of football ever. Not up for debate. 4 games all great and down to the end. Truly a great weekend for football and ratings were through the roof. Baseball still doesn't exist yet. Those meetings will continue to be crap until they meet and make realistic demands. Oh and the HOF may not elect anyone into it. This sport is such a joke in the way it is run. Embarrassing. Business Have a story and you be the judge. Heard from ...

I think NFT's are stupid. I have been consistent with this. But there is a market and money here to operate off of. Counterpoint to my own doubts: we have bought virtual apps  with the App Store launching in 2010, virtual farms on Facebook in 2012, social media access in 2015, Fortnite skins in 2018, and we spent money on OnlyFans in 2020, and continue to spend on these things today. Why are virtual trading cards out of the picture? With a virtual world, our assets and entertainment will be virtual too.  Blame the Metaverse.

It is almost time to buy. I have spoken about this for a month but this is almost the time to buy again. Bitcoin is below $40k, DOW is down, major stocks down. Seems like a time to buy and lower your average purchase costs. It will rebound eventually, buy the dip. Everyone should be buying as well, including old people. The old BS of 28 stocks to balance, 80/20 ratios, and fixed income for older folks is garbage. This is not the stock market of 40 years ago so stop treating it as such. Buy dips and say thank you.

There is money in real estate to be made. I have developed a model that is examining potential cash flows and what shocked me is the ability to have massive cash swings depending on timing. The real factors that matter are your interest rate and location, along with getting your costs down. Easy way to earn passive income, if you have the capital (isn't everything?) But then it brought up the topic of creating a cool, yet simple model and should you sell free products? Easy answer is yes but then I thought about it. Free products make more money if done correctly. Yes, free products. Entry fees and costs limit your client base. Free means everyone can partake. This does not mean everything should be free but when it comes to increasing exposure, free is better.  Think social media. Think current video games. Think most apps on your phone. Think restaurant promotions when they partner with sports teams or businesses. Free Free Free then boom, added cost. By that point, you are hooke...

Tax Thoughts Tax rebates have to be one of the funniest things that people think are great. You are paying a service money to file your taxes in order to get some of  your money back from the government aka the worst spender of money in the history of the world. They burn through trillions per year like it is water and provide lackluster services yet you are supposed to feel happy about getting $300 bucks back in your pocket. Laughable.  They also want you to report Crypto on your tax forms. Just one step closer to making sure they regulate the decentralized market here too.  Finally, remember when they wanted to tax unrealized gains? This month and prior month are examples of how dumb that is. Given market down turns, you would have been taxed on money you not longer have earned... stop voting for these people please. Sports Hope everyone likes basketball, soccer, and hockey since baseball is not happening anytime soon. There is no chance players report on time in Februa...

2 important notes before the week starts for most: Happy MLK Day. I know it is now preached about by the Media rather than explained but his impact on society is among the all-time highest by individuals in history. A better world emerged because of him and I am thankful for it. Right on que, markets are crashing as we speak since bonds are at 2 year highs. This was predicted a few weeks ago by me. Inflation is that bad folks.... If they raised rates and bonds rose in an election year too? Yikes. Good luck with that in November.

No major news stories heading into the weekend (need to wait until later on in the day to see what stories dump so they can be "hidden"). I was always fascinated by whoever came up with this. Before the age of social media, bias media, and "fake news," it was a staple to drop awful news stories on Friday knowing that by Monday it was over. The attention span of the public and media is short (unless you are Donald Trump, he may be the only exception). Pay attention to what gets announced in 6 hours because it probably means there is an underlying issue being hidden. In addition, it's a longer weekend with MLK Day on Monday. 3 days to improve yourself in some way and not waste it away like 99% of people will. Take a trip, hangout with friends, or see family, just do not sit inside and rot it away. See you all Tuesday to discuss the potential 4 rate raises this year by the FED, including one in March. Strap in and buy Crypto.

How vital is this to success? I feel like every article I read describes how important a healthy cultural is to a company's profits. I disagree to an extent. Now before I get burned at the stake, toxic environments are still a no from me. Harassments, sexual comments, and unprofessional behavior should not be tolerated. As an adult, we should know where this line is drawn already in my opinion. In terms of the organizational health, what really matters? Should a company do team trips? Special lunches? Giveaways and other promotions to encourage performance? I disagree to all of this and maintain the position that employees love 2 things: higher pay and less working time. That is it, end of story. No questions asked. For 99.99% of employees this works great to foster a winning business. Part 2 of this, how should we structure the company to ensure performance is always strong? Well, it is about the frame and shell of the tasks. This means the employees are able to placed and put int...

Politics Inflation hit 7% last year, the highest since Jimmy Carter. In layman terms, if your pay did not increase by 7%, you lost money. No way around it, the midterms will be a blood bath at this rate and 2024 cannot come soon enough... Sports The MLB and Players' Union are finally meeting so you know how this will go: decline offer, see you in a couple weeks, push season back. It is all baseball knows... Congrats to Lester on a great career. Easily the best Cubs signing in free agency ever and paved the way to 5 years of great baseball. Bulls win by 40 and rest up for the Nets? Hawks win? Sounds like a great night to me in Chicago. Crypto Catgirl coin, DEPO, and LINK are the future. I will not be taking questions at this time about them. In all seriousness, this week has proved that Crypto is not immune to economic downfalls. Bitcoin is down 33% from its all-time high and most others are following suit. The whole appeal was to be different than stocks but they are slowly turning...

Interesting argument I saw on Twitter (a nice refresher for once) debating whether you would give up 1 year of your life for 1 million dollars. The trick is you do not know when you die and you have to wait 1 year for the 1 million too.  This to me is a no brainer. At 24, that 1 million is life changing money if allocated and spent correctly. It buys a house and car, 250k in retirement assets to grow for 30 years, and 250k to start my own ventures with more potential growth. I am hoping this means I die at 89 instead of 90... But not everyone saw it this way. Some value life that much, or their age is already too high where the return isn't there as they are already retired and relaxing anyway. Not everyone thinks with a financial lens. This definitely made me think. I mean, we gave up 2 years for COVID and a stimulus check of $1200 so $1 million should be a resounding yes.

Two words that can mean completely opposite or the same thing depending on the person... Is the situation possible or probable? And if so, what are the odds of both? Do you take the chance if it is 51% to 49%? Or only 99.9%? Take the example: I could become a billionaire this year. Odds of this happening? Near zero. Possible but not probable.  How can you make the two overlap? Finding the ability to make your situation possible and probable is the key to finding success in whatever area. Having realistic expectations and making your goals overlap with probability can be the key to your success.

Happy Friday and a quick post to celebrate it. Sports attendance is down. Mass layoffs at ESPN. Teams are unwatchable due to tanking and the good teams' fans are getting complacent with winning every year. Less social media engagement. So what is happening? Is every sport dying when youth sports are a multi-billion dollar business?  Hardly, it's rather an inability to get people into the seats and keep engagement. Too many commercials, not enough advertising before the game, and high prices force the fans into a "meh" environment. The people running advertising never played and the corporate board is 60+ years old with the focus on profits with a mature company mindset. That is a recipe for disaster. Every team should be partnering with the youth programs. Look at elite travel baseball. These organizations have 5-6 teams each age group from 9-18. Assume this: 5 teams an age level with $3,500 a kid to play. 12 kids a team. That is $2.1MM of revenue and these teams only...

The market dropped yesterday and that trend will not change. Stocks and Cryptos are both down due to one decision: the Fed raising rates. Why? Well, when the Government spends trillions without adjusting for debt you get rampant inflation. Combine this with the Fed injecting trillions through quantitative easing and you get the worst inflation in 50 years. By raising the rate and buying back some of their debt they injected, inflation will crash. The issue is so will 401k's and investments. If they do not raise rates, inflation continues to increase but your 401k is saved. What is more frustrating is this was predicted to happen by anyone who has take a high school economics class. Our economy is hanging on by a thread for some and others are ready to scoop it all up. Just make sure you're buying.

Finally starting to read about crypto and put in my research each night (20-30 mins) to understand where the opportunities are. I am still in on Catgirl coin for the long-term (3-5 years) and in on Link for the next 2-3 years as well. The market is dropping so its a good time to buy and lower your average cost down if possible. In addition, I bought GBTC for some Bitcoin, Ethereum, ATOM, and Link exposure through the stock market. The vast majority of money remains in Apple, Target, and bank accounts. This led me to another goal of mine in 2022: develop passive income streams. I blog for my own enjoyment rather than income, and a podcast or YouTube channel would be for the same reasons. So where does that leave me? The goal should be simple: make $5-10 a day and reinvest into a stock / crypto / fund and generate more income on that. I am attempting to learn about farming and compounding interest opportunities within the crypto world. In addition, I am taking $30 a month from my paychec...

Few notes as we return from our holiday vacation... 1. Set your goals now. I set my list last night for what I want in 2022. Do it now so you do not forget and keeps you motivated. Failure is okay after all. 2. COVID only exists in certain areas of the country. It certainly didn't in Nashville last weekend... 3. Bulls are the team to beat if healthy. No ifs, ands, or buts. They are elite and play team basketball while being fun to watch. Finally back to what they should be with the fan base they have... 4. Blogs will be daily as long as I am logged into this computer. Basically, I have work, I blog in my free time. Funny how that works.... 5. Vaccine passports are live in Chicago. I had to show mine to enter a gym yesterday while watching others get turned away. If that doesn't sum up the stupidity of our leaders (all Democrats) than I do not know what does. Why try to improve your health (aka the number 1 factor for COVID deaths / illnesses) according to our wonderful elected ...