Animal Spirits Podcast - Predictions For 2025 (EP.394)

Episode Date: January 8, 2025

On episode 394 of Animal Spirits, Michael Batnick and Ben Carlson discuss: all sorts of predictions for the upcoming year, the AI bubble, the roaring 2020s of stock market returns, financial regrets at age 80, housing is the business cycle, when to sell big winner, the VC drop-off, what to do when you get super rich, 50 things a man should not know, and much more! Join the thousands of parents who trust Fabric to protect their family. Apply today in just minutes at https://meetfabric.com/spirits. Sign up for The Compound newsletter and never miss out: thecompoundnews.com/subscribe Subscribe to The Unlock newsletter: https://www.advisorunlock.com/subscribe Find complete show notes on our blogs: Ben Carlson’s A Wealth of Common Sense Michael Batnick’s The Irrelevant Investor Feel free to shoot us an email at [e-mail] with any feedback, questions, recommendations, or ideas for future topics of conversation.   Investing involves the risk of loss. This podcast is for informational purposes only and should not be or regarded as personalized investment advice or relied upon for investment decisions. Michael Batnick and Ben Carlson are employees of Ritholtz Wealth Management and may maintain positions in the securities discussed in this video. All opinions expressed by them are solely their own opinion and do not reflect the opinion of Ritholtz Wealth Management. The Compound Media, Incorporated, an affiliate of Ritholtz Wealth Management, receives payment from various entities for advertisements in affiliated podcasts, blogs and emails. Inclusion of such advertisements does not constitute or imply endorsement, sponsorship or recommendation thereof, or any affiliation therewith, by the Content Creator or by Ritholtz Wealth Management or any of its employees. For additional advertisement disclaimers see here https://ritholtzwealth.com/advertising-disclaimers. Investments in securities involve the risk of loss. Any mention of a particular security and related performance data is not a recommendation to buy or sell that security. The information provided on this website (including any information that may be accessed through this website) is not directed at any investor or category of investors and is provided solely as general information. Obviously nothing on this channel should be considered as personalized financial advice or a solicitation to buy or sell any securities. See our disclosures here: https://ritholtzwealth.com/podcast-youtube-disclosures/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Today's Animal Spirits is brought to you by Fabric. Michael, as I reach middle age, one of the strange thing is that you start getting morbid thoughts. Yeah. Oh, you just started? Well, yeah, I guess so. Seeing your parents age and seeing their friends get sick or die, death and taxes, correct? And I think maybe is that one of the reasons that people don't spend a lot of time planning for things like life insurance? Because they don't want to think about that kind of estate planning, life insurance.

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Company, not available in certain states, price is subject to underwriting and health questions. Check out Meetfabric.com to learn more. Welcome to Animal Spirits, a show about markets, life, and investing. Join Michael Batnik and Ben Carlson as they talk about what they're reading, writing, and watching. All opinions expressed by Michael and Ben are solely their own opinion and do not reflect the opinion of Riddholt's wealth management. This podcast is for informational purposes only and should not be relied upon for any investment decisions. Clients of Riddholt's wealth management may maintain positions in the security. discussed in this podcast.

Welcome to Animal Spirits with Michael and Ben. Mr. Carlson, it's good to see you. In person. We haven't done with these together in a while. John, when's the last time? It has been a while. Yeah. Good to see you.

Is it easier to have me a distance away so you can be longing for me, right? It does feel a little bit more natural. I think it's just what we've got into custom, too. It feels a little bit more natural for me when we're zooming, you know? Yeah. I'm residing. All right.

We're going to start the show with, Not housekeeping. I had this realization this morning. When I make these announcements, I call them housekeeping announcements. You need a new term for that, too? Yeah. I'm on board with a bingo card into the parlay. I'm making that thing happen.

Okay. It's not in my parlay. It's just, I have an announcement to make. Okay. A plug. It's not a housekeeping note. What does that even mean? Okay.

We have an announcement to make. Two announcements to make. One, Riddle 12th management is coming to Naples, Florida. Beautiful area of the country. We're going to be there February 19th to the 21st. meeting clients, meeting prospects, doing a live teacaf with our friend Brian Belski. So if you want to see us, get in touch. Info ad redholtoldt.com.

That's February 19 through the 21st. Okay. And then the next month, we're going to be on the other side of Florida. Last week, I dropped a breadcrumb about future-proof Bahamas. I jumped the gun. That's not until October. Yeah, we got two more before that. I skipped one.

I skip two. Three. that's right uh so in miami march 16th through the 19th on the beach on the beach literally we're doing future proof citywide and there will be a michael battenick birthday celebration i am turning 40 i did not realize this you're doing 40 while we're in miami well a few days laterish okay okay you know Doug bonaparte did a 40th birthday party when we were in out in california i think it was like a month early um what's the what's the what's the range there because that seems a month early is it's very Doug that's true sorry Doug we love you

okay so what do you want done for your 40th birthday party well in Miami I don't know but Robbins talking about planning something for me for my 40th and I said can we just skip it I really I'm not I'm not like a so for my bar mitzvah when Jewish boys turn 13 they have a party it's like a sweet 16 I've been to a bat mitzvah before okay same thing yeah so the idea is usually it's like a it's like a I don't know like a wedding without a wedding it's like one of those formal parties where the boy or the girl runs in and there's like dancers and everybody's looking at them I that wasn't for me I couldn't do that I don't like the spotlight being on me like between the bar mitzvahs bar mitzvahs and the bat mitzvahs and the summer camps you Jewish

York parents watch it you have to know just spend a lot of money on your kids that's like three weddings before they're so I was the only person in my age group that I knew that I didn't have a traditional bar mitzvah. I just did, like, a sports party. And you, because you wanted it more low-key. Yeah. So you're saying, so I am on the record saying, once you turn older, like, you can't celebrate your birthday's big anymore. Like, or I don't like celebrating birthdays big. I don't want presents. You can do 40. But I'm saying 40 and 50, you should definitely do something. You have to. When you turn 40 and 50, that's when you

can celebrate. I'm going to give you a free pass. You have to. I know. I just don't like that, but, uh, nah. All right. And you're, everyone has to do, like, the black streamers, right? When I did, with turn 40, I had like, black streamers? You know, when you turn 40, it's like, oh, your life's over, you're old. And so the signs are all in black and everything's bad and, right? Because you're old and over the hill. You never seen that before?

I haven't. Yesterday, I was having a call with Chart Kid. And Chart Kid is, I don't know how old he is, but he's a young man. He's in his mid-20s, probably. Okay. So before we get on the call, like, hey, who is this person? Like, I don't know, like, how old are they? Who are we talking to here?

And he's like, I don't know. probably middle age like 35 and I was like are you fucking kidding me and he was like and I think Chartkin no offense Matt added himself that it's not really an animal spurs listener

because he didn't really understand the middle age he didn't understand that I was like that that was a thing for us but he wasn't kidding it's a reference point thing your age depends on how you think middle age is I guess so

so we've had a few emailers say like guys come on enough with the middle age stuff your young bed no but look at the data for how long you're going to live. Listen, we don't need to beat this dead horse. We went over it.

According to the Washington, the Middle Age of 62. Let's just leave it at that. That's aggressive. All right. Anyway, Miami Beach, March 16th through the 19th, which is great for me because spring break is always the first week of April. So I got like a pre-spring break and then spring break.

Right? It's going to be great. All right. So I did my stack market predictions. And I wanted to go back a year So you do it 10 predictions, and you've done that's a couple years ago. Yeah, I forgot a lot of my predictions from last year. I think the number one thing that, well, let's just go to them real quick.

There was, I think I'd give myself like a B-minus. No consolidation media streamers. I think that was pretty damn good. The only activity there was was Paramount and David Ellison. But other than that, other than that, nothing. Okay, so you said that's not going to happen yet? Yeah, because a lot of people were suspecting it. Okay.

Yeah. Apple gets dropped from back seven. Netflix replaces it. Obviously, that was wrong. Although Apple did start the year in like a 20% drawdown, which I think. people forget through April. It was lagging pretty badly. Apple was up 30% last year. No revenue growth, a lot of multiple expansion. Margin improvement. If you had a slight paper short on Apple all year. I did. Yeah. I think the stock is ahead of its skis, so to speak.

Over its skis? Ahead? Over? Not ahead. Okay. It's hard to get ahead of your skis unless you fall. I don't know. Speaking of skiing, you saw the people complaining about the park city. Yes, the lines for ski debacle? hills were that's that's a richard failure sunk cost thing remember his whole thing was always let's say you bought tickets to a concert or a game but there's a crazy snowstorm what do you do you've already spent the money on the tickets do go so this is the sunk cost thing where people said i already spent the money on the tickets i'm going to go wait in the line that's a half mile long

i would have been in the ski lodge drinking beer like there's no way i would have waited that long to get on his ski hill all right allow me to do the trump weave because i'm about to go three different places i'll come back to where we started this um Speaking of some cost, so somebody asked me about the next box game. This was probably, I don't know, a couple of weeks ago, there's a bunch of kids in my town going. So I looked at the schedule, I said, wait a minute, January 12th or 13th, whatever the date is. That sounds like football season. So I opened the calendar, and I said, shit, that's wild card weekend.

That's my favorite weekend of the year. It terms of football. Okay. you don't want to miss her for the next game. So I bought four tickets and I told Robin, I said, I can't go. And she was like, what do you mean? I was like, I can't go. It's wildcar weekend.

She's, it's who, what, who cares? I care. It's a big weekend. So my dad is taking the boys to the game. Okay. So no sunk costs there. All right. Oh, you're, okay, sunk costs.

But if you went to a ski hill and you saw a line that was half a mile long, would you wait? I'm not a ski. I didn't grow up skiing. Skiing is for people with means, so I was not one of those growing up. And I feel like people don't pick up skiing later in life. I feel like golf is one of those things that you can pick up later in life. Not skiing. I moved to Northern Michigan when I was in fifth grade, and there's a little tiny...

Where? I was in West Michigan, and I moved to Northern Michigan. So I was here, and I went to here. Okay. And I admit, I was here, here. And there was way more snow up here, where I lived. And there was these little ski hills in town that were not for the people. people with means. It was two chairlifts. It was three runs or something. And one of them was

a bunny hill. I was in fifth grade. And my uncle said, just do this with your skis, snow plow. That was the brunt of my learning. What did you call that? Snow plowing. Snow plowing. Yeah. And that's all I was taught. And I was like, go learn on the bunny hill. Do you ski now? No, I stopped in college probably. Well, anyway, the reason why we bring this up is because, what was it, Val Resorts? I think so. Yeah. Was it like a strike or something? Yeah, there wasn't enough workers and that made the lines really. long. And the company didn't tell any of the guests. And so there was people. Pictures everywhere. Yeah, people were upset. I would have been really upset. And then people were making an economic

thing about it. That had nothing to do with the economy. Well, so, yeah, so there was a tweet that went viral. Like, this is the economy in 2025. Right. And then before I knew the story, I was thinking, like, because somebody emailed us asking about vacation, you know, their baby is getting to the age that where they could start traveling? And is this, like, is everything really expensive now? Is that just the way it is? Is it like really 10 grand for vacation? And I think the answer is it depends on where you go and when you go. But vacation is expensive, obviously. Yes, more than it was. Even though plane tickets are kind of level out of way. No, no, no. But there's a chart that we have later in the duck from the TSA. Travel is still automying. Okay. How did we get here from your

predictions? I can't retrace that. All right. What's your biggest prediction this year that is going to blow people away? Hang on. Real quick. Robin gets Acquired, that was really dumb. I didn't realize that Vlad hit all the voting shares, him and his co-founder. So that's a, that's an F. Money State's and Money Market Funds, check. Inflation gets to the Fed target. The economy overheats. Inflation picks up. A little bit, but let's say that's wrong. Yeah, that's wrong. Vibe cover begins. Yep, no recession. Stocks gain 20%. Large cap tech rolls on. Correct. The other 493 catch up. Incorrect. Bitcoin hits a hundred Cap did catch up for a little bit.

It did. And then it rolled over. And Bitcoin hits 100K check. You did say that. I did say that. Oh, that's a good one. Yeah, that's a good one. That was your best one.

So just going through the charts from last year, Amazon, which is a stock that I bought after going through this exercise, I don't think people remembered that Amazon went the longest amount of time in between all-time highs. It had gone 624 days. Wow. People forget how shitty of a year 2022 was. Right. Big time drawdown.

And Amazon was going nowhere for a while before that. For a long time. didn't realize, or I forgot, that last year ended with a monster bank. The S&P was up nine straight weeks going into 2024. Do you remember that? No, and then it was a- It was just a monster melt-up. Fifty-seven all-time highs for 2024. Yeah, so that was going into 2024. So that was like 25% of all trading days because there's 200, no, do my math. 20% all trading days? Because it's 252 trading days a year, if I'm not mistaken. Yeah. So 20% of all trading days were all-time highs. That's pretty good. All right. So my biggest, my boldest

prediction. So finally this year, I did the odds as I said I would. All right, I'll pick this one. Momentum keeps going in the first half, but we have a double-digit correction in the back half of the year and down overall on the year. I put that at plus $10,000, which is a 1% chance. Now, that doesn't sound like a 1% chance, right? No, it sounds like I would give that like a 20% chance. Okay. So would I, until I looked at the numbers with chart kid and there has only been one year and this was 1928 where the mark was up 10% in the front half of the year and then ended the year down which really surprised me that is surprising counterpoint things that never happened before happen all the time yeah so that's one of those

okay can I give a couple okay any so micro strategy leverage ETF blows up yeah so I wrote that prediction like probably a month ago and then this micro strategy felt 50 plus percent. And so I actually think that dramatically diminishes the odds of a blow. I thought that micro strategy was going to get too big. Now, if it goes back to $100 billion, then I think there's something. Now, I'm talking about the levered ETF, not micro strategy itself. I think the levered ETFs can blow up. And I don't know all the inner mechanics well enough to comment on how that might affect the underlying, but there's just not enough inventory. And there's some weird shit going on with the dealers and the gamas and the hedges and all this nonsense.

Right. As they get too big, the option, it screws up the options, market essentially. Right. You got anything? I got a couple. I'm going to offer a Grand Rapids Hedge prediction. So don't give me crap about this, but I'm basically going for the tails here. So either the AI bubble kicks into gear and we start looking like, okay, this is the 90s, 20%, 30%, 20%, like that kicks into gear. With what, the overall market?

Yeah. And people start thinking like, okay, we're on the, if we're going to do this and they're going to keep spending and AI is going to be big, we're going to get on this thing and we're looking at like a dot com bubble starting to blow. Like I think like another big year and people go, holy cow. Or like Nvidia falls out of bed and everyone goes, oh no, okay, air pocket. So I'm betting on those tape. That's my prediction. That's kind of a hedge to say both of those. But I'm not predicting like, oh, it's just going to be boring.

Nothing's going to happen here. Yeah. I'd say 6040 in terms of like keep going versus an ending this year. So if I. It just feels like early to end. That's why I actually think that, yeah, there's a better chance of like, okay, we're really going to do this. And it's going to start inflating.

It's a back half of 2026. So I think that if Nvidia did fall out of bed and it took the whole market down with it, my other one would be bonds outperform stocks. People rates, people are way too positioned for rates going up and the economy is overheating. And that if Nvidia falls out of bed, GDP growth is maybe not as high as people think. Interest rates fall, bonds up, like the 10 year outperforms the S&P. How's that? Then the S&P ends up.

the year, unlike it ever does, with a zero to 10% return. I always say that you never have a normal average year. Yeah. That would be my prediction that we have a normal to every year. How's that I saw somewhere recently that Europe has had a lot of average years. Oh, really? I didn't just look at their... Like 5% to 10% returns.

Okay. You said money stays in money market funds again? Yeah, I mean, I feel pretty good about that. The counterpoint of that would be if, like, growth does, like, inflation comes in lower than people expect. Growth comes in lower than people expect. The Fed starts cutting more than people assumed. Then people, oh, the Fed just cut 100 basis points in the last four months or something. I think it's possibly it could start to see something that come out. And people look at bonds and go, oh, wait a minute. Yeah, I don't think every dollar stays. But I'm saying like,

even if that would have happened, I think it would go from $7 trillion to six, maybe, maybe, maybe five. So Cliff Asness at AQR wrote a 10-year post-mortem, or premortem, I guess, saying this, this This is what I think I'm going to be writing in 2035 from an asset allocation perspective. And he wrote about U.S. equities being, you know, overpriced and bonds actually doing okay and international stocks basically doing all right because they've been left for dead and because so this is more of a, the world is going to return to a more reasonable place, which I think. Wishful thinking.

Potentially wishful thinking. So my only counter to that would be, so I was. I do my update every year on like an asset allocation quilt. And they have those everywhere now. But for some reason, I started doing it like 10 years ago, which is kind of funny because the original 10-year period I did was through the end of 2014. So 10 years later, I did it. And now that period completely drops off.

And I have the data going back to 2000. So I did this. The next time you clean the slate, then you'll be entering middle age. I'm already there, man. But I, so I did this for the- You're not there. You have a six-pack. I'm 43.

I'm middle age. I'm in better shape now than my 40s and I was in my 30s, which is kind of crazy. I'm pretty sure I will not be that person. I'm happy for you, but I also hate you. I hate myself because I have like a diet. So trust me, there's a lot of hatred going on inner too. I used to never care what I ate. Now I like have, I like care what goes in my body.

It's very annoying. Trust me. And there's people who love to talk about their diets and the food they consume. I personally hate it. I hate having those conversations. It makes me feel like internally ill. So this is the last time we're talking about it. So anyway, I did one for the years 2000 to 2009, which itself is an outlier period.

So look at my, I did my asset allocation quote for 2000, 2009. It looks completely different from the last 10 years. Look at emerging markets. From 2003 to 2007, this is like a dot. They were up 56%, 25%, 33%, 33%, 31%, 31%, 33%. So you look at that and you probably go, well, that period was an outlier. China was building cities, ghost towns, and they were pouring more cement than had had ever been poured in the world before that or something. So you look at this period and say,

that's the outlier. But my whole point of this exercise is, I think the next 10 years is going to be more unpredictable than people. Like, I think there's way too much recency bias going on, even if that recency bias could continue to work for two, three, four years. That's a good take. I firmly agree. So I think that it's hard to envision a scenario where these companies that are heavily investing in what potentially is a game-changing technology don't continue to keep their lead. It seems ridiculous to think that. But history has shown these cycles come and go and the winners, the leaders in laggards constantly change, even if those cycles can go longer than you think. Yeah. That's where I've fallen on this. J.P. Morgan had a good

chart showing the share, I think this was assemblance one, that the share of MSC, all-country World Index, and it's U.S., Europe, XUK, which I don't know why they do XUK. It seems like just kind of kicking them while they're down because the UK is just not as big as it was. EM in Japan, and you see the change in Japan is probably even more stark than the change in the U.S. going from 45% to 5%. But this is the whole point that these things can and will change. That's a good chart.

It's also one where you look at it and you go, what stops this? train. And that's the thinking. I do think that there is a little too much recency bias that people forget. The other side of that would be. People don't forget. But people would tell me, Ben, you're way too locked on that lost decade from 2000, 2009. I feel like that decade shaped me as an investor in terms of asset allocation and diversification. And people might tell me that experience is weighed on you too much. You're missing. So that's fair. I also think that people who have have come up as an investor for the last five, 10, 15 years, have no basis in reality before that.

Speaking of, people don't forget, I was watching, I love you, man, last night in bed. We were talking about the year today. Okay, so you put it on. It's on Paramount via Prime, I think. Do you have the app that tells you what streaming service is on? Yeah, it's called Google. Oh, no, I have one called Just Watch. Oh, yeah.

And it tells you what streaming service is on. Okay. But anyway. he had a bush like a 40-year-old Serbian. They just don't make movies like that anymore. It's true. It'd probably be a TV show if they made it today. So we were talking to Sean yesterday about I love you, man.

That's why I dialed it up. If you're a young person and you missed that, if it was before your time, God, it's funny. Great one. All right, this is from GMO. This is another, like, has the world really changed? They look at the top 10 stocks in the S&P going back to 1957. and versus the equal-weighted 490, the other 490 stocks. And they show that in that overall period,

the top 10 stocks have underperformed by 2.4% annually. If you just invested in the top 10 versus an equal weight of the rest. But since 2013, the top 10 is outperformed by 5% annually. So this is one of those, do I go with history or do I go with what my eyes are saying you right now? Yeah, but I don't know that the answer to, I don't know what the answer is because it can't see the future, but what's more important,

the history from 1957 to 2004 or 2004 to today? You know what the answer is here? You own the S&P 500. You don't try to pick and choose because the index will give you the winners. That's my not trying to get too cute with it. That's not really true. I mean, yes, no, the index will give you the winners,

but that's not what this is saying. Yeah, so my point is you own the index. That's how you ensure that you own the winners. I don't think you try to get too cute with it. All right. I did this chart. I had the chart kid make me this. The past five years of return,

we're halfway through this decade of the 2020s. And this is one of those, to me, a middle-aged thing again. My youngest daughter was in kindergarten when the pandemic hit. And I think back to those days. Not just getting married. Yeah.

So now she's in fifth grade. And it is one of those, you know, type of moments. Yeah. But it's, I don't know, one of those hard father time is on. defeated kind of things. So halfway through the decade, and every single year for the S&P 500, at least,

has been a massive year. In 2020, we had a 34% drawdown in an 18% up year, which is a crazy move. You know what? That will never happen again. See, I think that it's more likely to happen. Something like that. Because cycles are moving so much faster.

I'm saying they're... But down a third in the middle of the year and still ending positive 18%. Okay. The only thing that could cause that is, a pandemic or something like that. 1987, it almost happened. 1987 was down 34% and ended the year up 5. But it was up 40% going into the,

uh, 2021 was up almost 30%. 2022 was a 25% draw on and finished the year down 18. 2023 was up 26, but had a 10% drawdown. And then 2024 was up 25. Is it into contrarian play to say, maybe that's why I made that prediction? Like just more boring and average for the next couple of years.

I don't think we have that ability, though. Yeah. Can I just make a New York comment real quick? Go ahead. As a non-New Yorker, the sounds coming from buildings. We're recording this right now. It sounds like someone is moving like massive pieces of furniture above us. There's sirens constantly going off.

The heaters always make really loud noises. Do you just get used to that? I don't even notice it. John, do you? You must just get used to it. To me, to me it feels like just constant noise that I'm just not used to. I think we're comfortable with the chaos. It must be.

The building may implode on itself because the boiler stood on fire in the building yesterday. We took the elevator up this morning and the guy said he had to sleep here just in case. I don't know. Do I feel great about that? Not really, but I guess he'd roll the punches. All right. Balchun is checking in with the final top 20 ETF leaderboard for 2024 VLO. ended with $116 billion in flows.

So that's that VO is... That's Vanguard's S&P 500. But it is totally surpassed SPY as like the S&P 500 ETF. Is that fair to say or not? No, it's not. No, but I mean, in terms... It seems like a few years in a row now that it's gotten... But in the other one, IVV is the I-Share.

Well, they've had more flows, but SPY is still the biggest. Okay. So they'll be passed this year by IVV and VO, it looks like. So IVV is the I-Shars one, that was number two. So the S&P 500, again, is the thing. This is interesting. So I bet the Bitcoin ETF was third. Wow.

VTI was fourth. Okay, QQQ, SPI. Here's a surprising one. Ag was seventh, the ag. I looked at this the other day. Bonds are still in a drawdown. I think the ag is down 9% from the highs. We're in like a five-year drawdown for bonds on a total return basis,

including any income. and over the last 10 years, bonds have returned the ag, like 1.3% per year. Maybe the worst fixed income environment ever. People still on balance. But it's easier to lean into bonds, I feel like because you see it, well, yeah, but yields are 4% or 5% now. So, okay. Announcement to make, not housekeeping announcement. I put a new title in here on the dock.

Okay. I put a new section, retirement. I don't think this is going to get a lot of play. I feel like this is like a one every eight episodes. to think, but it's okay. I feel like retirement for the financial advice space, retirement is the biggest thing for the next 20 to 30 years because 70 million boomers are retiring.

Every day. Yes, something like that. Okay, so they had this story called financial regrets and wisdom of Americans over 80. This was interesting to me. Sue Jones thought she had more than enough money to live on when she was in her 50s. She wasn't counting a living to her 90s. She retired. Yeah, but how much fun did she have in her 50s?

That's what I want to know. That's a good question. So she retired with $50,000 in retirement money and a $2,900 a month pension in Social Security. Her husband had a pension. And those pensions, they do not account for inflation. Like, if you have a – the Social Security is like literally the only one that really accounts for inflation. So that 2,900 must have seemed like a lot of money back then when she was in her 50s. Probably not as much in her 90s.

And she just said, I plan to die out a more normal age. You know, good news. I live longer. But can you imagine the $50,000 retiring and just hoping that Social Security and Pension covers you? There's going to be a lot of people in that situation, though. Yeah. We've seen the stats.

There are plenty of people that have a lot of money that we talk about and talk to. But there are way more people that have little to nothing save for retirement. I thought a lot about this, not through the retirement lens per se, but just like older people and regrets. So I do respect the fact that as you age through life, you get more wild. and, you know, more introspective and all that sort of stuff. But should potential regrets in your 80s supersede how you feel in your 40s? And I don't, I don't buy that because if you're 80, like, oh, I wish I would have done this.

And hypothetically, if you had a time machine when you're 80 to go back to those things that you regret, I think you would probably still live the same way. Right. So she was much happier in her 50s and maybe not as happy in her 80s or 90s, but it was worth it for the 50s. Exactly. Right. So, yeah, I get why you would say at 80 or 90 that you have some regrets at that age. Right. And when you're 90, yeah.

And then it's also path dependent. You can't see the future. Guess what? If she died at 78, no regrets. Yes. But 40 years ago, dying young must have seemed like more of a possibility. Probability. Right? Yes. All right. Torson's Lock chart of the week. Credit card debt as a share of disposable income is very low. This has been dropping for a long time since the crisis. We have a lot of room to run here if things get hairy in the economy and wage growth starts to slow, growth starts to slow. People have the ability, if they want, to use more debt.

And I still feel like that is what's going to happen. Consumers are not going to stop spending on the ski scopes and the vacations. Well, if they get fired, they will. True. But even if the unemployment rate goes from four to six, 94% of the, labor force is still working. Right. So I just think,

I don't see how people all the sudden retrench, the consumer retrenched is and says, nope, I'm done. I'm not spending money anymore. I feel like people are just going to go into debt

to keep the spending alive. Right? The friends that you have that take vacations and stuff and got hooked on it after the pandemic, you really think they're going to slow down? I just feel like there's room to run here.

I think it all depends on their job situation. I do think that if people, you know, lose their job, they're not going to take vacations. Of course. But my point is that's going to be a smaller percent of the population than those who are still working. All right. We talked about this, I believe, last week. And I just said, I don't know how we can continue to have high mortgage rates. And I think that was one of your predictions. What did you say? That mortgage rates remain high. Yeah. I don't see how mortgage rates remaining six or seven percent doesn't eventually impact the economy. And so Luke Kawa at Sherwood wrote about this saying housing is the business cycle. So he writes, in a world where prospective new buyers are deterred by high long term interest rates, home builders are facing. pressure on margins, thanks in part to trying to subsidize some of this rate sticker shock,

like they've been buying down the mortgage rates. And with management of these firms' warning of lower than expected deliveries in the first quarter, employment and residential construction stands out as a clear vulnerability for the U.S. job market. Given the old max and that housing is the business cycle, popularized by a well-time 2007 paper by Ed Leamer of the same name, that means it's an important flashpoint for the U.S. economy and financial markets as well. I just think that this is one of those lag lags that eventually catches up. I don't see how we can continue to have strong growth in the economy with 7% mortgage rates. Eventually, it catches up to us.

Didn't we just discuss this the other week? We did. Yeah. And- Do you have my second thoughts? No, I'm doubling down on it. He's saying housing is the business. Remember I said, how can it be such a big part of the economy and not have an impact?

And he's saying, no, housing is the business cycle. And I think maybe the reason it sounds such a lag is just because of the 3% mortgages. And eventually it's going to have to trickle through. And there's only the- But so I was looking at a chart. somebody has the effective mortgage rate versus the current mortgage rate. Right. Could have been, doesn't matter where the chart came from.

We're still so far below where current mortgage rates are. And the high mortgage rates are impacting a very small percentage. Yeah. It's growing. But just, can you imagine being a realtor in this environment? Like, how many people have dropped out of that as a profession? Because there's just little to no activity. Yeah.

Think about when you move, you pay movers. You buy new furniture. You redecorate the home. you might do some renovations. Now, there's still renovations going on or people who are staying at their houses, but there's so much loan departments, there's so much activity

that is tied up into the housing market activity. Yeah. I just think eventually it has to make, it has to make a dent in something. All right, moving on. This is a great email. I'm the college professor from the NVIDIA article that Michael famously derided as, quote,

I give them no credit as investors. They just got lucky. Thanks for the credit for holding the 70% drawdowns, buddy. All right, well, he's back, and he's nailing it again. He nailed the QBTS trade. These are the quantum computing stocks. And Rigetti. Let's check in.

RGTI. He's still ripping? Who, credit to you, sir. So, yes, I dabble in small stocks, and I'm one heck of a lucky guy. They also are held at Roth, so taxing considerations. aren't an issue. Extra credit to you. Okay.

Now, we all know that Michael would have locked in his 30-send profit and sold both a while ago. True. I was just telling Ben, hey, I'm up 18% of Moderna. Do I sell it? But this is a conundrum in the middle of a bubble. Went to sell.

Let your winners run. Take some profits. I sold some Nvidia in 2008 to pay off my mortgage after, after, okay, I won't say that. This is the cause of a consternation of regret, so I don't want to sell too early, but I hate to leave a lot of money on the table

again. So what would you do if you were... I don't see how you can regret having sold a stock to pay off a mortgage. That should be a non-regret, even if the stock continue to go up. Yeah. So he's, you know, do I wait for an acquisition? Do I sell it a particular number? Like Ben and BTC at 99, do I sell it covered calls?

Love the show. You guys, my favorite paris social relationship. Love you, too. And no, in all sincerity, there's obviously a degree of luck, but there's obviously a degree of skill here, right? I mean, proof is in the pudding, obviously dabbling in early in stocks and having the fortitude to... As guys who aren't going to hold 10 baggers, probably, besides the S&P or VTI, there is no good advice to provide here. But wait, but really, if part of your investing strategy is to be speculative with small stocks and invest whatever, a couple thousand bucks, like, and ride the winner, sell the losers, that's, that takes skill. That's hard to do.

Yes. So anyway, to Ben's point, there's no, this would be a lot easier if I could see the future, right? I'd give you perfect advice. But I understand the regret part is like, I'm sure it's painful to sell at 6 and watch something run to 30. I wouldn't know. The other thing that would have to play head games with you is, am I really picking another Nvidia here? Like, are these really going to be a huge winner like that was? Who's to say?

Yes, that'd be the hard part. Like, or is this, is, are these stocks going to round trip because, I don't know, this quantum computing thing is not going to be as biggest people are saying it is. So I would say the way that I would recommend, paper recommend, because I'm not actually doing this because I don't have these sort of giant winners. It's just a trailing stop. Like, is it something as simple as that? So, like, I won't let this thing fall more than 10% from its all time high.

Or 20, like, whatever your number is. 20% and I'm out. Whatever your number is. I don't want any losses below 20%. So then you don't. You have to be okay with saying, like, there's no way I'm going to sell the high, just by definition, with the trailing stop. Right. That's not a bad.

Or how about this? Let's say that I'm making this up. Raghetti is at $19. What if you put an upside target? All right, I'll sell at $25. Come hell or high water. Whatever it is, you have to decide beforehand. That I know for sure.

I just love that. I don't know why this is called Raghetti. It sounds like the name of a character on Save by the Bell. Like, oh, yeah. Zach Day to Stacey Rigetti that one summer. Yeah. It just, it sounds like the Italian person. Whatever happened to Jeff from the Max?

I feel like that guy was like a poor man's Rob Lo. He was in Starship Troopers. He got his brain sucked out. He was too creepy with Kelly Kapowski. That was the problem. Yeah. Right? Can't tread on her.

All right. From the Wall Street Journal, a few people sent us this one. Insurance and taxes now cost more than mortgages for many homeowners. And they show that the share of average mortgage payment going to taxes and insurance is now close to a third. Which is kind of crazy of the cost of the mortgage. And they say in five metro areas, Rochester and Syracuse, New York, Omaha, Nebraska, New Orleans, Miami, at least a quarter of borrowers spend more than half of their monthly mortgage payment on taxes and insurance.

So part of this gets back to the thing we've been talking about, that home insurance in a lot of places is rising for a number of reasons. Part of it is insurance market, and part of it is people suing these places, I guess, and part of it is the weather. I think the other part of it, though, is just if you bought a house 20 years ago or something and you have a very low mortgage payment or you refinance a few times you have a low, like, of course taxes

and insurance are going to continue to go up as a portion of it. It means your mortgage payment is just really, really low. So I don't really have a lot of sympathy here for people complaining about this for some of the people. Okay, that's Ben at...

I'm just saying, I don't think... I have way more sympathy for people who are not able to buy a house. Listen, as a non-man of the people, I'm not surprised to hear you say that you have no sympathy. than people who did buy a house and now are seeing their cost rise, guess what?

Your house is worth way more than it was, right? There's some people who bought, they had stories here about people who bought in Florida and are saying, I wish I would have never bought in Florida because the cost of my insurance and property taxes are way more than I ever thought. Sympathy there, but I don't have sympathy for people who bought a house in 1997 and have an extremely low mortgage payment, and now their property and insurance is going up too. guess what, your house is up fivefold since then. Yeah.

You're fine. Yeah. How's that? I'm having sympathy for the other third of the country that never bought a house. Fair? Okay. All right. J.P. Morgan Guide to Alternatives.

You go through this one? I did not. Okay. They have a chart showing U.S. real estate transaction volumes. and I kind of feel like we stopped talking about the office space crash. That's right. Commercial real estate was the next layman brothers, right? Yeah. Remember that?

I do. What happened to it? I mean, it's still disgusting. Like, the transaction volumes on apartments are way down. I mean, industrial's hanging in there, but... I think we kind of nailed that at the time. We said, listen, this is not going to be an event. It's going to be a death by a thousand cuts if anything really really.

bad happen. So they show the U.S. online retail sales by segment, and they compare today with pre-pandemic. And total online retail is 15.6% today. It was 11% before. Clothing and general merchandise is 14.5% up from 10. So we know where all these trends are going. And they look at the change in the number of physical retail establishments. And the biggest hit is not surprisingly department and discount down 40%. And this will just continue to shrink, right? Like there's no war. Nobody's opening up a Macy's. And in fact, I went to a Macy's Ben the other day. I was, it was January 1st. I was in the city. You know, you know what really... You went to like the Macy's, the one of all the decorations and such? You know it gets my rocks off?

I like working when nobody else is. Makes me feel good. You came and worked on January 1st, right? Yeah, it makes me feel good. Okay, you and... I'm a sick puppy. You and Jensen Wang from NVIDIA. Did you read that thing about him? That said that he, he loves working on vacations. His Team, this is from the new Take Him book about NVIDIA, and some posted a little screenshot of it. And he said, his team hates it when he goes on vacation because he says, I'm sitting on my balcony, watching my kids play in the sand, and I'm firing off more emails than ever because I love working on vacation. Okay, that I don't do that. Michael Badding is just like the NVIDIA CEO. Yeah, no, that's not healthy behavior in my opinion.

No, not at all. He says like he loves, loves, love working. Okay. Okay. Well, anyhow, so I was in New York City without a belt. I only have two belts. What's your belt situation? I have a jeans belt, like a leather belt,

and they have like a summer belt that's more of like a... So you only have two belts too? I'm a two belt guy, yeah. Okay. So I'm a two belt guy. One of my belts is a little bit too small, so it doesn't really fit well. And then the other one is just worn down.

Plus, I feel like you have to, when you have a belt that fits perfectly and you've got it, like there's no need for another one. Yeah. Until you lose that belt. What happened? I don't know. I just can't find it. On vacation? So anyhow, I was in the city. Pants were falling down.

Went into a Macy's. Not a great experience. Never is. No, horrible. No. Finding the stuff you want or need and the sizes, it's, yeah. So the Macy's right over here, the flagship, what does that start losing? $150,000 a day. Obviously, I'm making that number up, but it's just a slow drip to zero.

Yes, but they have great decorations, though. Yeah. Can't beat that. All right. I want to talk about private markets. The F.T. did a piece on the state of the industry. They said the tally of VCs investing in U.S. headquartered companies dropped to 6,175 in 2024, meaning more than 2,000 of fallen dormance since the peak of 8,300 in 2021, according to Pitchbook.

And I think this is very much like all the IPOs that shouldn't have happened to 2000, right? Like it's sort of nature's healing type of thing. So they show all these charts, off 25. That decline is not a worry as much as the worry was back then. But I do think that it has massive implications, which we'll get to in a second. So they say more than half of the $71 billion raised by U.S. VCs in 2024 was pulled in by just nine firms. So concentration and VC like everywhere else. Entries in Horowitz, iconic, thrive, you know, the giant ones.

And so funding is down. And so the little players, the ones that came in, they're gone. and they're having a much more difficult time raising money. They said the time to return capital has elongated a lot across the industry over the last 25 years. The word you don't hear very long. You don't hear that. Elongated. In the 1990s, it probably took seven years to get your money back.

Now it's probably more like 10 years. Some LPs have run out of patience. The $71 billion raised by U.S. firms in 2024 is a seven-year low and less than two-fifths, the total haul. And they have a chart showing new VCs. They basically went to zero, right? Like they raised 20-something-something-billion. billion in the peak of 21, and it's effectively collapsed to zero. All right.

So I think there are massive ramifications for this, not just like for the entire economy and for the stock market. Okay. Massive. So look at Sherwood has a chart showing Open AIs valuation and context. The latest is $157 billion. And that is bigger than Zoom, Snap, Zillow, Warner Music, Domino's, Ralph Lauren, Roku, Duolingo American Airlines in New York Times.

Combined. There's another chart that shows Big Tech has acquired 870 companies, again from Sherwood. Looking at Google, Microsoft, Apple, Meta, Amazon, and Nvidia. 870 companies. So,

back in the day, Vision Pro would have been a venture-backed company. Like, the company making the Vision Pro would have been a venture-backed company. Now it's just, Apple. Right. So the biggest companies are being funded by. Right. Waymo would have been its own company. Exactly. So the biggest companies are being funded by the largest, by the Mag 7 and the largest venture capital companies that don't write $200,000 seat checks anymore. Because the funds are so

gigantic. Can we spin this in a positive way? I'm not saying this is bad. No, but my positive spin on this would be if you're investing in the S&P 500, it's not as concentrated as you think. made this point a lot, that when you're investing in one of these big companies, Google, Microsoft, Apple, you're not investing in one business line. I get it, but I don't buy it. Like, Sam is right in saying that the businesses are way more diversified than they were in the past. Look at how many different business lines Microsoft has and Amazon has and Google has.

But, yeah, would it be a healthier dynamic if these were their own companies? Yes, I totally agree. Yeah. So, but Amazon stock is still Amazon stock, even though the business is way more diversified. But if Vision Pro was a stock, what would it be down right now? All the way. It would be down 90% right? All the way. So anyway, I'm not, I don't know that this is good or bad, but it is.

Right. It just is. And we've been going towards deregulation, and that was always the biggest worry. I heard that from a lot of, like, value investor friends. Like, just wait. When they break up Amazon or they break up. Not happening. And that is just not happening. So this is a fundamental shift from the way things used to be, the way things used to get

funded and further solidification of the mag seven as giant moats. Yeah. Like, Nvidia's funding core weave. Yes, I feel like everything I learned about monopolies in my econ 101 classes, throw it out the window. Yeah. Right? Because these monopolies actually make it cheaper for people buying their products in a lot

of ways, easier and more efficient. They're not, they're not, you can find bad stuff they're doing, but. consumers love this company. I think five years ago, you and I would have said there's a 3% chance that in 20 years, Amazon and Apple and Microsoft are still dominating and Google are still dominating. Now, I'd, is it 50-50? I'd say better than even odds. We're closing in on three companies that are worth $4 trillion. I'd say it's better than even odds that these companies are still dominating a decade. I'm not suggesting that their stock price is going to continue to grow up 20% a year forever. But still, $4 trillion is a lot.

large number. What, who replaces them? Oh, Michael, read a history book. Okay. Things change. Right, but what's the time for endless changes? Yeah, maybe, maybe the leaders stay leaders longer than they did in the past. No, not maybe. I'll pound the table on that. It's already here. It's already happened. One of them is going to make a mistake, though. In this whole AI thing, but they did. Look what meta, look what meta did with, with, uh, what's their laps called? What do they call that portion of their business, that segment? I don't know. Reality Labs, right?

Is Web3 still a thing? Is that? But they did f*** up. The stock dropped 75%. Same thing with Netflix. Guess what? They fix it. True.

All right. One other chart that stood out to me, in the JP Morgan Guide to Alternatives, they have U.S. private credit versus leveraged loans. And they show the share of leveraged loan in default by industry over the last 12 months. And by far, the number one, actually, that's not true. Number one and number two, pretty close. Number two is health care. That's 20% of the total default volume.

Number one, 23%, that's media. Media is just in rough, rough shape. Rough shape. And the reasoning is just... Social media has disrupted traditional media. Social media, internet, YouTube, podcasts. Yeah, that makes sense to me. All right, you have mentioned the growing popularity of the CFP of the CFA.

Have you ever talked to anyone in conference? that thought that AI could replace the financial planner. I can easily see it in the retail aspect, create a realistic image of a fake person, and add the conversational aspects of AI. A lot of what the financial planner does is just make the client feel good about the path they are on and whether the volatility seems easy to replicate if AI

is what they say it will be. It's sort of reasonable take that I disagree with. Yes. So Josh and I talk about this on Ask the Compound like a month ago or two. And his take has always been, and I've stolen this probably before. Josh says, wealthy people will not trust a robot. And I completely agree with that statement.

Maybe someone will throw it my pay. I think actually an AI financial planner for people who aren't traditional wealth management clients, I think it can actually help a lot, answer questions. I don't think it's going to replace financial advisors. I think it's going to help. I think AI will help a lot on the people that are just getting started. And it'll also help financial planners be more efficient. Our financial planners are already talking about this.

the notes that it can provide after a conversation or the emails it can provide like it's going to make financial planners who use AI better advisors. But the replacement thing, I feel like every 10 years, something comes along and people wonder,

is it going to replace financial advisors? TurboTax did not replace CPAs. It did for a certain segment of the population. And I think I will do the same. All right, hey guys, love the show. I was curious if you could talk about how you benchmark your own personal portfolios. Given that neither of you are very close to retirement,

equity, heavy. Do you try and beat the S&P 500? Do you anticipate moving some of years, missing some of years outperforming others? I often hear you guys talk about gains and loss in individual stocks, but I don't know how you view your own benchmarks. I got to be honest. I don't know. That's a really good question. No, no, no. Like, I literally don't know my performance is, and I don't, I just don't really care. As crazy as that might sound. I, in the back of my mind, back of the envelope, I guess, know what my performance is based on what I own and such. And once a year, I update my spreadsheet. I did it. last week. I update my spreadsheet. I look at my performance. Here's what I put in. Here's the

difference. Here's what I made. That makes sense. Here's how I benchmark myself. I do a simple spreadsheet where I say over the next five to 10 years, here's how much I think I'm going to save. Here's how much I assume in market growth. And where am I along those goalpost? Am I better or worse? And I look at it and I update. Of course, correct. And I do kind of look at that. Yeah, I don't do any of that. But I don't look at a benchmark. I've used this before, but Jason Zweig interviewed a bunch of people in Boca a number of years ago and asked a guy like, did you beat the S&P, like to retire here and, you know, live on the beach? And the guy said, like, I don't know and I don't care.

I'm in Boca. Yeah. So I did something right. Yeah. So that's sort of, that's where I am. I just care that my number goes up into the right. And a lot of that is a function of saving more than my performance versus the S&P. And do I want to be the S&P?

Yeah, of course I do. Do I think I'm going to? Probably not. Do I care? no I don't because also to be clear I'm talking about so I am picking stocks I've got a I've got a taxable account that I that I mess around with and I've got a step IRA that I that I do my stock picking it in my former cam strictly broad market funds so that is the market and so um you know I it's listen this is personal right like there are some people that are very analytical very rigid about

their math and that's a one personality type I am on the other end of the spectrum personality type I don't care. I prefer to just get the market returns. That's where I am. So I don't care if I beat it. All right. So this post went wild from the guy who was a founder of Lume. What's his name?

I forget. Okay. So he founded Lume and he sold the company and he's worth, I don't know how many millions of dollars. I think he sold his share he said was $60 million. No, he said that if he would have stayed there, he would have, he had enough money where he gave up $60 million. Oh. If he would have stayed on. Oh, so tons of money.

Yeah, so I don't know how much he sold for. The post is all about, I'm really rich. Just read the first thing. Oh, that you posted here? Okay. You read. You're better read it. Okay.

Thank you. Life has been a haze this last year. After selling my company, I find myself in the totally unrelatable position of never having to work again. Everything feels like a side quest, but not in an inspiring way. I don't have the same base desires driving me to make money or gain status. I have infinite freedom, yet I don't know what to do with it. And honestly, I'm not the most optimistic about life.

I know this is a completely 0th world position to be in. The point of this post is not to brag or gain sympathy. To be honest, I don't know exactly what the point of this post is. I tried to manufacture one, but I just felt like a phony. Then I recognize the irony of creating purpose out of a blog post when I don't currently have much conviction of purpose in life. So anyway. To loom sold for $975 million. That doesn't mean he got that much, but he got 50 to $100 million, something like that probably.

Yeah, I understand this. completely. It's, it is funny to me, though, to think it becomes an existential crisis when you become ridiculously loaded. And I get it. But read through all the old books about like the Gilded Age, the Rockefellers, the Vanderbilts. There was no existential crisis about being so wealthy. They either spent their faces off partying. You've read the, have you read the Vanderbilt book? They literally passed out, rolled up dollar bills to smoke cigarettes out of. They were smoking money. They were just lighting money on, they were spending so much money on. They were spending so much money parties and boats and they spent all their money or it was Rockefeller and turned around and

like gave it all away and set up charities like they did not have an you had no existential crisis back then yeah you either spent or you gave it away and I understand why we have the existential crisis now because of how interconnected we are and the internet and all this stuff but it's it's interesting to think about that that was never a thing before really yeah I think it's probably also isolating and lonely oh I'm sure when everybody knows when you can't hide your wealth it's like dude it's a headline it's probably like becoming famous. Like, if you're an actor, an actress that becomes famous, like, you can only talk to other people in that position. There's not many of them. Yeah. So I think that the entire

audience, ourselves included, would say, well, like, giving the money and I'd, I'd figure it out, I wouldn't be having an existential crisis. So I don't think, this guy's not asking anybody feel bad for him, but it's just, it's just an interesting thing that when you get, when you finally get the prize, it's like an empty feeling. Right. He's talking about, like, traveling around the world and meditating and all. It's, yes. It's also personality type. Right? Like, I think that there are people that money has all sorts of different impacts on them. Some, you know, are their best versions of themselves, some of their worst, somewhere in between, some are...

This is my thing about 10 million being the sweet spot, and having 50 or 60 turns it from being, this is amazing to, this is a responsibility. Yeah. I don't want to mess it up. Yeah. All right. Also, from that Sherwood post that I referenced, which is just very chart heavy, they have one that shows how sequelitis changed movie titles. So they show the top 10 movies per year, and then they show, like, how many of them are sequels. And if you look at 24, if you look into 25, it's a lot of, a lot of sequels.

Unfortunately, this is what's ruined movies, I guess. Lucas Shaw did a post called the fact that he looked at ticket sales by year. And he said, rising prices of massed 20-year decline in U.S. movie attendance. And he said domestic box office based on tickets sold peaked in 2002 and has fallen a 50% from that high. he said even excluding the couple years most affected by the pandemic inflation adjusted revenues near an all-time low based on data going back to 1985 and i guess that's part of it is a lot of the high quality stuff that would have drawn people in the theater in the past is now just on tv but i think you you see this a lot with tv shows there's a lot of tv shows there's a lot of tv shows that should be one season and done and they come back for the second season and it's not as good and you just think those well those have been movies in the past we've lost those as movies because now they're tv shows yeah so i think that's a trade-off that I think I'm okay with in some ways and not okay with another ways. You know, people were mad about LeBron for ruining the NBA with the Big Three stuff, how it became like just a superstar type of league.

I think Marvel did the same thing to the movie industry. Yeah. Right? It just became so bankable to just find this IP and just beat it to death. And they went too far. Yeah. That's fair. And, yeah, the studios said, we can't make money on this stuff anymore.

Yeah. So we're not going to make it. What happened to juror number two? They like didn't do a wide release So juror number two Came to Max last week And I kind of Like I know I heard about it

But I kind of didn't see it And you're probably in the same situation Like wait heard about it Wait Clint Eastwood like huh So Wonder Brothers didn't do a wide release I'm not exactly sure what the story is there Probably because the movie kind of stunk Oh you thought it stunk

So give me your take It was a better premise than a movie The premise was really interesting Yeah What would you do in this situation? I love those. I thought they could have done a really good twist ending, right? Did he, didn't he, did he, did any?

And then they leave it up to, I didn't like the ending at all. I thought the movie was way, could have been a half hour shorter. Okay. Dan LaRosa hates the movie. And he doesn't understand why. So he's with me. Yeah, he's with you. I liked it.

Chris, Jonathan liked it. I thought the one complaint that I had about the movie was because I love the premise like you did. The supporting cast was horrific. and not J.K. Simmons or Kiefer, but who was just in like one scene, that was kind of weird. But the other jurors were really bad actors. So Clint Eastwood is a 94-year-old director. He's just, you could tell the quality of his movies that's just dropped off a little bit. That was part I saw.

I didn't like the mule either that much. Interesting, yeah, interesting premise. Okay. Would appreciate your call on this situation. I agree that the first car should be a hand-me-down. Mine was a 1987 Ford escort, and my wife got a 1984 show. every celebrity. The oldest car in our family is a 2017 model-year compact SUV.

My daughter will be a 14 in May and is already gunning for it. When she turned 16, it will be 10 years old with 85,000 miles on it. Probably worth around 12 or 13 grand. It's all-wheel drive, plenty of safety features, and it's just a 2.0-liter four-cylinder. Sounds perfect, right? Here's the catch. It's a Porsche McCann in Carmine Red. Based on all other criteria, it fits the bill.

But what kind of monster will we create if we give our daughter a Porsche as her first car? Am I nuts to give her the car? Can't do it. Can't do it. Can't do it. You can't give your kid a red Porsche. Even if it's really used and you just can't. Yeah, I agree.

Sorry, sell it. Or can you keep driving it? I don't know. Can't do it. Yeah. Somebody sent us an email that made me chuckle. Love that we are getting more lazy If we have her commentary.

Michael needs a sealable patch for his phone. This is Waterpark 101. Uh, yeah. You don't have one of those for your jet ski? No. You really don't have one of those? No. My wife has them all over the place now

because she dropped her phone in the lake last year. So yeah, you waterproof thing and you can still use the phone in the waterproof. I'll get one. So you can put it on your neck, you can put it in the holder thing.

Okay. I'm thinking about becoming the person who wears a mask on an airplane. Thoughts? Sick of getting sick? The dude next to me on the way home was blowing his nose the entire time. And I was, I don't mind germs. I'm sort of a what doesn't kill you makes a stronger type of guy. But I don't want to get sick going somewhere or coming home. I'm surprised we don't

see more. That's one thing I would have been wrong about that we don't see more on airplanes because it does seem like every time you go on an airplane, you're rolling the dice of getting sick. Now, do masks help you not get colds? I literally have no idea. It's kind of help a little bit, right? I would think. I think we would know this. It is funny to think about all the stuff that people thought was going to happen following the pandemic that didn't, right? But what do you think about my idea?

I said, it's not crazy, right? No, I don't think it's crazy at all. Yeah, because I floated by Robin and she said, well, people are going to be looking at you. I said, who cares? How many people we talked to in the last couple weeks that travel that are just deathly sick right now? Right.

It totally throws your life into a tailspin. Yeah. When you're sick like that. All right. So I usually, because you told me to take, I take a, when I get into LaGuardia, I take a cab to the train station. And I just try to tell the cab, I'm going to the 30th and 31st in Astoria.

And I was like, give me an address. I don't have one. I was like, dude, it's a mile away. Yeah. And then I take the train in, go to Queensboro Plaza, all the way down to Grand Central or whatever, the next stop when I get off and I'm right by the library. But it was way too cold. And I thought, you know, screw it. I'm taking an Uber.

I'm not going to stand on the platform and wait. So I took an Uber and thinking, you know, I'll just work in the car with my little handy iPhone hook up my laptop. but it took me like 30, 35 minutes to get in. And I was like, holy, this is so much faster because usually it would take me an hour to get an Uber. And then I got here and everyone's talking about congestion pricing. Bill Sweet shows me his like phone of all the traffic

and it's all green. And having not thought about this at all because I don't live in a big city, I don't have any like big takes on it, but it was just shocking to me that this happened. And now I guess you have to pay $9 if you're going to ride in congestion times because I did it at 8.8. How much did it cost?

I didn't even look at my app to see how much it costs. 70 maybe? That's a few money right there. Sorry. I think it was 70 bucks. It's not bad. Which is probably, but I couldn't believe the speed. I stopped at one light maybe, and I didn't, I couldn't believe how fast it was.

Okay. So it's probably stinks for the people who used to drive and now have to ride the subway or figure another way to get in. I saw a lot of people talking about this. I don't have any, I don't know the first thing about congestion prices. or is it's good or bad? I don't know. For me, it was good because it took less time to get in here. But, yeah, I think there's going to be some unbelievable economic papers. I think people are upset because they're trying to force people to go to take mass transit

and the subway has been pretty dangerous here. So people are understandably not too thrilled. They get it. That's fair. We walked out of a Knicks game last night and there was two people who I thought could probably do me bodily harm that were walking around the city, correct? And you, you just do a B-line across the street and put your head down. Oh, that's the move.

That's the guy waving his arms and yelling. You just get out of Dodge. Yeah, you just keep walking. Somebody sent, there's an article into Esquire. Do you, you read Esquire, don't you? I still get the physical copy of Esquire and GQ. You know what? I feel like you are the exact profile of somebody that reads both those magazines.

Oh, yeah. Right? Fair. 40s, best shape of their life, hair. And I still would never buy any of the clothes. It's so, the clothes are so expensive in those magazines. So somebody emailed us,

50 things a man should not know. And number 37 was any human being who says they didn't have that on their bingo card. That's pretty good. I like it. That's a good take. That's a great take.

Which Harry Potter house who would have been sorted into? That's pretty good. I like it. Oh, this is a knock on me, the healthiest item on the cheesecake factory menu. That's a, that's, that's fair. That's pretty good.

I have the salmon broiled, dry. Yeah. All right. Steam broccoli. All right. Recommendations. My kids had already seen Wicked. They'd seen the play with my wife. My wife had seen the play multiple times.

Loves Wicked. Took the kids to see the play with her mother last year. Then took the kids to see the movie. They had loved it so much they wanted to see it again overbreak because we honestly, after two weeks ran out of stuff to do. Let's put them, bring them to a movie. So I had to go see Wicked. I kind of knew.

It was like, oh, it's a Wizard of Oz spin. and I like to give my wife shit about it because it's like actually the witch and Wizard Viles was not a bad person and I said, you're rewriting history here, you can't do that. So I kind of give her crap because she loves what it's going.

Anyway, we went to see the movie. Hand Up did not realize how much of a musical it was. I think I texted you from the movie like, so this is a musical. Despite the fact that I'm not a fan of musicals, personal preference, don't mind people who are.

It's just not my thing. Love musicals. It was a very well done movie. Oh, yeah? It was... Did you enjoy yourself? I kind of enjoyed it. Again, it was like...

I didn't need all the songs. Yeah. But it was very well done. My kids absolutely love it. They can't wait for the next one to come out. But I thought it was very well done. Is it a next one coming out next year? Yeah, it's like a year away.

So my kids, I can't wait for it to come out. Were they upset with the cliffhanger? I don't think so. No. I think they enjoyed it. Okay, I watched Blink twice on your recommendation. and I've put this in the bodies, bodies, bodies, and it's what's inside to other Michael Patnick suggestions that I liked.

This one I didn't like as much. No? A little too dark for me. And it was one of those where, like, a lot of these thriller movies, like you know there's going to be a twist. But I felt like this one was like, there's a twist coming. I loved it. I thought it was like too much of like, yeah, we know the twist coming.

It was well done, but it was just too dark for me. How about Christian Slater? Still looking good. You know who wrote and directed that movie? I don't. Zoe Kravitz. Oh, shit. Yeah, which I did.

She wrote it and directed it. All right. I came across Diner the other night for some reason. Kevin Bacon movie. I never heard of it. The 1970s. Like, one of his very first movies. And it's a good, like, guys in the 1950s, like, the diner was their hangout.

And, God, Mickey Rourke, before he had his plastic surgery messed up. I know there's been stories on it. What a great-looking guy he was. He really messed up by doing all the plastic surgery. Did he die? No, he's still alive. But I started going through the Kevin Bacon movies again, and I feel like I'm here to go against your Kevin Bacon chart.

Animal House, Diner, Tremors, Footloose, River Wild, JFK, A Few Good Men, Murder in the First, Sleepers, Mystic River, Crazy, Stupid Love. He's been in some really good movies. I think your point was like- Footloose? I mean, I don't like Footloose, but that was- I've actually never seen Footloose. No, my point was... But he never delivered to the box office. Is that it? He was, like, the 14th choice for all the good movies that he didn't get.

And now, it's not his fault because he was going up against Mr. Hanks and, you know, that whole cast of characters. True. But my point was, he's been in a lot of stinkers. I think that was the point of the chart, right? Okay, I picked that as classics. All right, one more thing. My kids are into the Mr. B stuff, which I don't want to be the adult that, like, shits on the kids' stuff. Because I watched playing a trash back in the day.

I watched the real-world road rules challenges. Like, my parents, I'm sure, thought, what is our kid on? Core TV? Are we judged Judge Judy guy? I never got into the court TV, actually. So anyway, my kids watch the new Mr. Beast show on Amazon. And I never really got the Mr. Beast thing. Just whatever, I'm past that.

But all he does is he puts people in situations of my kids are constantly saying, what would you do in this situation? Like, would you do this thing for a lot of money or not? So I guess that's his whole, I'm sure there's more to it than that, but that's the whole thing. Like, we're going to put you in an uncomfortable situation, you're going to have to potentially screw people over or do this weird thing for lots of money.

And that's the whole thing. That's it? That's pretty much it, yeah. Is it good? My kids like it. It's, yeah, it's okay. But is it, I come in and out of it. Is it his money that he's giving away?

Is that sort of what makes it so cool? Probably not. Probably not. I'm sure it's Amazon's money. Okay. All right. Oh, you see this 8-bit Christmas poster in here? Okay.

You ever see this movie? We tried it this year. Didn't like it? My kids gave up on it. I thought it was okay. I was watching it. Somebody emailed, it's a Christmas movie that you should add to the list. Okay.

Didn't draw my kids in, but, you know, we had other stuff going out. Okay. All right, I'm here to say that if Linus were on Netflix, it would be a massive show. Okay. I binge-watched not just season one, but also season two. And there are phone-down shows like White Lotus, Severance, right, where you're dialed in. I would say that Linus is as close

to the line of a phone down show but also, but it is on the side of a background show. In other words, you could have it on the second screen while you're working and still... I feel like Taylor Sheridan shows are...

It's okay to be on a screen a little bit. Yeah, because there's a bunch of dialogue that you can completely zone out of. Yeah. But the action is serious. Morgan Freeman is cooking. Nicole Kidman, too, right? I watched the first episode.

Yeah. Morgan Freeman is in it. a bit, but when he is, he's throwing 175 miles an hour. Remember Doug from House of Cards? Oh, yeah. He was in Penguin, too, right? He was in Penguin, too. Yeah. You know who he looks like in our universe?

West Grey. Ah, I see it. Right? Yep, I see it. I'm just telling you right now, any time there's incoming, get down, I'm in. Okay. Yep. Right? It's like, it's that type of a show. It kind of goes right into it, too, right?

It doesn't mess around. It's good. It's good, clean fun. It's only eight episodes. She was on... What's her name? Zoe Salada. Yeah, she was on Smartless recently.

It was very good. She was in the... What's that Amelia movie people are talking about? Or Emily? Amelia Perez. Amelia Perez. It's on Netflix. I thought about watching it.

It got Golden Globe stuff. We'll see. Is that also a musical? From now when you were an exclusively a musical guy. What was it? La La Land a few years ago? I never saw that one. Ryan Gosling?

Five minutes. I turned it off. No offense. No offense to musical. It's not my thing. Okay. Like, I don't see, you can't move a movie plot forward with a musical number. It's tough.

All right. We did it in person. How to feel? Not bad. John? Great. We're good. All right.

All right. Keep the emails coming. Animal Sparrants at the Campan News.com. Thank you for listening. Have a great weekend. And week. There's an awkward close. I don't think that's working.

done. We'll see you next time. Let's try.