The Bossticks - The Real Wolf Of Wall Street - Jordan Belfort On How He Got Leonardo DiCaprio & Martin Scorsese To Create A Movie About His Life

Episode Date: November 5, 2019

#226: On this episode we sit down with the real Wolf Of Wall Street, Jordan Belfort. Many of you may have heard Jordan's name before on the recent Hollywood hit movie; The Wolf Of Wall Street. Leonardo DiCaprio portrayed Jordan and Martin Scorsese directed the film. In this episode we discuss how Jordan had a movie created about his life by two of Hollywoods biggest names. We also discuss how to sell, and mistakes to avoid while building your career, and how to sink a 180 foot yacht. Yes you read that right.  To connect with Jordan Belfort click HERE To connect with Lauryn Evarts click HERE To connect with Michael Bosstick click HERE Read More on The Skinny Confidential HERE For Detailed Show Notes visit TSCPODCAST.COM To Call the Him & Her Hotline call: 1-833-SKINNYS (754-6697) This episode is brought to you by ROOTZ NUTRITION Whether your goal is to start seeing better results in the gym, or just look and feel your best, you are going to love the Rootz Protein Superfood.Packed with protein, greens, electrolytes, and tons of superfoods, it's perfect for adding to your morning smoothie, drinking after exercise, or as a quick and easy meal replacement at any time during the day. Use code SKINNY for 20% off your entire order. This episode is brought to you by Lunch Box Wax This Episode is brought to you by Ulta Beauty. Ulta Beauty is dedicated to bringing its guests the most exciting new brands, which is why they've just launched an entire platform built to help beauty lovers discover more. Introducing SPARKED at Ulta Beauty™, the new destination for curated need-to-know brands—many exclusive to Ulta Beauty—which each have authentic stories and products. Produced by Dear Media  

The following podcast is a dear media production. She's a lifestyle blogger extraordinaire. Fantastic. And he's a serial entrepreneur. A very smart cookie. And now Lauren Everts and Michael Bostic are bringing you along for the ride. Get ready for some major realness. Welcome to the skinny confidential, him and her.

Aha. So I said, you mean to tell me if I get someone to send in 100 grand, I get 50? He's like, well, theoretically it doesn't work that way. We don't call people like that. We're calling average moms and dads. They invests $500 or so forth, right? I'm like, why? He goes, because rich people don't buy penny stocks.

We made it. We made it to another Tuesday, Lorne. Welcome back, everybody. That clip is from our guest of the show today. The real Wolf of Wall Street. It's the actual guy that Leo played in the Wolf of Wall Street. Jordan Belfort. How crazy is it to have Leonardo DiCaprio play you in a movie?

Like, what would you do? It'll happen. Like, what if there was a Dear Media movie? Maybe not him. Starring Leo DiCaprio as you. You'd freak out. What if I played him in a movie? All right.

I'm going to go projectile vomit. I am Lauren Everett's, the creator of the Skinny Confidential. And I am Michael Bostic. I am the CEO of the Dear Media Podcast Network. Guys, this episode, it goes into a lot of different places. Jordan is a fun guy. He is a fun guy. Before we talk with Jordan, we are going to do the question of the week.

We're going to do it every single Tuesday. You can expect it. And we're going to tell you what the name is. of this series next week because we think we thought of a name. But anyways, question of the week, ready? This is very relevant to this episode. This is from at Haley underscore Birchfield. And she says, what is the biggest business mistake you've ever made?

And I'll let you start, Michael. Well, that's relevant to this episode. A couple of business mistakes made. My biggest business mistake ever made is when I've solely chased money, right? There's a lot of people that they see an opportunity. they don't even sit back and ask themselves, is this something I actually enjoy? Is this something I'm passionate about?

Is this something I really believe in? They just go for it because there's dollars associated. There's a dollar signs at the end goal, and so they just start pursuing things. The next thing you know, most of the time it's fleeting because it's not something you care about. Most of the time you're setting yourself up for failure because you're doing anything,

cutting corners to chase that money. And so I think if I could give any advice to young people, and obviously you'll hear it in this episode, is to, yes, obviously you want to have a sound business that's financially working. but if the only reason you're doing something is because there's a big paycheck, whether that's a job, an entrepreneurial endeavor, whatever it is. If the only reason is money, I am certain that you will end up unhappy or unsuccessful at some point in your life. So you have to find a greater reason

outside of just money. So refine your intention. Yes. My biggest business mistakes, I have two. Well, I have a bunch of mistakes, but if we're just going to go sort of general here, One is I think that I could have done a better job at transitioning from a solopreneur to an entrepreneur. It was really weird to be working for myself for five years on my own terms, doing everything myself and then having to bring on a team. I didn't know how to manage it. And I think I would have looked more into how to manage a team. I don't think I was the best boss that I could be. I think I've gotten better, but I'm still not quite there yet.

Another business mistake that I've made, I was talking to my dad about this the other day, is that I, feel like sometimes I put all my eggs in one basket. So I've been so focused on building my business for the last 10 years that sometimes other things get neglected. Like maybe my spirituality or I don't know, like even if something as small as a meditation practice or time with friends and family, it can get neglected because I get so obsessive over something. So I don't know if balance is the right word that I'm looking for, but I think that it's important to make sure that you put eggs in other baskets than all in your business because then when something goes wrong in the business, it can be all encompassing. Those are my two. I think that's good too.

Thanks, babe. With that, we are going to talk business mistakes in this episode. We are going to talk about the movie in this episode. We're going to talk about a lot of fun things. We're going to talk about quailudes. We're going to talk about a lot of things. Leo DiCaprio. This episode goes everywhere. Jordan is a dream guest so much so that we have invited him back on for part two. because we truly feel an hour was not enough. He has so much in that brain, we got to have him back on. Guys, the guy had Leonardo DiCaprio play him in a movie directed by Martin Scorsese. I mean, just that in itself.

Like when we were talking to him, we first met him, like, what does that feel like to have Leonardo DiCaprio and have a movie written about you and directed by Martin Scorsese? That is not a unique life. This is a very unique interview. We go all over the place. Jordan will be back. Guys, with that, who is Jordan Belfort for those of you that are unfamiliar? Jordan Belfort is an American author, motivational speaker, and former stockbroker.

In 1999, he pleaded guilty to fraud and related crimes in connection with stock market manipulation and running a boiler room as part of a penny stock scam. Before turning his life around and getting to where he is now, which we're going to get into, Belfort spent 22 months in prison and had a movie written, directed, and produced by Martin Scorsese, where Leonardo DiCaprio played him. Guys, with that, get ready for a wild ride. with the Wolf of Wall Street himself, Jordan Belfort. We need to take a break because this is something that I've really wanted to talk about a lot, Michael.

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One-time use per guest only. This code cannot be combined with any other offer. This code and offer expires February 5th, 2020. This is the skinny confidential, him and her. Jordan Belfort, the real Wolf of Wall Street, live in the studio. Welcome to the show. Thank you. This is going to be fun. I'm very excited for this. I love being double teamed. Oh, we're going to double team you. We have 100. I have 100 questions. Cool. Let's go back for the audience that is not familiar with you. Maybe they haven't heard your story, haven't seen the movie. I guess the ones from North Korea, you mean? Yeah, yeah. The two people that don't know what the Wharf of Wall Street is. Let's go back. Where'd you grow up? What was your childhood like?

Grew up in Bayside Queens. A little middle-class family. You know, it's like I think, you know, the great thing was we had enough to know how little we had. So it wasn't like there was no food in the fridge. That was, you know, I was there. But we lived close to Long Island. That's where the money was. So there was this vision we all had that, like one day you'd hit it big and move out to a Long Island with the rich people. You know, although I will tell you, growing up in a six-story building, I would scratch my head at the age of 10 and 11 saying, why would people want to live in homes? I mean, I have like 50 friends in my building. In my own floor, I had eight friends. It was like, who would want that?

And I get it now. But I didn't get it. So I loved, you know, sort of where I lived growing tons of kids, highly educated, very success-oriented area I grew up in. Your dad was a smart guy, yeah? My dad and my mom. My mom, really, and my dad, who just passed was really smart. But it were both CPAs in the 50s. My mom then went to law school in the, I think it was 2000.

She was 11. Yeah, she graduated. She was the oldest woman in New York State that passed the bar. Yeah, she was a real go-getter. I mean, you told us that on your show. Do you guys, you think that was a big inspiration for you, your mom or your dad? You know, I had this talk with someone the other day about just about, you know, women in the workplace and this equal, right?

I think on some level, I'm kind of up, was oblivious because I just, my mother was so empowered. I mean, like, my experience that women just thrived in the work environment, she never complained about being mistreated. But, you know, she's a brilliant lady and she would never put up with it. So it was just my own personal experience, right? Obviously, you know, when you see shows like mad bad, I'm like, holy shit. They're like, like how they used to treat women back in the, it's crazy, right? But that was when she was going to work, which was amazing. Yeah, and she still show up as attacked today, spry, you know, and she's a lady.

80s. So what's a mini Jordan look like? Are you a hustler? Are you making deals? Mini Jordan looks like just like I am today, but probably hopefully a little bit younger. I was like a born entrepreneur slash salesperson from the time of my mother's room.

At the age of six hours, I was to give at the lemonade stand and selling toys and stuff. At the age of it had a paper out. I was knocking on doors to expand it. At the age of 10, I was shoveling driveways after snowstorm. So he used to snow a lot back in the midday. before Al Gore had the global warming, right?

He was still like crazy, right? So I, you know, about a mile away was a really wealthy neighborhood called the Gables. They had big homes, right? And I bumped up and I just went by little shoveled this big. And I said, knock on, 20 bucks I'll shovel out your driveway. And you just made a lot of money with snow. Then my first real venture in the business was a magician. And I was 12.

I was watching TV. So David Koppel feel like, I think you made the Statue of Liberty disappear or something. And I was like, I want to be a magician. So I started my own little magic thing where I put it in the penny saver said the amazing belfort, children's parties, $25. I didn't even do any magic tricks.

Then the phone starts ringing and I panicked and then like my dad was really good with me because he always knew how it was on to these next thing. So he took me into the city and bought me some magic tricks. And I really great memories. There was a famous magic shop called Lewis Tannen back then and I became the amazing bill with Harry Potter hat, the Cape, right?

Did that and then I hit big for the first time at 16. And so I really made a lot of money. I started going down to Jones Beach in New York. It's a huge public beach on a hot summer. Sunday day there's a million people. Like a million people, right? And I noticed there's people a bit chicking and noting as they were going up to the concession stand.

It's far walk, right? It's very long beach. So I said, hmm, I wonder what will happen if I, you know, a lot of a cooler with some ice cream and ice is. So I went down next morning. Back then we had yellow pages back then, right? So found this ice cream distributor for good humor ice cream. Went down to Astoria Queens with these mad Greek stand

running this distributorship, right? the trucks would come in the morning and fill up. And I went with a styrofoam cooler, $7 for the cooler, loaded up with a barrel of cherry Italian ice is in a scooper in cups, chip witches, fudgichols, milky waste knickers, and frozen fruit bars, right? Chipwiches were the jam. There you go, right? And frozen fruits, right?

Big markup. So totally loaded the cool was $22. I sold that cooler out in an hour for $140. It was crazy. This is $19.78, right? So minimum wage I think was $0.95 an hour. I made $120 in one hour. So what did I do?

went back the next day with four course. And I did that through my entire the high school college, put myself through school that way. That was the little mini Jordan. You know, wow. We left your, after we recorded with you on your episode, we left and I told Lauren, I said, you know, there's certain people that you encounter in this life, and you can look at them

and no matter what situation they're put in, they're going to make it. Like, no matter what. And you're one of those people, obviously. My friend's dad used to say, if you flush Jordan down the toilet bowl, he'll come up holding a plumber's license. And you kind of have in certain ways in certain aspects of your life, which we're going to... The problem is I flush myself down the bulldog to many times, yeah. Okay, so let's fast forward a little bit.

How do you land on Wall Street? So the short story is so I, after I graduated from college as a very good student, right? My mom wanted me to be a doctor, and I didn't know what I wanted to do. You know, if you were to ask me at 20, what do you want to do for a living? I said, well, I want to be rich for a living. I didn't have quite a vocation in mind. You want to be rich. So my mom always said, you know, the old and noble way to be wealthy.

And this is when I was in the high chair. You know, you have to be a doctor or a dentist. So it was like she was spoon-feeding me the apple sauce as she was brainwashed me. You've got to be a doctor or a dentist, right? So I said, well, all right, well, I don't want to be a doctor. That's another eight years. I'll kill myself, right? Say, in me four years, dental school, I'll be rich.

I'll still be doctor-belt. But my uncle was a dentist, made a lot of money. I said, fine. So I took the test. Well, got in. First day of dental school, we had the orientation. There's 105 kins in the auditorium. Dean gets up.

He's like this white hair guy, white jacket, very dental looking, you know. And he's like, just looks to Paul. He goes, hey, welcome to the Baltimore College of Dental Surgery. You should be very proud to be here. Dentistry is a wonderful profession. You know, you'll be a pillar. You know, bravo to you. And everyone's like, hey, right.

I'm like, okay. You know, the kids look pretty bright on in Bushdale. Then he says, but let me say this. The golden age of dentistry is over. If you're here to make a lot of money, you're probably in the wrong place. I'm like, the fuck, I'm in the wrong place. I got up and I walked right out. I literally dropped out my first day.

Couldn't tell my mother that, though. She was like, oh, how's like? I was like, I didn't get Maryland, but finally, my money ran out, and I had to get real of my life. So I looked in the help want the section, right? And I answered a blind ad for selling door to door. And turned out of me meat and seafood door to door.

When I broke that to my parents, they were devastated, but you know, they always support me? So I walked into this warehouse where they had these guys, you know this business where they sell like this home freezer plans, like boxes of steaks and shrimps, like the guys in the pickup truck. That's what it was. And they had a one-day training program where, you know,

get in the truck with a guy, and he'll teach you how to sell. And the next day, they give you a truck. So, get in the truck with this guy's nickname was the penguin. He's a stick up his ass, like that sort of guy, right? So the penguin takes me and goes, listen, the key to sales, you got to be pumped up and positive. I'm like, all right, you know.

He goes, and whatever they say to you, matter how me and they'll just always say, have a nice day if they hang up on your, you know, slender door. Like, why? Because it makes you feel better about yourself. I'm like, all right. Right. So he drives about 40 minutes up into a, area called New Rochelle up in Westchester County, New York,

gets into the first door. Knocked door was, hi, I'm Elliot. I'd love a slam. He's like, have a nice day. It's fine. It happens sometimes. His shoulders back, wada, wada, wada, wada, wow, get totally positive, right?

Goes the next door. Hi, I'm Ellie. I glaslam. How about I say, let me tell you something. I walked like 35 doors in a row get slammed in his face. And every time they slam the door, he was like, how would I stay? How would I stay?

Wah, wado, wado, wado. Penguiting all out with his. No problem, no problem. No problem. Until somewhere like around 12.30, I noticed something strange. Gets out of the truck, his shoulders drop. He's like, loses the wall of sticking his ass falls out. He's like now walking normally.

And he goes up to the door. And instead of that confident knock, knock, knock, he's like barely knocks, right? And the woman opens up, kind-looking woman. And he goes, you wouldn't want any filet mignon shrimp ball lobster tails. Right? I mean, the last 50 people said no. So assuming you're going to say no, too. So let's just, now he didn't say those words, but it was so obvious that the guy had lost

the state of certainty and no one. I was like, wow. I was like, I'd never seen this before. It's like my first experience really in the field. Does he know what terribly sounds? Well, he didn't sell a box that whole day, right? So I said, well, let me give it a shot anyway. The next day I went back to the warehouse.

And they loaded me up with 35 boxes, which was five a day, over seven days, right, a week. And that was that, right? And you're supposed to sell here. Five a day. Right, right. So I went out there and I went up to a wealthy area back in Westchester, right? Because I figured they had money to afford it. And the first door I knocked on, it's a big mansion. I'm like, you know, I was like, big door knock on. I'm this little guy, right? And the woman was, hi, can help you. And something happened. It was the first real sales job I had.

It was real sales. It sounds like you got put in the position that you were destined to be in that moment. Yeah, exactly. And I remember almost like an out of body expect. I felt, I said, wow, I sound really good. Like I was smong, she was laughing, whatever happened. Next thing I know I'm in house with all this meat selling of this meat. She ends up buying 13 boxes of meat, this one lady, was called a baker's dozen, right? She probably still has the freaking meat with so much meat, right?

She was like a single woman, right? So she buys it all the first day. I saw the entire truck, all 35 boxes. I almost saw a woman with the truck. She was bought the truck from me, right? And when I got back to the warehouse, they were like, what did you do with all the meat? Did you sell the selling you knew?

I said, no, that was cold corn. Like, bullshit. No one ever sold one like 10 boxes. I said, oh, this is Coke. Shit, I want to buy the meat after this story. How do I buy it? Actually, not bad meat. It wasn't particularly cheap.

But anyway, next day they ate me 50, I sold those 50. And that first week I sold 280, 2508 boxes. I shattered the company wreck. I did that for a couple of weeks. And then I said, well, I'm working for these bozos. They don't know anything. Like half the time this meat, not in the freezer. I said, I'll just do it myself, like the beach.

So I went down. I found the meat distributor, a fish distributor. I built myself a box, I bought a truck, made the double markup, started going door to door, and doing really well. Took the profits, bought a second truck. Then I bought a third truck. And before I knew it, I was 20 to a 26 trucks on the road. I was making a ton of money, I thought.

But actually, I was making every mistake a young entrepreneur could make. I was over-expanding. I was undercapitalized, growing on credit. I had no idea what I was doing. The economics of the business were shit. I was not keeping track of inventory. Things were thawing out. People were stealing from me.

I wasn't even screening out my recruits. I'd hire people from the paper and give them a truck. They'd be smoking crack under a bridge and my stuff. It was like, I literally ran the worst business in the world, right? But of course, as a young entrepreneur, I mean, had a partner. There was the penguin and I became partners, right? When we were still friends to this day, right? And the funny thing is we went to this accountant, this old Jewish accountant he found, right?

And we explained the guy, oh, here's our business model. Now, this guy probably knew as much about freaking meat. It's like Santa Claus. Anyway, so he goes, oh, well, it sounds pretty good. that I think you guys are going to be rich. We would like the fucking honeymoon. We're rich. We need ride you.

Let's go buy champagne. We've got to buy, we've never made the first freaking sale yet. We buy champagne. We need to lease cars for a right way. We lease ourselves beautiful cars. I literally did this. Everything you could do wrong, I did wrong.

Within two years, I was like this proverbial Dutchman with my finger index. And that's really where you learn about business by making massive mistakes. And it was by sheer force of sales ability and training sales. people, that I was able to keep this going, and then finally just collapsed. I lost everything. I personally guaranteed every truck. I went bankrupt. That was 23.

But those are the best years to learn. Oh, my God. It was amazing. At the time, though, I was, like, devastated, right? Especially the day when they took the tow truck came and took my little red Porsche away. I was like, I thought it was like the worst thing, right? Anyway, so right around that time, I heard the story about a kid that grown up with. His name was Michael Falk.

Now, Michael Falk was not the sharp kid or a good-looking kid. He was like the weird kid. There's always a kid with the smelly house. No one wants to play in his house. That was Nick Michael. You get it. His grandmother was kind of weird. I think she used to beat us with an umbrella.

He was the weirdo, right? I hear, Michael's on Wall Street making over a million dollars a year. I'm like, get the fuck out. A million dollars a year. That's impossible. It was 1986. I'm like, this is not possible. Sure enough, like a day or two later, I'm on the local park.

And he pulls up in a red Ferrari. All right? This is not a good looking guy. He was not a weird dorky kid, right? He's wearing like a $2,000 suit. He looks good now. He's got a gorgeous model. I'm like, I want the car.

I want the model. I want everything. I'm like, I have to go. So at the time, I was actually married to wife number one. There was a bunch of wives. I'm not alone in the wife department, right? Anyway, so I said... This is the one that was the one that was the one that was not the Margot Robbie one.

No, the other one. She was like underplayed. And the girl was pretty too who played it. But she was really a very beautiful. How old did you get married the first time? 21. 2. Oh, damn.

Yeah. Very young. Lauren, I am, I'm proud of you. You are tight and toned up as a pregnant lady. I got to say, you've been kicking ass in the gym making me look bad because you're going to, you're actually going to the gym pregnant more than I am going not pregnant. Today when I woke up, you said, where are you going at 645 and I was off to Pilates? Can't believe it.

What do you take in here? Protein. Got a lot of good protein. That is true. So every single time after I work out, I have my green smoothie waiting for me. Either Michael makes it or I postmate it. And if Michael makes it, I am using a specific protein. So we've talked about this before, roots, protein, superfood. It's packed with protein, greens, electrolytes. I really need electrolytes

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Code skinny for 20% off your entire order. Again, that's rootsnutrition.com, spell roots R-O-O-T-Z Nutrition.com and receive 20% off your entire order with code Skinny. Enjoy, guys. You're going to love this stuff. Anyway, great girl, right? But, you know, she wasn't really like a rocket scientist. Let's just say that, all right?

I need a girl that's going to challenge me. I just do, you know what I'm saying? Like, you got your hands fucking full. The hawkles out to you, right? Anyway, anyway, all right? You know, it's face facts, buddy, right? I love you. You're a good-looking guy, but you got a fucking head's full.

All right? We don't know that. I just put you for her. You're still alive and standing. We'll see. We'll see how long. You're dead before you're poor. Anyway, but happy, you're going with the smile.

Yeah, yeah. I'm hanging in it. I'm hanging in there. She's fucking work. Yeah, yeah. You're telling me there. Anyway, so I said that I'm going to Wall Street. Now, I had to actually sell myself a job here.

Because, like, let's face it, my resume is like a dental school drop out of just the glad bank. You know, right? So I walk into this brokerage firm and I go to my interview and I have to like stick out because like 50 kids. Everyone wants this job. It's at a big firm, LF World Child. And I say to the guy, listen, you know, I'll do anything. I'll watch. I'll sell your stock right now.

I said, I'll sell the guy's stock. So that's from the movie when they say, did you pitch a stock during the first. It's true. I did that, right? And the guy's like, whoa, whoa, whoa, he goes, geez, I never heard anyone like this. He goes, I'll tell you what, either one of two things are going to happen to you. Either you're going to be the biggest broker room, Wall Street history, or you're going to end up in jail. The guy's a fucking genius.

He was right on both accounts, right? Is that a line from the movie? I feel like they said that. No, it's in my book. But what he's saying is both happened. Yeah, both have. He was saying, like, in jail, it would be a huge broke, right? So I hired me, and I walk into the border.

And now I got these guys, like 60 kids there. They're making like 60, 70, 80, 80 grand a month. bull walking to the 80s, right? And I have to sit if, like, you know, over six to eight months, it's like a training program, right? So I'm so broke. My wife and I were like, you know, at nighttime, I'm going into office buildings and selling costume jewelry,

daughter-to-door to pay the rent. I had no money. We could barely pay our rent. On the weekends, I go to the beach and make money, right? And finally, after this training program, getting treated like lower than Pondescomb, it's my first day as a broker, passed my test. Turns out to be October 1987 Black Monday.

Yeah. That's true. And the stock market dropped 508 points. Just like that, the firm that was in L of Rochallel around for 112 years, out, right? Now I was panic-stricken because before that, even though I had no money, I felt good. Like, I knew where I was going. Everyone knew it was going to be a big broke, right? A lot of sales ability.

Everyone knew that. But now, I was like, it doesn't seem like a big deal. But on that day. Money must have completely dried up. You guys are too young for this. They thought that it was going to be the next Great Depression. no one realized the market would bounce back, right? So on the way home, I was in the fucking bus.

I still, I'm traumatized from these days. I can't go on a bus. It freaks me out, right? And I remember on the bus, you could have heard a pin drop. Like, everyone was so nervous. Everybody in the free world knew that the market had crashed and the Great Depression was coming. Everyone but my first wife. She wasn't like a news bug.

She's watching Oprah and soap operas all day. So she just assumed that I broke the company record the first day. So she's waiting for me with a bottle of, champagne like our last dollar as she went and bought a bottle of champagne i walk in the door i'm like like did you break the record honey you be rich yet i'm like oh my god i collapsed in her arms and started to cry and that was really how it happened and then from there i i was panic-stricken and paralyzed with fear and self-fowl and self-loat and self-loathing and couldn't move for about three hours because i didn't have more than that we couldn't pay our rent so i took a deep breath

started going through the help wanted section and stumbled upon an ad for a small firm in lullown selling penny stocks and that was how it was all started, like the movie, just like the movie. For people that are unfamiliar with penny stocks, can you explain in a nutshell what a penny stock is compared to? Sure. Yeah, well, I mean... It's for companies that can't get on the NASDAQ. Yeah, the thing is, is that it's changed a little bit. The big thing is not so much the price, right?

So, yeah, a penny stock is a stock that theoretically trades under a dollar. Like, it's in pennies, 10 cents, 50 cents, right? But actually, the context is much different. Because theoretically, you could have a stock that Microsoft could be a penny stock. In fact, in some places, like Australia, they have legitimate companies. The big companies are trading at 30 cents a share. They're priced in dimes and pennies, right? In the United States, it's very different.

When companies are penny stock, it's typically been designed to be a piece of shit. It's not going to work. It's never going to work. There's way too many outstanding shares. It was never conceived as a legitimate enterprise. That's not true in Cleveland. It's like Canada, the mining deals. where they have shares that traded 50 cents.

So in the U.S., maybe these have changed somewhat. I don't think that much in the U.S., but the context was far worse than just a penny stock. But I didn't know that. I had no idea what a penny stock was. When I walked in, they said, we're selling penny stock. Like, what's a penny stock? I knew as much as you did it.

I was trained in how to sell big stocks, like back then Kodak, which is out of business or IBM or, you know. So that's what I had been taught how to do. And the first thing that stuck out to me is when the guy showed me the commission structure for the penny stock. It was like, if someone sent in 100 grand, you would keep $50,000, half was commissioned. Wow. And that was a reasonable size trade where I come from. People would send it $100,000 a quarter million all day long. It wasn't announced. Yeah, I'll buy me 20,000 shares of X, Y, Z stock. That could be a quarter million dollars, no big deal.

So I said, you mean to tell me if I get someone to send in a hundred grand, I get 50? He's like, well, theoretically, but it doesn't work that way. No, we don't call people like that. we're calling average moms and dads. They invests $500,000 or so forth, right? I'm like, why? Because rich people don't buy penny stocks. Now, as the normal me, I probably would have addressed that right then and not bought into it. But at that moment, I was so beaten down.

I was like, fine, just give me the leads and let me. I couldn't pay my rent. I was like, fine, okay, great. Just let me, tell me who to call them, right? And they hired me, and they gave me a stack of leads of these people who were like the average moms and pops and were written in requesting information on penny stocks that had huge upside potential and very little downside risk as the phrase goes, right? That's the pitch from the movie Leo did. And then I sat down and wrote myself a pitch

what I thought people would want to hear. And in the same way, like with the meat business, when I opened up my mouth, like it's a word just, I mean, so the whole office, like as I started talking, like, you know that weird feeling? When people watching me, before I knew it, the whole office had stopped. The manager was running with a tape recorder to date me. I'm like, what the hell's going on here, right? And I was like a modern man among cavemen. Because I had been trained by the big firms. Is that Matthew McConaughey character real? Yes.

Did he actually train you? Yes. There is a guy named Mark Hanna, who's a great guy, hysterical. What happened to him? What's he up to? Can you interview him, please? You've got to get him on the show.

I really should. Mark's a cat. Mark ultimately came to work for me. He became a partner for a short time in Straton. Great guy. Lazy, but such a talent, like a natural talent, really a natural. Lots of martinis at lunch.

The guy was a, he was like the sort of guy, like the great Mark Hanson. He came for a wealthy, family from Brooklyn, like a kind of mob affiliated, not a mob, like just in that sort of fear, right? His parents, his dad owned a club, a famous club called Pastels, I think, which was like where Saturday Night Fever was based on, right? So Marks, that always had money his whole life. They go very wealthy. So Mark was like a gentleman, like, you know, we wanted to get his nails

done. He was just a really great guy, right? And I remember he said, like, one day his dad, like, whatever, something happened, he lost all his money, he calls Mark in, he goes, Mark, he just want to let you know, taking a setback and he lost most of the family money here. So he's like, how could you? He's like, that was, like, you asshole, what's wrong? That was Mark Hanna. Okay, so I didn't want to sidetrack you there. Yeah, he's really funny.

But, you know, Mark was, the benefit of had to Mark Hanna. It was mostly tonality. And I watched Mark because I wasn't allowed to sell at the watch. I had to listen. So I was able to listen to Mark, who was really talented when it came to how he had this silky, smooth way of speaking. It was almost like he was apologizing to you as he ripped your eyeballs out. It was like amazing.

Like, give us, like, an example. Like he'd say, sir, I understand that you don't know me, but let me say, I want to be an asset to you, your family over the long term here. All I'm asking for, sir, is just give me one shot. It sounds like Taylor when he's trying to get laid. Yeah, right? I showed you that thing about the Wolf of Wall Street for getting laid, right? But that was Marcus, sir, you know, all I could say is, you know, sir, you give me one shot and believe me, that was Mark. And then you'd see other people who just sucked.

They're like, I'm telling you. And I was like, so I got to see both sides. And because I wasn't allowed to speak, I was really observant. So when finally my day came and the market crashed and I went to this firm, it all was bubbling inside my head. And I had the natural ability. It just came out. And that's how it started.

This is the story in Robert Green's book, The Laws of Human Nature, about the guy that was paralyzed that got to sit and watch. We just sit there and observed and observed and observed. And what ended up happening is he just became real fucking good at human nature. Yeah. And that's kind of what sounds like. like what happened to you. Exactly. And I think that really, you know, it's funny in my one of the books I was writing that whole story just got edited it out because I explained that one of the things

that really led to the creation of the system I teach was that time frame of being forced to watch others sell and to see how most people just suck so badly. I think the way I explain it now is that, you know, it's like almost a flawed internal communications platform that you have. Like communication, you have words that you say. You have tone. tonality that you apply to those words that gets a certain point of course. Then there's also body language. Let's keep body language added up for a moment. Just so there's a tonality, how you say what you say, right?

What happens with a lot of people is they have interesting words to say, and they are in their own mind they're applying the appropriate tonality, but they're actually toned at. They think they sound a certain way and they don't. They think, like, I'm really excited about this. And to them, they think they sound like over-the-topic side. And they sound like they're ready to fall asleep, right? So it's almost like the words come out the way they should,

but the tonality gets impeded somewhere. Is it disconnect? So a person like that will struggle greatly with getting their point across, with capturing people's attentions, with having charisma, with living an empowered life. So one of the beauties of what I teach is just that. It's like, you know, how do you essentially unlock? It's very easy once you realize what's going on.

Because here's the deal. You don't have to learn tonality. Like there's all to there's like 29 tonalities. 10 of them will be used again and again as we influence and persuade, right? You don't have to learn these. You already know them. It's just that you've used them by accident when you really felt the certain. Like, for instance, I don't care how poor you are with communicating.

You've always had a time or a few times in your life where you were just so certain where you spoke certain. It was oozing at you. You're just so sure of yourself and certainty came oozing at you. You had other times when you really felt empathy for someone, and you're like, I am this. Oh, my God. Oh, my God. Yeah, I, John, but you've had times when you told someone a secret. You're like, Jim, let me tell you, I have something.

The reason for the call today. So we've all used these tonalities when we've really felt them. So what I teach people with the system, the straight line, is how to use them on purpose. In other words, when should you apply these tonalities? And at first, you do it consciously. But once you show someone, how consciously, here's how eventually the unconscious mind will catch on. And once it does, it becomes fluid. And that's a gift you get people.

Because I just couldn't imagine. I think it's the saddest thing would be to go through life. There's so many people that are brilliant, talented, great ideas. But they almost die with their music on their lips. They can't get it out because they don't have to share their message with people. And that, I think, is the true beauty of what sales really is outside just of selling as a salesman, just like communicating effectively, you know? And some people have that more as a natural, like some people are more natural than others.

Of course. Some people are unnatural. Some people are awful. And then you have that full continuum in between. So the question really is, is where do you land in the continuum? And does it serve you or not serve you? Is it impeding your life in some way? Is it not allowing you to be as effective as you could be?

Are you working twice as hard because no one wants to listen to you? Because when you open your mouth, they're like, you're sco. You're screaming out. Look at this way. Let's say a message has intrinsic value. Whatever that's say it has intrinsic value X, right? That's the message. If I was the one delivering that message, guess what? There's a multiplier. The perceived value would probably triple because the way I would explain this to you, you'd be like, wow, damn, oh my God, holy shit, right? Versus someone that was a very poor communicator. It would be divided by a third. The value is still there, but either the communicator can enhance it or detract from it. That's really sales in the non-sales world.

So when you were selling back then, do you think you knew all this subconsciously? Yes. You knew. Yes. So how long after you start, you know, basically selling penny stocks and making these big commissions, do you start opening your own shop? So it happened pretty quickly. What happened was, in the first month they made like $60,000 myself.

My money problems disappeared. And then I was approached within a few months from the manager who said, hey, you know, I got this idea. I want you train the sales. People, I'll run the stock market. because I will get rich. You've never seen anyone train and sell like you. At this point, I just went bankrupt.

I was like, you know, and it's interesting because I almost informed some limiting beliefs about myself from that failure. Despite all the successes I've had as a kid and the anchor experience of being an entrepreneur, one failure. It knocks you up your pedestal. Yeah, I was like maybe I'm just a great salesperson.

Maybe I'm not meant to run my own business, right? So I hesitated for a short time, but like most successful people, and I'm sure you guys, You just step into your fears, you overcome your own limiting beliefs. You know, there's two ways to overcome limiting beliefs. You can do it yourself, which we do all the time, and empower people will do that eventually. Or you can use people who are experts at that, like coaches, that really did the real deal, the real version.

People like myself really understand the dynamics of that, and you can help people overcome it. Either way, you know, I did it naturally. So I opened up my own from about five or six months later, except this time, I did everything right. every mistake I made with the first go-round, I did the exact opposite on this go-round, and I started the firm selling penny stocks to average moms and pops, and we were doing well. That went on for about two or three months, and one day I'm lying in bed, and I'm like, wait a second. Like, you know, I remember that for now I got my mojo back.

Like, why are we calling poor people? Why don't we call rich people? They have more money to invest. It seemed counterintuitive we're doing. So I tried that. And to my shock, it didn't work. Rich people would not buy penny stocks. they did not buy them.

I said, all right, I get that 10 cents, a piece of shit they think. I said, maybe I should reverse split the stock and make it a $5 stock. The value of a company is based on the price times the number of outstanding shares. You could raise the price of a stock without increasing its value,

but you reduced the number of outstanding shares called a reverse split. So I took the stock and we reversed split it up to five. He said maybe people will like it more of five. And they did a little bit, but not enough that it was like six of one half a dozen other. There was nothing monumental

that I could switch to calling Richby. They really didn't want to buy it. That did shock me. And I was lying and bedding and doing my thinking. And I was like, you know, I think I know what it is. I said, you know, LF Rothschild, right? I watched this happen. They're calling people all across the country.

But Jordan Belford, Mark Hanna, they don't know you. But calling from LF Rothschild, who they do know, the Rothschild bank name, and you're selling a company like IBM, which they'd heard of before. So you have one strike against you, two in your favor. Okay, fair enough. you could open up accounts. But now you're Stratton Oakmont, Jordan Belfort selling a $6 stock,

three strikes when you're out. Right? And I said, I got to tip the odds in my favor. So I said, let me start by not selling a $6 stock. Let me start by selling a bigger stock that they've all heard of. So I found a company that you all know, Eastman Kodak, back in was a blue chip. Now it's had a business ironically.

And it was a great story about why the stock was depressed. And I wrote this great script. And I started calling rich people. And also, as far as far, Stratton went. What's the script? The script. Do you remember it?

The script of Stratton, sure, it was like, you know, had to come up with a reason why they have heard. Can you give me the inflection? Like, pretend I'm on the other line. I'm like, I'm sitting around. I'm watching Oprah like your wife. I'm watching a soap opera and my phone rings. Let's say you're a rich person.

You might talk a market, right? I'm a rich person in my name. I say, Jim, hey, Jordan Bubba calling from Stratton, Oakman. How you doing today? You say, all right, say, Jim, listen, you probably haven't heard of Stratton because for the last 10 years, we're strictly an institution. block trading firm dealing with selective of banks, insurance companies, and pension

funds. However, we've recently opened up our doors, Jim, to the most substantial private investor. And all I want to do right now with your permission, of course, is send you out some information on the company, Stratton, along with a copy of our track record, and then get back to you down the road. Next time we're making a recommendation to our institutional clients.

Does that sound fair enough? I got to say, I got to say, Leo fucking nailed you. Leo did nail you. Okay, sorry, I just needed to hear that. So then they'd say, yeah, sure, go. ahead. Now, what can I really send them? Now, that story was true. See, I didn't start Stratton. I bought it, and it was in business for 10 years. It was an institutional trading firm dealing with banks. So I found the best version of the story, right? You know, you haven't

heard us because we're shit-ass securities. It was, no, you know, you probably haven't heard of us before because for the last days, you were strictly an institutional trading firm dealing with banks insurance companies and pension funds. All right, make sense, there's a reason why it's called the justifier however we've recently on the low you see then you'll know you right you recently opened up our doors the most substantial private investor and jim all i want to do right now with your permission of course i love though with your permission of course that's a good information on the on our company strat and securities right and then get back to you next time i'm making a recommendation to our big clients does that

sound reasonably yes sure why not great just a couple of quick questions you've said to waste your time the questions what do you uh right if you're great jim next time we speak i'll have some great for you have a great next time you you wait like 10 days, call them back, say, hey, Jim, and now here was the magic, though. So rather than trying to conjure something up and lying, I just sent them a letter saying, great, speaking that day, blah, and I sent them a book in a FedEx, a book, actual book, right? Why? Because it created reciprocity. So when they got the book and you tried to, it's very hard to get through the gatekeeper twice sometimes. So when we call back,

these are a wealthy business, we're calling B2B, right, businesses. So when you call a business owner, and you say, hey, is Jim around who's going, oh, Jordan and off him from Strang? He'll notice about it. Oh, Jim, it's the guy who's the guy who's, sent you to book. He's like, all right, fine. He feels indebted to you. Just not the buy, but the big of a hey Jim, Jordan Bellin, how you doing today? He's all right, great. Now, Jim, if you recall, we spoke last week, I said to get back to you when I had something that was really over the top, great. So I read the bill. He goes, yeah, great. Well, Jim, the reason for the call today. Something just came across my desk. It is perhaps the best thing I've seen in the last

thing. So you have 60 seconds. I want to share the idea with you. Got a minute? He's like, yeah, shoot, go ahead. Great. Name of the company, Eastman, Coton. That was it, right? So I tested that like you and guess what? People started buying like mad. Quick break to talk about Ulta Beauty because who doesn't like Ulta Beauty? I mean, it's definitely one of my favorites. So Alta Beauty is dedicated to bringing its guests the most exciting new brands, which is why they just launched this platform, you guys. And it's an entire platform built to help beauty lovers discover more. So it's called Sparked. It's at Alta Beauty, like I said, and it's the new destination for

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So at the Skinny Confidential, I always like to be ahead of the curve and on the pulse. So this very much sparks my interest. Ignite your curiosity and discover Sparked in select Ulta beauty stores. If you guys want to check this out, you can explore the whole virtual world of Sparked on Ulta.com slash sparked. It's a unique interactive experience where you learn about all these exciting brands and founders and their authentic stories and products. I think this is very, very much on brand.

And with that, let's get back into the show. This is a really good, like, practice for men that need to get a girl. So, Taylor, you should be taking note. Use your inflection. A producer Taylor. Throw in with your permission, of course. What she's saying is that desperation is so obvious ring off you. She's just telling the world.

With the permission, of course, is, of course, the best part. That's a good one. Nowadays especially, you know. In the old days, fuck permission. You know, so let me. So let me. So let's fast. track it a little bit because I want to talk about when this starts taking off and you guys start

going wild. So, here's what happens. So long story short, so I did that and I recruited my junior partner, Danny, the Jonah Hill character, right? Right guy. Is that true the way you guys met where he said, show me that paste up? Yes, exactly. Except it happened not in, it happened in the playground of our apartment building, not in a diner. Okay. It was exactly like that. I showed him the paste up and that was right. He put his job that day, right? And he true to life, he actually was married to his first cousin. He was so funny this guy. He's still another guy. Yeah, he lives far away. He was a very funny guy.

And some of the things that came out, he's like, yeah, you know, leave on the institution steps. He was like that if the kids were, he was really, really hardcore. Funny guy, and he's got two wonderful kids who actually live in L.A., right? Great kids, right? Anyway, we started doing this.

We opened a lot of accounts. The plan was we called them back 10 days later and say, and I don't want to get all the particulars, like, you had schmooze calls in the middle, right? To touch base, hey, everything's going well, but then you called them back 10 days later. say, Jim, hey, two reasons for the call, something, you know, number one, I want to quickly update you on Kodak.

Right now, the stocks where we bought it, blah, blah, blah, right? Tell them a story where the coat, about comes. And second reason, Jim, something else just came across my desk. It's a bit different in nature, more speculative, one of our own investment banking deals. If you have 60 cents, I want to share it with. You got a minute? He's like, yeah, true, go ahead.

Now, the idea I have is because you're now his broker. He perceives you was not a penny broker. He said, yeah, sure, go ahead. Say, great. Jim, name of the company, Ventura Entertainment. It's actually a West Coast company. located here okay and anyway the biggest trade in penny stock history and remember ventura was a penny stock we'd split it to five and did this sort of two-step process with a lost leader i guess you

could say was code up was the loss leader so the biggest trip was like i think i did a check a six thousand dollar trade was like broke all the records right the average trade of a penny stock was five hundred dollars so danny and i have our stack of leads because we opened up accounts in kodak but made no commission from that he had 50 so we started dialing. He gets the first connect. I'm in the boardroom. So I'm watching him through the window. And he's talking and I'm just watching him. He's talking. Two minutes like he hangs at the phone. It's got this kind of a weird look on his face. And he walks towards him. He's holding a body. I guess the guy bought something. He said, what happened? He goes, I don't know.

It goes, the guy bought $120,000 worth and apologize for working so small. And in that moment, I knew. You know that you were going to just be flooded with money. I was like, oh my fucking God. I've cracked the code. I made on that trade $70,000 in like a minute. You couldn't compare the profit from the ability to call a rich person that could deploy. And by the way, like I said, and apologize to you for only spending 100. 100, right, versus, like, straight together, $500. I had 12 people working with the stratinites, right?

Who had the average IQ of Forrest Gump on three hits of acid, basically, right? And what happened was I, like, you know, I looked out into the border. I saw my strategy. Wow. all I have to do is take these 12 kids and teach them how to call rich people and I'm going to be the richest guy. The rest will be history. So how fast does this all start pouring in the skin? I also want to know how you teach them. Well, I'll tell you this is what happened. So I look, I said, wow, all I got to do is teach them how to do what I'm doing and the rest is they say will be

history. As they also say, easier said than fucking done. As it turned out, trying to train a bunch of barely post-adolescent income poops, okay, who dropped out of high school to close the toughest, richest, meanest investors in the world, you know, CEOs, it turned out to be not just difficult, but fucking impossible. After one month of them trying to close, they hadn't opened up a single account. And meanwhile, Danny and I were still open up accounts like water. And that baffled me. See, what happened was, I was teaching sales. I was a great sales trainer even before I met to the straight line. but I was teaching a different system. It didn't have a name, but it was great.

But the thing with the system is, like, you don't know how great it really is until you stress it to the point of fracture. It was good enough to get an average mom or pomp to part with $500 because impulse buy, no big deal, right? But like any other engineering project that goes around, like, you know, the bridge collapsed, like, oops, we thought it was strong,

but one too many cars on the bridge, the wind is blowing one mile an hour. I was in a couple catastrophic fail. What happened to me? The system I taught had a catastrophic failure. It didn't work. I could not use the system to take average kids with no education and get them to close rich people.

And then I went on a quest for about a month as they were in closing, trying to find some other system. And the worst part was that already the system I had back then was infinitely better than anything else I saw. So I was stuck. So it was like this four-week period where everyone was negative. They wanted to quit. And every morning I give a meeting.

And then every afternoon I give another meeting. And then I get these marathon trainings at nighttime. And for like four hours, once every two weeks. Come back. We need a marathon because, you know, we can't take this. The rich people are assholes, right? So I agreed to come back. And I knew it was like a make or break moment.

Because either I was going to crack the code for this or they would want to go back to selling penny stocks. It made me so angry because I knew I was on to this big thing. Long story short, I went back that night. And it was in that evening where something happened that a thought occurred to me. And it had to do with, you know, they were getting hit with objection after objection. And I was as well, but not in the way they were. They were getting batted around. And I had this thought.

And I looked at these guys and I said, don't you guys get it? Every sale's the same. And they're like, what? I'm like, guys, every sale is, say, watch, it's a straight line. And I drew this long line on the center of the board. And I put a big, thick X on either. And it was a visual representation. Exactly what would happen in the sales call.

Yeah. And see, what was happening. was, I was such a natural born clothes. It became so easy to me that... You knew what to do at each point. Like, everything mattered what they said. I knew exactly how to react, had to sort of, you know, corral the sale, move it forward down this line. And there was something about this line that when I drew a line, it just completely redefined how I taught people how to sell. And I said to them, you know, guys, you got four seconds. The crux of it, there's so many different

aspects of the straight line. It's an amazing program. It changes people's lives to I mean, it's amazing. It really is. But the crux of it was that I have, and you could see it today, but back then it was the same. I have a certain way of talking that when you hear me, you like, damn, that guy sounds, you heard with Leo. He said, wow, he sounded sharp, right?

That's a strategy to sound sharp, to sound on the ball, to be enthusiastic, but not yelling and scintuitive, enthusiasm, right? And also an expert in your field. So unless that comes across in the first few seconds, you're done. The prospect, in this case, these wealthy bisman, would say, ah, this guy's a novice,

and they would take control. So if the other party takes control of the conversation, guess what? Every sale becomes different. Now, they're controlling. You become reactive versus... Everyone can apply this to dating, too. Of course.

Of course it's for dating. There's a great... You saw a thing on line with Stevie. It's hysterical. This guy did a... We're going to link it out. Yeah, it's really funny. So here's what is.

It's communication strategy. Now, when it comes to selling, it took these, what happens I went for a four-hour marathon. They taped me. And it was late at night, so I was like, I hope this,

wow, it sounds pretty unique, right? Next morning, I gave another meeting. They taped me again. At 9.30, they picked up the phones. And what happened next was like, I'd never seen anything like it. These kids who couldn't close the damn door, went on an account opening spree

that resulted in, you know, two movies. So when you blow the doors off of this, I mean, you crack the code and the money starts pouring in, like, how fast does your life start escalating? Like cars, when does the cocaine come in? What kind of dirty-minded?

Because you know what that means. I have a lot of questions. Okay, I'll answer all of that. Okay. When do the doors completely come off? When did the doors come off? The doors come off when I meet a guy. I'm on vacation in.

Is this second wife for first stalled? First wife still. Okay, go on. And I meet this guy and his name was Elliot Levine. And he was the chairman of Perry Ellis, men's clothing, CEO of Perry Ells, right? One of the most brilliant garmentos ever, but a complete degenerate.

I know how to love him for it, because everyone... Sounds fun. He sounds fun. Is he single? He's like 68, right now, but the Elliot Levine was the guy, he could wear a diaper and a bow-tide-say. That's the latest thing. Everyone wants to wear diaper.

He was like such a charismatic and a brilliant guy, but the most self-destructive person, like Elliot, and I'm not exaggerating. He would bet on like eight aunts dancing on a postage step. He would win the dance off. He would bet on anything, this guy. Like he was constantly betting, like tossing coins, 10,000 of toss.

So when I met him, I was in the Bahamas, and my junior partner, though, he was the blockhead, we called him. He had like a blockhead, and it was dumb as a block too. But his head was, like, so square you could drop a plum line down, and it would hit his fucking cheek the whole time, right? So the blockhead says to me, check this guy. It's like James Bond. So I run into the casino, and I see this young guy,

you have to understand the scene I walk into it. He's a handsome. guy back then, right? He was in late 30s or mid-30s, right? And he's sitting there with about a million dollars in chips on the table. He's playing seven hands, 10,000 hand, and his wife is standing by him. She's blonde, Jewish, emaciated to near perfection, all right? And her shirt, she's got an ace of spades and a jack of diamonds. Like, it was like out of a fucking, like a character of a movie, right? I was like, holy shit. And I'm watching this guy play and he's up like 500 grand.

I thought I was a big game. I'd give him a $500. Holy shit. Next day, he comes out to the pool and he just sits beside me, right? We start talking and we hit it off. He'll take a like to me as much older than me. And he told him what I was doing. Anyway, we got a week later we met in the city.

You know, he was a huge player in the garment center. It takes me out for lunch into the garment center. And we're sitting there and we're talking casually. And he's like, what are you? It was like, if David Copperfield could do cocaine, by sleight of hand. He was so smooth this guy. He's like, as he's told him,

he had like this little belay he carried with a peri-ealous collar stain. He's like, anyway, he talked, like four D-Asians. No one's like, what happened there? Did he do? He did coke. It was beautiful to watch.

It was gorgeous to watch this guy do coke, right? Holy shit, right? So next thing I know, he's like, I can't do coke. He goes, I'm like, alright, fine. I'm very impression, right? So I was, all right, fine, so I did coke. And then once that happens,

I'm a bad person. You know, once the cocaine starts, it's terrible. I just want to do terrible things with women and the dirty of the better. So it was the middle of the day, and I was like a nice guy. I loved my wife and everything,

but, you know, I had some coke in my system. He's like, let's go to see Gina Girls. Like, who's Gina Girls? Oh, you love Gina Girls. It was a madam in the city, right? Next thing I know, I'm with two hookers, one sitting on my face. I'm just, I'm a lost my,

and I'm just like, the dirty of the better. I'm just snort and cold. Although I didn't even come home that night. And that was that. And then that was a blip. I was like, wow, this guy's a maniac. He goes, hey, next day, let's go gambling together. We take a chopper to A-C.

Went with Trump, by the, he flew in the chopper with us. It was his casinos, right? Oh, Christ. Okay, he owned the casinos, right? We flew down there and gambled, like, just wild man. We did massive quies of cocaine. His drug was quailutes. I wanted to ask you about quail-

So that's really how the quailudes started. So, and he was into quailudes, and we started doing quailudes. And- What does the quailude do to you? You can't even find him anymore, right? Thank God for that, because I'd be taken with you. Good. You know, that's so great. They were, like, the ultimate.

it euphoric high. So imagine you could take like five beers and distill it down to like its essence of this and inject it and maimline buzzing and so euphoric, right? And the thing is you wouldn't get tired from it afterwards. Like you could be really fucked up slurring and drooling and then like an alley like, hey, how you doing? So there was no hangover from them, right? And then you could balance out the tiredness with a little coke, which made perfect sense to me, right? So I started doing it to balance, right? And Elliot and I just became like running part. there is. In fact, Steve Madden's shoes is Steve Madden's shoes because of Elliot. So I was the founder of Steve Madden with Steve together. We founded it. And I was tapping Elliot's brain was this brilliant

market who really came with the strategy that drove Steve Madden shoes. So what ultimately, you're going crazy, you're making a lot of money. Like what ultimately was the downfall? What got federal agencies involved and what got them paying attention to what you were doing? The big one was just that someone was bad luck that someone else got indicted. But ultimately it was the smuggling money overseas. And that's what Agent Coleman said. Like, to me, when he was all my friends now, the FBI and I were friends. He was in my podcast last week. I think it's hilarious. Yeah, he's a

great guy. And it's really, really interesting that his take on the whole thing. And it wasn't the stock stuff. That was whatever, you know, they weren't. It was just really that bad. It wasn't like really that bad. I guess in their eyes. The FBI was going to go after, right? But I smuggled money, the cash to Switzerland. And that opened up the whole money laundering

stuff, and that was really it. And so at this point, just like walk me through this, through the movie. So at this point your own wife number two. Yes. So what happened was, it was just like the movie, I started throwing these wild parties in the Hamptons, right? Just, and it was, God, I wish I could have gone to one of those parties. They were really fun. They were so great. I had the police working for me. So it was like, there's so much shickling. Like, I'm sorry, we can't hear you. The parties were just insane. They got bigger and bigger and bigger, right?

It'd be thousands of people. Really, it was really. It was great, you know. And it also was a different in time. This is when sexual harassment was considered like in vogue. I'm not saying that's a good thing or anything. But no one had Stratton got harassed. I'll tell you that much. It did not happen. Everyone fucked everyone. If you harassed someone, you were fired. Taylor, too bad you didn't

work for Jordan. Yeah. But it was really interesting. It was just so much, everyone was young. Always fine-looking animals. You're a fine-looking animal. Fun-looking animal. It was just all fuck, right? It was really bad. You never knew what was going to happen when you opened up a bathroom stalls. Is your second wife mad that everyone's fucking each other? No, no. So,

When I met the second wife at a party. She walks in and she was very beautiful. I googled her. She's beautiful. Yeah. And imagine her when she was 21, right? We all looked better than we're 21, I guess, right? Except for you, you're getting better every year.

Thank you. Of course, you know. Anyway, I got to get back my brownie points. Smooth up. With your permission, of course. With your permission, of course. As I was saying, she was very beautiful. And I was like, fuck.

I was like, and my first wife was beautiful too. but at that point I just wanted longer legs, blonder hair. It was idiocy. I don't think any woman really could have made me happy at that point in my life. I just was more bigger, better, this and that. So, and she became my mistress for a short time,

and then I fell in love with my mistress, and I left my first wife because I liked the movie, she pulled up in limousine, and the door opens, and like, it was just awful, right? Anyway, and then marriage won, and then she came on the scene.

And she was a very good running pawn, partner for me. You know, she was the right wife for the right time. And she gave me two of the most amazing children in the world. And they're amazing. So I'll always love her for that. And we had a very, very dysfunctional marriage that, I mean, it's hard to say because, like, I think that both of us are probably, you know, listen, I tried not to reframe it. I think we always reframe what happened in the past. I know she, because of me, I think her version is completely full of shit. She's so full of shit about the whole thing. I mean, she's a therapist now trying to make that she was like hostage.

I'm pleased, okay? It's like just not true. Okay? I mean, you know what I'm saying? I was no gem and she was no gem, okay? And she knew full well what was going on, all right? Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. So, you know, again, I'm not saying I was a model citizen,

but she was no model citizen either. It takes two to tangle, right? My first wife was an innocent victim. That I will tell you. She was an innocent victim, not the second. She was a mercenary. So I want to know after all of this comes crumbling down and you have to go to jail. What is it like in jail for you?

you isolated from everyone else or were you like in the yard with all these different people? No, no, Tommy Chong was my bunkmate from Chi Chi Chi. I didn't know that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, we should. Yeah, so what happens? I go to jail. It was a white.

Where is it like a white collar jail? Okay, so. It was a totally cool jail. It had tennis courts. I had a butler, believe it or not. I want to go to jail. It's not. So I said to a, you know, I said to a friend who I was going to jail.

He was probably going to get sentenced to something he did recently. I said, it's not that, you know, for what you did. It's not that, you go to real jails. very different thing, right? But in the white collar, you know, it's not, when I say white collar, it's not really the right word. It's like, it's a nonviolent offenders jail for people with short sentences. You get it? Yeah, you don't have to worry about getting. There's no, no one lifts a finger in anger. It's more about like, you know, we get rosemary from the gone to cook. Seriously. I mean, I had a but I had a but that being said, it still sucked because it was jail,

but you make the best of it. You get it because when you have money in jail, you can get anything you want. I mean, in terms of people will do anything. For five cans of tuna, I'll make your bed every single day and bring you cappuccino. One guy was cooking, this guy was catching squabular. I shit, you're not. This guy was, it was David. In fact, Tommy was on my podcast. He was catching squirrels in the yard

and cooking goes... Do you eat squirrels? Is squirrel good? Well, I don't know, because by the time I got there, there was really no squirrels left. Tommy had been through the whole squirrels came, he got there before me. Tommy Chong's just chomping down squirrels? Yeah, so Tommy, by the way, is the best. So what happened was, he was in jail before me. He got the

too much before. Right? Marijuana beep. Saw, not even the stupidest thing ever. His kid was selling bongs, but across state lines. Not even drugs. Anyway, because he's Tommy Chong, right?

They made him an example, right? Wonderful guy. And when I got there, we were both very high profile. So I guess the administrator, Mrs. Strickland, she was a great lady. And she passed away from brain cancer. But she decided that the best way to keep it eye in both of us is to put us together in the same cell.

So she moved someone out of a cell and put us together. So we had this, like, we were like in this, I wouldn't call privilege, but let's just say as close as you can, where the woman was treated me, us very well. And Tommy was my bumpmate, right?

So the first few days of us being together, you know, we tell each other's stories. And, you know, I have him rolling on the floor some of my stories of my insanity. And the third or four of that, he goes, you know, I honestly thought you were making this shit up. But my wife Googled you and it's all there. I can't believe because you've got to write a book.

I'm like, really? I didn't think my life was that weird. Because, like, you know what it's your life? You're just like, I don't know, really? That's my life. I said, my God, it's crazy. I'm Tommy Chong. I'm saying your life's crazy.

Hold on second. Jordan. Martin Scorsese did a fucking movie on you. I know. And Leonardo DiCaprio played you. Your life's pretty fucking crazy, man. I know, but at the time, it's like there's little steps you take and you can become desensitized to your own sanity.

I don't deny. I knew that most people don't sink yachts. I said that was a bit strange when I had. I think strange things just happened to me. I didn't really quite understand what's going on. I was almost like a little kid. How'd you think of a yacht? Taking it out into a storm because I was high on quailudes.

I was in what's called the movement phase. Like with cradles, you have these phases. You have the tingle phase. So you take a quailud, right? And you start to tingles. It's really a force of grace, right? Then you get what's called the slur phase. Where you're, I love you, I love you.

I love her, I love you, right? And you're slur. You're like, baby, I have, fine. I had a few slurs. She sounds good. I can slurts good. I can slurred too, no big deal, right? Then you get into what's called the drool phase.

when you're still to get a little more fucked up. You're like, well, baby's drool. I can draw it. Then you have what's called unconsciousness. That's phase four. And you can actually get past phase four by doing Coke at this strategic moment, right? And those are the faces of a quail-in-eye, right? Then there's this other phase, very rare, happens only once in a while when the drugs hit you the wrong way.

It becomes having, it's like the drug-induced equivalent of having ants in your pants. You can't sit fucking still. But what happened was I ended up going to Rome to go on a two-week cruise with the boat. The movie's completely fictionalized with that wild. It's true the boat's sake, but it wasn't, they had some other reason we're trying to tie loose ends together. But I was just there to vacation, right? We were in Rome, and the plan was to go to Sardinia.

And we went down to those eight of us, you know, my wife and three of our couples, friends, right? And when someone was, oh, my God, why is the water so rough in the harbor? I look at it as like white caps in the harbor, and that was when I realized. fuck I'm in the moving phase I said we have to I felt like this terrible fear like almost anxiety attack that if I stood in the harbor I would die so when we get to the ship

my wife runs out she goes Captain Mark you know is it too rough to make the crossing he was like well I'm like I said if we don't move I will die I said can we make it he goes yeah we'll make it we'll break a few place but I said fucking let's go he goes let's go be a great adventure and that was how it started right

so it was like eight to ten foot chop so I went got in the boat and you know I took four more ludes because that's what I did when I got invoked. It was the appropriate move at the moment. Went to the top deck, drank a few bloody marries, passed out cold. I woke up about two hours later to the feeling of sea spray out my face. I'm like, what the fuck? I'm like 50 feet up and all of a sudden a wall of water comes crash down.

Boom. And that was how it started. Meanwhile, so I fell off top, the storm turned into a freak class 47 gale with like 30 foot waves and 80 miles. It was just the craziest thing. So meanwhile, I go back downstairs now into the main salon. right and they're on the leopard print carpet it's like a really big boat 160 foot boat right my wife and six other people seven eight right they tied themselves together with a roll not that

fucking smart right i'm like and they're on the thing and they're and they're crying and there's plates like decorative frisbee's no one thought to get you no i was sleeping no they couldn't even move was that it was impossible to move and you and you're and you're waxed out on quail liz with i'm like what happened i'm like the wife said i'm gonna kill you what did you do this you force it's like all right, calm down, calm down. Anyway, long story short, we started crawling up to go see the captain. We could even walk, right? We get to the bridge and the captain's like, what happened, Captain Boy? He's like, oh, we're in trouble now. We're in the shit. He's like a freak storm kicked up and it's only getting worse. I'm like, well, can we turn around? He goes we can't because if we turn around,

we'll get broadside, we'll tip over. I'm like, oh, fuck it, right? We never said we were now on the deck and I'm like, my friend Rob was there was my partner in drug from. Like this guy is like, before we went on this trip, I had to go on a last minute drug collection, so he probably armed with all a bag full of drugs. So, like, Rob, you have the Coke. You start doing Coke as though. I was just so crazy. I didn't want to die sober, right?

So I'm getting high as Kites as the thing's banging this way and that. And it's like an hour and a half of this boat just like being ripped apart. All of a sudden, it comes like, shit, rogue wave. What's a rogue wave? Like, oh, fuck it. I'd like the side. So my gigantic wall of water comes out. He turns into it and guns it.

We start going up and it just flipped over it. And the boat flips over it. And now, like, basically, we were, like, half caps. We turned back up on a side, right? And he's like, you're right? Like, yeah, yeah, we're right, right? And the engineer comes up from the bottom. We had a crew of 12, right?

He's like, we lost the front portal. We're going down by the head. And I was like, yes. I was like, I fucking hated this boat. I'm like insurance money, right? And so the captain's like, Mayday, May Day, yacht, Nadine, Dean, going down on it. Anyway, so they now had to come rescue us.

And they sent out the actual Coast Guard, and they tried to lower the basket, you know? Well, it's like the movies, not quite. It's fucking harder than that. because when the wind is howling, it's 50 feet. That way, they couldn't get the basket to land on the boat. They ran out of gas, right? So now they left.

He goes, all right, we have to go into the rubber rafts. I'm like, the rubber fucking raft. It's like 50 foot waves now, right? Puts the first rubber raft in. We all go down to, like, the back deck. It washes away. He's like, all right, that's not going to work. He goes, wait, go back up to the top now.

We go back up to the top, right? He's like, all right, I just got a call from the, they're saying the Navy. The Italian Navy SEALs are coming to rescue us, the special forces, right? So we have to push the helicopter over the side. We had a helicopter at a plane on the boat. Right? So we push the helicopter over the side to make room for the landing, right? So now they say you can only take what you can carry.

No luggage. Now, my wife had already lost her luggage on the way there. So he just bought like $50,000 worth of new clothes, right? So now that's gone. Like, all right, fuck it. Now on the boat, I had a quarter million in cash, artwork, valuables, paperwork. I look at my friend. I said, Rob, you got the question.

He's like, no, I thought you had, I said, Rob, where did the link goes during your state? I said, get the fucking ludes. Like, I could not be stuck in this country without ludes. He's, I'll get the ludes. Ten minutes later, I'm just, where's fucking Rob? I go downstairs. He's on the stairs with his pants and I was pissing on the carpet. I'm like, what are you doing?

I just always wanted to do something like that. Like, get the fucking ludes. He goes, all right, fine. So he goes, so he goes downstairs, right? Comes back like a minute later, he goes, I got shocked. I couldn't. There's a short circuit. It's flooded.

I can't get the pills. I'm like, so. You fucking go. I don't care unless you're going to die from the shagher. You're right. You're out what I'm thinking. Give me a favor. He just met this girl.

She was his girlfriend back then. She was a total mismatch from Rob. Shelly had to walk around quoting the Bible all day, right? Anyway, he's like, just get Shelley a breast job. If I dies, it fair enough, right? I agree to that. He goes down. He comes back up with a bag of 150,

his hands on, and his third degree burns on it. Right? So now we go back up to the top, right? So anyway, long story short. Oh, me, it goes, I mean, the story goes on and on here. How much to not? I mean, like, how much did not make a movie?

Oh, my God, it's so much. I mean, there's political corruption involved. We got to have you back in here just to dive into all this shit. You know, at the end of the day, listen, you know, it's funny and it was glamorous. There were some things that were, but my life is much better today. I'm so before, wow, I mean, it was 1997, so do the math. At 20 plus 22 years, right? And, you know, it was terrible.

Like, you know, I mean, to live like that, it was great on one hand, but it was awful on the other hand. So, you know, if I could do it again, of course I would change things, right? What's the biggest regret? People lost money, even though they were rich that doesn't make it right. I definitely would change that. That was the biggest regret. And also all the drugs I did, because I can't look back and say the drugs enhanced the memories. Like, I've, what I can tell you is that you pick a fine restaurant anywhere in the world.

I fall in a bowl of soup at that restaurant when I was high. Versus really enjoying things as I could have enjoyed them. You know, now, you know, and went out eventually ultimately was that system of sales, though. that I ended up was able to take that and then really take that and make it ethical. And that launched my new life after the movie. And that was like, my life is infinitely better today. So when you find out that Martin Scorsese wants to make a movie about you, and do you automatically get to meet with Matthew and Leo and all these people?

Like, how did Leo learn to depict you so well? Did he follow you around? Yeah, no. We spent about a year together. Just him studying you and just. Yeah, all time going out, hanging out, yeah. We became good friends all the time. Is he cool?

Very cool. He's such a nice guy. I got to tell you, he's such a good guy, and he's a man of his word. Like, you know, he really is a good guy. I hope he one day gets married, finds love. Maybe this one. He knows. He's a wonderful guy, and he loves his mom, and she's a doll.

He's a really good guy. He really is a good guy. He never gets in trouble. Yeah. Like, he just, he flies under the radar. He's a solid dude. Okay, so here is my proposal. Since we have to be out of here in two minutes.

Do you want to sleep me for $1 million? Is it an indecent proposal? You never know. Where are the queen of my proposal? One million dollars. You never know. Where are the ludes? There we go.

This is what I propose. You are such an insane podcast guest. I want you to come back and we talked about this with your wife. Yes. Will you? With her permission, of course. Taylor, don't get a fucking hard on four. She's really hot.

I want you to come back with your wife because I have more questions that I didn't get to cover. I want to tell you one funny story before we go. Go. So last time we were at my podcast. I said to you, I asked you a question, I said, what would you do if you're going to die and you hear this? I said, this is the classic. I said, what would you do if you were single right now?

Where would you go to meet a guy? You know what you said to me? Yeah. What did you say? I said a bookstore. Or what? Or? Or?

Or? Oh, yeah, my whole thing. No, I said, this is what I would do. I would go to St. Trope. I would go to the harbor. I would go to that little cafe. I think it's called Seneca. And I would sit with Anna Karenina with a dog-eared book

that I hit against the floor, 500 times with bookmarks hanging out of it. And I would wear this really hot outfit with huge sunglasses and a huge hat that's like, don't fucking bother me or talk to me. And I would cross my legs with white stilettos, super high right in front of the yachts.

Where do you think my wife was when you said that? She was in Santa Fe. Uh-huh, with her friends. She's still there. She might be reading Anna Curranor. You better look what she's reading. How funny is that, by the way? That's where she is. She's the friends. It's such an accurate thing. You sit there and you look like don't fucking touch me, don't talk to me.

I don't think she's trying to pick up a guy, but she's there because she loves Sanctra. It was so ironic that you said that. Track her location. I was like, you're not going to believe what my pot. I knew what you. I was going to say, fuck him with her. That's my whole strategy. So Michael better not fuck with me. I'll go somewhere else. You don't fuck with that. Yeah, don't fuck with that. Yeah, no, no. I'd like to live a little longer. I think if you fuck with, that would be the least of your problems, by the day. I was reading an

article the other day about the woman who cut off the husband's genitals. That's too boring. It's too obvious. Too obvious for one of those. I'd go way fucking deeper than that. It would be more like that movie with Meg Ryan with the guy when she would be ex-closed up with Matthew McCona accidentally. I know what you're talking about, but I don't know the name. It's really funny when she like destroys the, puts her pills, his hands, it's...

I might frame him for murder or, like, drug use. Yeah, your life's... I don't want him to go anywhere white collar, though. It needs to be like... No, bad, bad. Pententry shit. But like penitentiary in like Guatemala. Definitely.

You know? You may be a bad influence, Jordan. I would like... We're just spitballing you, yeah? I want you and your wife to come back on. I'm already inviting you right now on air in like three weeks. When she comes back from reading and her current enough. She's dog-earing the book as we speak.

She's hitting it against the ground so it looks used. And I'm sure her stilettos are high enough. Yeah, you get a little fake library card popping out like you're subscribed to the library. You know what I mean? Let's get real fucking specific with it. George Belfort, the real wolf of Wall Street. Where can everybody find you? Yeah, pimp yourself out.

Tell us about your program. Instagram and everything. You go to Jordan Belfort.com. Follow me on Instagram for sure. I post great stuff, funny stuff, and also a lot of content for, you know, influence communication. And, you know, I love what I do, guys.

You know what I really love what I do. It's not even about the money for me. I just love helping people. And that's, I think my drug these days, my addiction is helping other people make money. And I love doing it. I'm good at it. And it feels great.

His podcast is fucking hysterical. You've written two books, right? Three. And your program's called The Straight Line. Yes, it's called Straight Lines, Sales. persuasion system. You've persuaded me to go buy your program after this podcast. I pity you.

Jordan, when you start throwing wild parties again, don't forget you about your good friend. I know, I know. I promise I won't forget you and good luck. Taylor wants to come too. Of course. Taylor, you in? What Taylor? I mean, I can't.

Absolutely. Taylor's in. Okay, come back on the podcast, please, with your wife. I will. And Instagram handle one more time? Oh, Wolf. I'm there if I'm a wolf of Wall Street is like that. Yeah, I think it's the...

I have a son who's 23. I don't need to know these things. He doesn't... We're going to like it all over social media, yeah. Yeah. Thank you for coming on. You're incredible. Come back.

You got it. You got it. Well, that was a wild ride. Like we said, Jordan will be back on the show. He is such a dream guest. I feel like he needs to be a regular. There's so many, like, different directions we can go. Before you go, we're doing a giveaway.

As always, make sure you've rated and reviewed the podcast on iTunes. And then to win some very team. TSC goodies. Think notebooks, pens, pop sockets, just like some swag. Tell us your favorite part of this episode on my latest Instagram at the Skinny Confidential. And someone from the team will slide into a few of your DMs and you'll get some TSC goodies. With that, we'll see you next Tuesday and make sure you guys are leaving your questions of the week too on our latest Instagram. See you soon.