The Compound and Friends - Emergency Broadcast: Chicken & Waffles (aka How Could Life Be Better?)

Starting point is 00:00:00 All right. Good morning, everyone. I was eating at Nas's fried chicken restaurant last week and I had a thought. How could life be better? I'm with eight of my friends, only six of them I really like, and we're literally eating chicken and waffles in a restaurant co-owned by my favorite rapper of all time and we're inexplicably drinking champagne with this meal. I did not pay for the champagne. How could life be better? How could life be better? How could life be better? There is a cosmic scoreboard that hangs over all of our heads and we forget that it's up there. But it's really, really important to look up and to say, you know what?

Starting point is 00:00:39 Things are working out. We're earning points and they're deserved. They're deserved. No one is giving us any points and I mean that as individuals but I mean that also as a firm. We talked recently about breaking a billion dollars in assets. It's just the start. There's no finish line. The scoreboard is still running, okay? And when we think about how could life be better, this concept and it's something that we try to impart to our clients. We try to remind them that they're on track in different types of markets and in different environments. We try to remind them when they come to us with issues they're having or conundrums that they face.

Starting point is 00:01:16 I might sell my business this year. We might have to move. I have health issues. One of my kids is not doing well in school. We try to remind people, yeah, there are challenges and there are things that we have to deal with. But overall, how could life be better? Very hard to picture for most of the people that we cater to. They're in a good place in life. They're in a good place in the grand scheme of things compared to many other people in this country that aren't as fortunate. I think they get that and I think it's important that we express

Starting point is 00:01:43 that every once in a while. The firm is having a lot of success right now and there are some people that get upset about that. There are some people that we don't even know and they just hear about us or they see us and they just say, I don't like that guy or I don't like those people or I don't agree with what that firm is saying. And everyone is entitled. Everyone is entitled. But that's entitled. Everyone's entitled. But that ain't on the scoreboard, other people's opinions. That's not on the scoreboard. Here's what is on the scoreboard. We have a business that's growing between 30% and 40% a year, organic.

Starting point is 00:02:18 We have a business that is 100% employee-owned. employee owned. And yes, outside of Michael, Chris, Barry, and myself, we now have our first employee partners, equity owners, which we will be talking about in a later meeting. We have a business that has profit margins somewhere north of 20% year in, year out. Bill, is that accurate? Are we going to keep it that way? God, you better. We've got a 401k plan for employees with over a million dollars in it. That's money that you guys earned. We had a nice firm match in there. I think we – what did we match? Four percent?

Starting point is 00:02:49 Four percent. We could probably do a little bit better. Yeah. We won't but we could. Right. We do a lot of snacks in the kitchen too. It all balances out. We have a business where employees are thriving.

Starting point is 00:03:02 Clients are happy. Forget about just new clients coming in or clients who've been with us for a while making referrals. We're getting letters from clients, like literally letters about how lost that they had been prior to having some kind of an investment philosophy that makes sense or prior to having a financial plan dictate what they buy and sell. So many people that we speak to came to us without even a semblance of what do I need the money for? Where is it going to go? When am I going to need it? What tax rate might I be paying when I withdraw it?

Starting point is 00:03:36 What is the inflation picture going to look like? What might my property be worth? What are the variables in my life that might change over the next 20 or 30 years and how should I invest based on those contingencies? What's the right portfolio? No idea. No idea. We are finding these people at a moment when they recognize they need help. They're lost and we don't have definitive answers. No one does. We have good answers. More importantly, we have a process that allows us to make changes on the fly as things in their lives change they don't have that they don't have it and they're happy to have it um and they're coming to us in droves and it's phenomenal to see so how could life be better when you think about

Starting point is 00:04:15 having an employee-owned firm where no one else put money in we don't answer to private equity we answer to ourselves we do what's best for the long-term health of Ritholtz Wealth and our clients and our careers. That's how we run the business. How could life be better? How could life be better? Everyone involved in the 401k plan, everyone contributing, how could life be better? Health insurance, taking care of for employees, how could life be better than being in a situation that so many people in America are not fortunate enough to be in? than being in a situation that so many people in America are not fortunate enough to be in. Phenomenal. Phenomenal.

Starting point is 00:04:49 And controlling our own destiny, right? So I think a lot of people that maybe want to take shots at a firm, any firm in any industry that's doing well, a lot of that comes from insecurities over their own situation, unhappiness, over their own circumstances. Don't matter. Scoreboard is above our heads. It's a cosmic scoreboard. It's in the sky. No one else could see it.

Starting point is 00:05:10 We could see it. We know what the scoreboard says. And we know what we want it to say. And everything that we do every day is based on running up that score forever, forever. Okay? That's my message to you. Ignore everything. Focus on how could life possibly be better than it is right now. It couldn't. This is as good as interview with Ben about the use of historical data. You will get client questions about where does the data come from?

Starting point is 00:05:49 How can we be sure about the market? A lot of that stuff gets answered in those conversations. That's what you send people. Send people directly to that. It's hot. Blair Ducanet did some interviews this week at a CFA conference. She talked to Brian Portnoy. She talked to Daniel Crosby, two of the

Starting point is 00:06:05 smartest people about behavioral investing that exist. We're going to run that later in the week. We've got my friend Andrew Thrasher talking about using technicals at an RIA. Barry's on it. All kinds of stuff going on. If you have clients that listen to podcasts or that listen to any kind of talk radio, this is another great way for them to get our perspective on a day-to-day basis. We have so much content. It's coming out of our ears. It is specifically designed for investors, high net worth investors. Feel free to direct them to the Tadis and Ben thing this morning.

Starting point is 00:06:37 They're going to love it. All right, that's it. Talk to you later.

The Compound and Friends - Emergency Broadcast: Chicken & Waffles (aka How Could Life Be Better?)

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