The Compound and Friends - Emergency Broadcast - Josh's announcement

Episode Date: March 25, 2019

Josh makes a big announcement to the staff of Ritholtz Wealth Management. https://ritholtzwealth.com/ Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

I want to tell a little story about how I ended up exactly a week from today. In fact, right at this time, I was in an ambulance on my way to an emergency room on the north shore of Long Island. And it was a police ambulance, which means I got an extra big needle for the IV to go in, because they really don't play games. I learned this. You don't want an. I learned this. You don't want an IV from a police ambulance if you have a choice. But anyway, so – but I want to talk a little bit about what happened and how I view things and I will try to keep this brief but I think it's important. So let's rewind. Last last September Chris informed me that we had approached

900 million dollars in assets under management as a firm and I am a child so as soon as I see 900 and the goal from when we launched the firm was we should be a billion dollar RIA I said and of course this is not

the reality but I said to myself, I am going to single-handedly pour all of my willpower, all of my will, all of my energy, every shred of cosmic detritus that I can summon to my fingertips and I am going to literally push the firm over the goal line and get us to, what is that, nine figures? Mike, you're the director of research. How many figures is in a billion? What is it? It's nine figures. I'm going to do it. I mean, of course, everyone's going to do it with me. No, it's ten.

All right, get the fuck out. All right, so it's ten zeros. So I said, like, all right, this is it. We're right there. This is five years. We had just passed our five-year milestone as a firm. And I said, we're at 900. Watch this.

We are going to pull together as a team and run the ball over the goal line. Like I literally was looking at it that way. I'm not sure why because I'm only 42. And if something's meant to happen, it will happen eventually. But I just said, you know what? I'm going to do every single meeting, every podcast interview. I'm going to respond to every reporter.

I'm going to do two, three days a week on television, blog posts, building the video channel like a lunatic. Like I am just going to literally through sheer force of will just make this happen right now. And then of course within two months, the S&P 500 falls 20%. And Chris informs me we're at 840. Now, those of you who know me know that that was the moment where I said, okay, I haven't been doing enough.

So January, February, I come back from December break and I decided to do even more and I decided to push even harder and double down on what we're doing on YouTube and double down on the voice projects and just whatever in my power I can do in addition to what all of you are doing every day, I just thought, in my power I can do in addition to what all of you are doing every day. I just thought, let's just will this into being and make this happen. So the first few months of this year, I really, I think I treated myself with a very reckless disregard and just went all in on this goal and willing it into being on my own. And that's where I find myself, essentially, in an ambulance on Monday,

and they're taking me, and I'm too big for the ambulance. Like, they have to adjust the back of the stretcher up so that my feet can let the door close. So I'm, like, sitting up in an ambulance, which no one ever is doing. Like, most people in the ambulance, they're flat on their back,

looking up at the ceiling of it. I'm, like, looking out the back window at cars in traffic on Northern Boulevard. And like, you can almost wave to people. Yeah, I'm in an ambulance. What are you looking at? So anyway, but I get to the hospital and I'm fine. They have to put a tube in me. It's not worth getting into. But long story short, I made a really, really fast recovery. But all of the surgeons that came to visit me, all of the doctors, they sent a nutritionist in. They sent like a wellness person, which I think is somebody that failed out of psychology school. I don't know. But everyone's like, and then my mother-in-law and my wife are around the bed and everyone just

over and over again. For three days, I'm are around the bed and everyone just over and over again. For three days, I'm in the hospital. And over and over and over, you know, you really have to take it easy. You really have to make some changes. And you really have to, like, your lifestyle has to adjust. And you have to take time. And you have to, like, calm down. To which I said, absolutely fucking not.

Absolutely not. I will not stop fucking not. Absolutely not. I will not stop. I will not relent. There is absolutely no way that I'm going to every day wake up in an industry that's got, I don't know, $60 trillion in investable assets, almost all of it invested incorrectly, filled with insurance brokers pretending to be financial advisors, hedge fund managers pretending to mitigate risk

and conflating volatility with risk, people running mutual funds that cost 170 basis points who can't beat an index if they knew the answers to the test the week before. This is the industry that we're in. All of the money, all of the money is invested incorrectly. All of it. And every day we come in and we make a little dent in that. We fix it. We fix it. We have a conversation with somebody who's been told the wrong thing or has been sold a portfolio that doesn't really work for them or has been allocated without any kind of goals or any kind of objectives for their financial plan or whatever the case may be. Every day, we put a little dent in that. We save one account at a time. We save one client at a time. We need to be doing more. We need to be doing it

bigger, okay? So I come out of the hospital thinking that way, and it's not a matter of, yeah, let me end right back up where I was. It's more a matter of, okay, I have to personally work smarter in order to help the firm fulfill its goal, but the goal is not going to be delayed. The goal is not going to be put off, not even for a minute. And it's really, really important that we understand what this opportunity is and how important it is for us to fulfill it. The last thing I want to say on this topic is that by working smarter on my end and supporting everyone in what they do and having you guys support me in what I do, that's the only way this is going to happen. support me in what I do. That's the only way this is going to happen. So it was very childish of me to think in terms of let me run the ball over the goal line for the firm, especially given the fact that I'm not even talking with inbound prospects on call one, on call two. That is the work that you guys are doing. My role is not to run the ball over the goal line. My role is to support everyone's endeavors here. That's really the way I want to start thinking about what I do here.

And I think everyone's got that opportunity when they have a reset like I just did to think about what they're really supposed to be doing, how they're supposed to be spending their time. So I come out last Wednesday. Within two days, I'm back on television. I still have the Band-Aid glue from where they put all the needles in my arms. I still have like the bandage glue all over me and within five minutes on my show, I have to decapitate somebody. The market is down 400 points. I'm just – I'm collecting people's heads because that's what I do. That's what I do. And how many inquiries did the firm get within an hour of the show ending?

What's the number? Because this is an audio medium. I don't know. There's no camera on you. Five. Five, Chris. Thank you. Within 45 minutes. Okay. There should be five every time. Look, guys, here's the deal. Here's the ultimate irony of the whole thing. I get a Slack message as I'm coming off the morphine drip. I open up my phone. I get a Slack message from Chris and it's an updated Form ADV filing. And guess what number finally appears on our Form ADV as I'm recovering from my mishap? What's the number?

One billion. One billion. Is it one billion even? One billion and change. Okay. All right One billion. One billion. Is it one billion even? One billion and change. Okay. All right. 1.03 billion. 1.03 billion? No.

Is it close? No, the price is close. No, we're low. Yeah. I don't know how Apple's doing. Carry the one. Look, guys, we are now a billion dollar under management registered investment advisory. Okay? Give that a round.

And I told, and I told everyone we were going to do it. I told you all, and you all knew. That's why you're here. No one's here because you thought we'd do less. New goal is 5 billion. It's not two, it's not 1.5. And it's not, let's just do whatever it takes to get there the wrong way. It's what we've been doing. We're going to keep doing it. Treating people the right way, telling clients the truth, speaking at conferences about things that we're passionate about, speaking on podcasts, going on radio shows, going on television, writing our blog posts, sending out our emails, curating content over and over and over again. And then when we get those conversations with

people that are interested in learning more, we are going to crush it for these people. We are going to bring a sense of certainty to a realm where literally everything is uncertain. And we are going to show these people that they're going to be fine. And we're not just going to tell them that. We're going to demonstrate with data, with Michael's research, with Ben's work, with Barry's work, the investment committee's work. We are going to demonstrate to them that there is, that there are answers to the questions that have been bothering them

and keeping them up at night, and we are going to convert. We are going to convert. We are going to bring in every qualified person that should be a client, is going to become a client. And not just a client, but a happy, referring client. That's what we're going to do. And that's how we're going to get the $5 billion. So give yourselves one more round of applause. Let's rock and roll this week. Thank you very much for all your work. Really appreciate it.