The Compound and Friends - The Most Invincible Career Path in Finance

Episode Date: June 22, 2026

On this episode of Live From The Compound, Josh Brown sits down with Ric Edelman, founder of Edelman Financial Engines to discuss the future of higher education, why financial planning may be one of the most AI-resistant professions, and the growing advisor shortage facing the industry. With 300,000 financial advisors in the U.S. and 38% expected to retire within the next decade, he explains why he's investing in the next generation through Rowan University's new School of Financial Planning. Plus, Ric shares his latest thoughts on crypto, institutional adoption, regulation, and why he's staying bullish despite a challenging 2026 for digital assets. This episode is sponsored by Betterment Advisor Solutions. Learn more at ⁠https://betterment.com/advisors.⁠ Sign up for ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠The Compound Newsletter⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ and never miss out! Instagram: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://instagram.com/thecompoundnews⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Twitter: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://twitter.com/thecompoundnews⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ LinkedIn: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.linkedin.com/company/the-compound-media/⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ TikTok: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.tiktok.com/@thecompoundnews⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Investing involves the risk of loss. This podcast is for informational purposes only and should not be or regarded as personalized investment advice or relied upon for investment decisions. Michael Batnick and Josh Brown are employees of Ritholtz Wealth Management and may maintain positions in the securities discussed in this video. All opinions expressed by them are solely their own opinion and do not reflect the opinion of Ritholtz Wealth Management. The Compound Media, Incorporated, an affiliate of ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Ritholtz Wealth Management⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠, receives payment from various entities for advertisements in affiliated podcasts, blogs and emails. Inclusion of such advertisements does not constitute or imply endorsement, sponsorship or recommendation thereof, or any affiliation therewith, by the Content Creator or by Ritholtz Wealth Management or any of its employees. For additional advertisement disclaimers see here ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://ritholtzwealth.com/advertising-disclaimers⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. Investments in securities involve the risk of loss. Any mention of a particular security and related performance data is not a recommendation to buy or sell that security. The information provided on this website (including any information that may be accessed through this website) is not directed at any investor or category of investors and is provided solely as general information. Obviously nothing on this channel should be considered as personalized financial advice or a solicitation to buy or sell any securities. See our disclosures here: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://ritholtzwealth.com/podcast-youtube-disclosures/⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Today's show is brought to you by Betterment. What growth strategy are leading RIAs using that most firms don't? Segmentation. Some clients' needs are sophisticated and require deep, ongoing planning. Some clients' needs are simple, like those in the wealth accumulation stage. The smartest firms know, planning shouldn't look the same for every client, but the experience should always be exceptional. Now it can be with Betterment Advisor Solutions.

It's the platform built. for segmenting your book and streamlining those smaller and simpler accounts. The onboarding experience is automated and paperless. The portfolio management is streamlined and tax efficient. The client experience is consistent and modern. And the impact isn't just felt by your clients. It's felt across your entire practice. Imagine a back office that's humming, a team that's thriving,

and a service model ready to scale. Betterment advisor solutions. Your biggest regret will be not doing it sooner. Learn more at betterment.com slash advisors. What is the future of college? Why is financial planning almost impervious to AI? And what the hell is going on in crypto? We are going to cover a lot of ground today.

My friend Rick Edelman is back. Rick is one of my favorite repeat guests here on the show. He is the founder of Edelman Financial Engines, managing roughly $300 billion, for over 1.3 million clients. Rick stepped back from day-to-day leadership at the firm and is now serving as a strategic advisor and board member. Rick has written 13 personal finance books and is an outspoken advocate of crypto and investing in exponential technologies. Rick, thank you so much for coming by. Great to be with you as always, Josh. You like New York? I love New York. I have an

apartment here in this city. I'm here as often as possible. How often do you come in a given year? Oh, at least once a month. Okay. And for anywhere from several days to a couple of weeks. Okay. Well, we're thrilled to have you here in New York. You're here at a high point for the city. For sure.

I'm sure you watch the parades. Yeah. Okay. People are feeling pretty good about New York right now. And glad to see it. All right. I want to talk to you about the future of college. You have a new book.

Is it out today? It came out in December. It debuted at number one on Amazon. Number 14, by the way. I haven't read it yet, but I've read a bunch of your books. Why should I read this one? You need to read it as an advisor because you have clients who have children of college-headed age. They're teens or tweens or you're a grandparent of such kids.

And we need to reevaluate the entire college question, which no college book on the market does, which is why I wrote mine. Okay. What is it called? The truth about college. Okay. What is the truth about college in 2026? It is that we parents, grandparents, are viewing college incorrectly. The motive in American society is to get your kids into college.

And every book, every tutor, every high school guidance counselor, every parent is all focused on how to get the kid in, how to choose the right school, how to pay for it, how to prep for the SAT, how to prepare the application. Describing my life over the last three years. It's all designed about college. High school guidance counselors are often evaluated on how many high school seniors go to college. So there isn't an idea of any other course, of any other path. And yet what we need to recognize is that for today's environment, college is not the way it was when you and I went or when

our parents went. Today, college is broken, meaning the fundamental assumption that kids ought to go is fundamentally flawed. And I've got the statistics to prove it. 24% of college freshmen drop out. less than 60% graduate within six years. And 10 years after graduating, less than half are working in a job that required their degree. In fact, most are in a job that didn't require any degree. And yet the average cost of a school today is facing a quarter of a million dollars. The average undergrad graduates with 30,000 in student debt. It is severely interfering with their ability to buy a home, buy a car, live independently, get married, have children.

We're seeing declines and delays in all those statistics. And here's the worst one of all. 50% of today's college students have been clinically diagnosed with depression. Can I argue with you on all this stuff? Absolutely. Okay. My household is singularly focused on getting both of my kids into a school and not just any school, but a big school or a good school. and a lot of the reason why is the social opportunities that are created.

Yes. I want my kids with other kids who have worked hard. Yes. And didn't just wake up and happen to be in an institution, but really had to fight to get in there. I think there's character that's built as part of that process. And I think there's a certain level of kids that I want my kids to associate with because it'll put them in a better position to begin their adult life. No argument. If I were to take your stats and then redo them for the types of schools that I want my kids to be at, would the outcomes change?

No, that's the crazy thing, is that even if you send your kids to the elites, to the Ivy League, et cetera. We're not a big 10 schools or SEC schools. You're going to still find those statistics. In other words, I'll give you two answers to this, Josh, because you're raising a really valid point. Number one is this, and you'll resonate with this a whole lot. an average kid who goes to a great school will have an average life. A great kid who goes to an average school will have a great life. In other words, it's more about the kid than the school.

The second element is... Do you create above average kids by putting that goal in front of them when they were in ninth grade? No, not necessarily. No, we know it from the statistics. 85% of incoming freshmen are undeclared undecided. And this is why over 80% change their majors and 60% change school. because what the parents and they thought was the right place to go, the kid discovers in their second or third year,

this place isn't right for me. It doesn't meet who I am or what I am. Not at a cost that- Is that a kid finding themselves? It's perfectly fine. For you, Josh, your family, the wealth you have, sure, it doesn't matter in that sense. But for the average student who is massing massive amounts of debt

and recognize that whenever you change majors, you end up having to take extra credits because the old credits don't qualify. or if you change schools, the new school rejects 43% of the credits from the old school, which means you have to go to years five and six at more expense, more time. So for most Americans who are challenged financially, this is a path toward a problem. And therefore, here's the conclusion. While I painted a statistical picture of really bad issues, the real message is this. For most kids, you're right, college remains the best path.

I'm not trying to say no to college, and my book is not anti-college. My premise is this. If you do it correctly, college is the greatest choice. The problem is too many parents are allowing too many children to go about it incorrectly. They're going to the wrong school. They're choosing the wrong major. They're going about it in the wrong way, amassing too much debt, and emerging unprepared for today's workforce.

So the book has a simple premise to teach the kid how to graduate in four years, debt-free, on the dean's list with a degree ready for them to enter a field they love. So somebody buying this book will get that roadmap from you. How do I achieve an actual college education that matters? Yes, and it shows you how to minimize the cost of college to avoid going to debt, how to choose the right major, how to determine if college is right for your kid right now, and alternatives if not, such as the vocations or a gazillion other options that frankly didn't exist very much when you and I were in college.

So it's basically a simple point of saying to the parent, it's different than it was when we were in school. And we can't assume that your child's experience will match yours because the environment is different. One of the things that's funny about the fact that it's different, it seems as though the schools that are the biggest are getting the highest amount of applications now. Yeah. And a lot of that is sort of like the polarity is shifting.

things south, at least where we're from. Kids from the Northeast are increasingly choosing schools like Alabama, Clemson, University of Georgia, Tulane. These schools always got kids from New England and the New York metro area, but now I think they're getting a lot more. I don't know what that's about. And then I contrast that with Syracuse, which says it's not going to hit any of its goals in applications this year or in enrollment this year. I've always thought of Syracuse as being on roughly the same tier as a Tulane, but there's a difference in preference. Why does that difference in preference exist?

Is it about the weather? Is the thing that I keep hearing? Is it about post-COVID, just different lifestyle choices? Is it the Instagram effect? People seeing much better visuals for a Southern school than a school that's in upstate New York, or is it some combination of all these things? It's no doubt it's some combination. I'll add another factor in that's sports.

Kids want to go to a school that has a great sports program. They always did, but more now? Yes, I think so. And for all the reasons you cited, and yet we have to recognize that the cost of going to that school, especially out of state, the tuition is so much higher, that half of parents today and half of high school seniors today say college is simply not worth the cost.

Okay. What do you make then of the statistic that people will show where it's sort of like two lines and they diverge of income throughout your lifetime, people with a college degree versus people without. How do you explain that? These are some of the big advantages and the reasons for going to college. College graduates earn on average a million dollars over their lifetime more than non-grads. College grads are more likely to have stable marriages.

They're less than half as likely to divorce. They live longer lives. They live healthier lives. they live happier lives. They have greater support and involvement in their communities. Their children grow up better because they're living in better neighborhoods. They're living in safer neighborhoods. The children are generally involved in a two-parent household as opposed to one. And we have seen lots of studies showing the advantages to children of that. So there are tremendous advantages for going to college and graduating with a degree. The challenge is

that today, it's not so much getting into college. That's increasingly easy because enrollment is down nationally by about 15% compared to 10 years ago. So schools are accepting far more students than ever. It's easier and ever to get in, but it's harder than ever to stay in and graduate. And that's the point of the book. It's not a question of going to college. It's a question of graduating from college. Okay.

Which is the point. Right. Okay. You said, you had a fireside chat and you told students that institutions should have a fiduciary obligation to their students, but they don't. Right. So that's a pretty damning thing to say when you're speaking at a school that you yourself are help, which we're going to get to in a minute, you yourself are endowing. But like, what do you mean by that?

Is that a general thing for every school that they should consider adopting some sort of. They should. I think they feel it. No, they don't. You don't really don't think so. Absolutely not. Business schools seem to be very obsessed with showing potential applicants. This is what percentage of our students.

end up in a career. I feel like they look at that as a point of pride. They play the same game that mutual funds play with survivor bias. They're not showing you how many dropped out. They're showing you of the graduates. Here's what the percentage of graduates are working in that field. That's a huge distinction. Colleges are, I hate to put it this way, but they're nothing more than car salesmen.

Their goal is to maximize sales and revenues. And without regard as to whether this vehicle is in the best interest of that buyer, and whether or not they're getting the best price. Colleges are in the business of attracting students. They're going to do whatever it takes to do so, such as building lazy rivers, seven schools in this country, now offer one. They're going to have... I mean, you would like a lazy river if you were at school.

If I were 17, I would go for it. But, come on, you know, this is junk food and heroin for a 17-year-old. So we need to recognize that they're doing whatever it takes to admit students. They frankly shouldn't admit. How else do you acknowledge 24%? out. At some schools, they have food banks on campus because the students are food insecure. They can't even afford food. But if you can't afford food, what on earth are you doing there? So they've got to do a better job of evaluating, are you right for this campus? Why are so many

schools offering remedial classes in English and math? Isn't that a way of saying you're not ready to be here? Yeah. And that's kind of the problem. So they're happy to accept you. And then there's the cartel issue where so many schools will say, oh, we're going to charge you in. in-state student rate, if you're a state school, and we'll charge you a higher out-of-state rate, well, guess what? They're going to go after the out-of-state student where they get higher tuition revenue. So all we end up having are students going to different states because they can't get admitted into their home state, forcing all these students to spend more than the otherwise should because of the game the schools are playing to maximize their tuition revenue.

Florida seems to be going the other way. They have, the schools have become a luxury item within Florida. They cost a lot, but they are also very focused on taking the top students and not having that brain drain and having those kids necessarily run up to the Ivy League. And we're also seeing- And I'll give you another example. You're absolutely right. A lot of schools are now offering free tuition and some of the elites, Brown, Harvard, Yale, MIT, and others, if you're earning under $100,000 a year, tuition room and border free under $200,000 a year for the family, tuition is free. This is all wonderful.

And it's another illustration that over the next 20 years, college will probably be free for everybody everywhere, just like K through 12 is. You think that's where this is going? Yes, no question. Okay. Where will we see that first away from Ivy League? We'll see that with state schools?

Yes, state schools, and we're already seeing this. Community colleges in almost every state are free right now. So your kid can get the associate's degree for the first two years, guaranteed transferability into the four-year state college or university. Why will it go that way? Who, in whose interest is, is that taxpayers will decide they want to fund this? The taxpayers are already saying this. I'll change the word.

The voters are already saying this. Mom and dad know how incredibly expensive college is they can't afford it. And they're demanding that their state legislatures make college more affordable, translation free. And partly because schools of many of them have abundant endowments, others have resources from other methodologies, that they are playing the game, again, attracting students by offering free or low-cost or subsidized expenses. Okay, tell us about Rowan University and what you're doing there. We announced a couple of months ago the creation of the School of Financial Planning. I'm going to be...

Where is Roan? Tell people what the school is. Rowan University is a state university in New Jersey. It's about 30 minutes outside of Philly, two hours from here in New York. And they're an R2 university. There'll be R1 next year, a leading research institute. They're one of the only schools in the country to have three medical schools. It's an astonishing institution. I went to Rowan, and that's where I met my wife, Jean.

She's on the board of trustees. We've been heavily involved there for a very long time, and we just created the School of Financial Planning. As founding head, I'll be involved in creating the curriculum and hiring the faculty. Our goal is to produce 500 CFPs a year once we get fully up and running. We're going to offer a minor, a major, and a master's degree. also an online program. And the fundamental reason that I chose to do this is because we have a big problem in our country. Last year, business schools around the U.S., 1,500 of them, graduated over

a quarter million business, finance, marketing, and accounting majors. Less than 200 schools offer a financial planning degree, and they produce less than 4,000 financial planners. Let's face it, what do we really need more of? Marketing guys or financial planners? What are the biggest schools with financial planning programs that you can think of. Oh, Texas Tech and Kansas have two of the best programs in the country. There are lots of good ones, but not enough. We're producing far too few financial advisors relative to the need. We're all familiar with the McKinsey study that says 100,000 going to quit over the next 10 years.

Okay. Let's dive in on that. So McKinsey says we're going to be short, 100,000 financial planners. We have 1,500 schools offering business degrees, fewer than 200 offer financial planning. Why does that imbalance exist? For the simple reason that most people are unaware of the existence of the financial planning profession. Students have no clue at age 18 that you can go into financial planning. They've certainly heard of Wall Street. They know about brokerage and investment banking.

They love to go in that direction. Everybody's familiar with accounting and finance and marketing. Their parents are unfamiliar with this. This is the first gen. It didn't exist when you and I were kids. I agree with that. So I spoke to somebody at the University of Ohio. They now have a financial planning program. It's under the home economics major. That's exactly the problem. It's not in the school. It's not in the business school.

That's right. So I guess they were doing personal finance that then became financial planning. Yeah, they treated it like home. It's home. Yeah. Let's balance a checkbook. So a business school kid at Ohio State, which is a great school, does not have entree to financial planning as a profession unless they switch. out of business.

Right. And it's pejorative too. It's bizarre. People think, you know, kids think, oh, you're talking about selling insurance and selling stocks and bonds. I don't want to be a salesman. They don't understand the fiduciary nature of what we do, how we improve people's lives. They have no clue because their parents, very likely, don't have a financial planner.

Many parents themselves aren't doing very well with money. They're financially illiterate as adults. Kids are growing up financially illiterate because K through 12 doesn't teach them anything about this. and they have no idea what the rewarding nature of our profession is. And that's a big reason why kids aren't choosing it as a choice, partly because most schools don't offer it, even when they do, as you pointed out, it's not in the business school.

So we're doing it in the business school, the business college at Rowan University, where kids can not only major in it, they can choose to minor. So go ahead, stick with your sociology or philosophy or history major, minor in financial planning. And now you can do it as an online course. You're a career changer in your 40s and 50s. Now anywhere in the country, you can get this program online. And we're also going to be creating a couple of dozen certification programs.

You don't want a full-blown career and financial planning. Here's a certificate in tax planning or estate planning or retirement planning or college planning. To allow students and people in the workforce to add this as a new career path as their current careers are being threatened by AI. So one thing that I've noticed recently is kids are saying wealth management. When you add, so my, my daughter's 20, my son is 17. So I'm right in the thick of this. And I know all the parents of the kids and it's constant like up until the last year, I think when I asked people like kids, what do you want to, I'm studying business.

What do you want to do? Private equity. What is private equity? I have no idea. But everyone I know that works in private equity has a sick car. That's like literally the decision process. Yes. Okay. I'm hearing wealth now more and more. And I don't know if that's because private equity stopped hiring, but I am hearing kids talk about going into wealth. They don't say financial planning. Right. They say I'm going into wealth management. And they still don't know what that is. And they want to go to Morgan Stanley or Goldman Sachs. They have no idea that the most powerful people in wealth management are financial planners. Right. Because they own the client. Right. They own the client's allocation decisions. So they go into wealth.

you might become a wholesaler selling to wealth. And I don't know if that's what you would have intended if you understood. And they don't understand which is this issue. The high school guidance counselors have no clue about this either. So they're just less likely to recommend it as a career path. And so our real mission first at Rowan University will begin with New Jersey, since it's a state school, of going to the high schools around the state to let these kids know of the career option. This exists and it's a great career.

Right. And it's in demand. And our next step will be to take. take this, put it in a bottle, and make it available to colleges, universities across the country. We're just going to replicate this on a national scale. So fast forward, four years from now, the first class of School of Financial Planning at Rowan graduate. Where do you envision, obviously everyone is different, but where do you envision a lot of them

ending up in their first job? Is it answering phones at Schwab Vanguard Fidelity? Is it finding a local RIA near where they live that's like willing to mentor a 22-year-old, which most firms are not? You know this. Or is it some other way of getting it? Because it's really hard to understand the career path for a lot of people. And because of that, you're absolutely right, Josh. And because of that, it is really important that we establish the effective career path for these kids.

And this is why Edelman Financial Engines has funded this program with a $10 million gift. and is going to be creating internship opportunities and career opportunities for these kids using its national stature with 175 offices around the country. There aren't that many firms that have the size and scale to take a meaningful number of advisor trainees. Right. You know, Morgan Stanley and Merrill Lynch, they will still do that. But on the RIA side, what do you have, 10 RIAs of the wherewithal to not just big RIAs, but, RAs that actually have something to teach. And that's why our big focus, Edelman Financial is very heavily behind this, going to create these opportunities for these kids, not just in the Delaware

Valley area, but on a national basis. And broadening this to other RAAs around the country, because our ultimate goal is to produce 500 CFP-ready graduates a year. And we're going to be trying to infuse this on a national scale and encouraging other schools around the country to replicate this model. We're going to give it to them in a box. so that they can very easily create this without having to reinvent it. Can you tell the audience why you think financial planning is one of the more impervious professions in the age of AI? Why do you think of it that way?

It's because at the end of the day, as we all know as advisors in this business, it's about the human relationship. Although we do know that AI will eventually be able to provide EQ, and some people are already getting therapy from online chatbots, we know that it's. It's the human connection. If you have a personal relationship with someone, you're going to want to maintain and sustain that. And this is something that will be, I will phrase it as last man standing, that by the time AI does that, every other job will have already gone by the wayside. So I don't know when it'll occur, if ever, but it'll be a very long time from now.

Creating the job stability and career opportunity in this profession that simply doesn't exist elsewhere. Accounting will be history decades before the financial planning industry is. I have this, so I have this vision that I share with my financial planners here at the firm. I'm curious what you think about it. I sort of think of them as luxury goods, luxury items or luxury. To the extent that AI is going to be at the forefront of our interactions, everyone's interactions all day long, the moment that you actually get the attention. of a human being will actually be special. And having the attention of a human being that really knows you well and whose guidance you trust, that will feel like your luxury for that day.

Whereas every other interaction just boils down to a transaction, I need this, you give me this. Thank you. I'll take it. Goodbye. So I'm trying to sort of like instill in my financial planners, time spent with you is a luxury. Wealthy people will pay for that luxury.

and it will stand out in a sea of interactions they have with chatbots and software programs. And it'll be even more meaningful in five years than it is today, if you can imagine that. What do you think of that heuristic? I completely agree. It's going to be the advisors using AI to augment what is they do behind the curtain. The client isn't going to care. They don't care. Clients already know you're using tech software.

They don't care. What they want is from you is not only the relationship, development, but also the analysis of how does all this noise, how does all this information, all this data apply to me in my life? And let's remember that the overwhelming majority of people in this country all around the world don't care about money. They don't like the subject of money. They're intimidated by the subject. They're busy doing other things. They have preferences in other areas. They don't want to have to go to a chatbot to get answers. They don't want to go online to ask questions. They want it handed to them. And that's what you is the personal

human advisor can do, saying, I got this. Don't worry. about it. 20 years ago, the percentage of the population that was a, considered themselves a self-directed investor, it's about 30%. And today? 30%. Exactly. So the 30% of self-directed investors who are ruggedly independent, they want to do everything themselves, they're going to have better tools than ever. That doesn't mean anything about the other two-thirds. Right. That weren't self-directed last year, the year before, the year before that, and probably won't be. It seems like it's in this stasis. I don't think that chatbots are going to be the thing that takes 30% to 50%. Remember when everybody was fearful that Wealthfront and Betterment were going to put us all out of business?

Well, you and I laughed at that in real time. Exactly. And today they have CFPs on staff, you know, humans. And so it's the same kind of thing. They're launching referral networks to human advisors. So that's the robo revolution. It's that old, it's not becoming a cliche. AI won't put you out of business.

It's the advisor using AI who will. And we need to recognize. that you're what you do, how you do it will shift, but what matters, what cannot be replaced is that human dynamic, that human connection. All right. So you and I, you and I agree on that. I want to, uh, I can't let you escape here without talking about crypto winter three, or five or what, eight, I don't know.

What number crypto winter is this that we're in right now? Depends how you count. 50% drawdowns were better. I think this is number six. Okay. So you wrote an update. How do I describe your involvement in crypto? You're a proponent, you're an advocate, you're involved in the Digital Assets Foundation.

Predominantly, I'm an educator. The Digital Assets Council of Financial Professionals, DACFP, you've keynoted at our annual conference. It is a crypto education company. We don't manage money. We aren't serving clients. We aren't pitching product. We're just teaching advisors in their firms. What is it?

Do you have to change the size of the venue each year for that event based on the price of Bitcoin? No, shockingly, this year we just held our event annually two weeks ago. We had a 60% increase, even though Bitcoin is down 50%. So it's a biggest audience. That is surprising. I think it's because advisors are now realizing it ain't going away. More and more clients own it, more and more are asking about it. And advisors are behind.

They're racing to catch up in their knowledge. Okay. So you did a mid-year update. You said first half of 2026 has been brutal for digital asset. Yeah, we know. Not only is Bitcoin down, we saw a 10-day period where $4 billion was drained from the popular crypto ETFs. You cited the fear gauge being up 20%.

Michael Saylor sold Bitcoin for the first time since 2022, which there's a qualifier to that. But you just list all of these reasons for why we're in this bare market for Bitcoin. If you could just give people a sense of like, what's the big picture? here, why the drawdown, and whether or not you have any sort of sense of how far through this particular crypto win through we might be? The reason for the drawdown, it's the death of a thousand cuts. No single reason, but a couple of dozen minor ones that all add up to breaking the camel's back. And so we are still in the mess of this right now. And it's reflected in Bitcoin prices being down 50%. Gold held up. Bitcoin fell. But, but,

those two things were highly correlated last year. They were moving up together. For a while, they were. But if you look over 16 years, they did not correlate. And for most of Bitcoin's history, it has not correlated to anything else. It's been truly an independent asset. So here's the other one I wanted to ask you about. There was a period of time where Bitcoin and the NASDAQ were very highly correlated because Bitcoin was seen as sort of like it's not a company in a traditional sense, but it was seen as a technology play. Correct. That linkage has also broken. Bitcoin is down with software, which I'm not sure if there's any linkage there.

But semiconductors have obviously doubled in price over the last year, and Bitcoin's been cut in half. So that linkage seems to not be a thing that people are talking about anymore. And that's the challenge for everybody looking at this sector is trying to figure out what is it like. And it isn't like anything. It's like everything at any given moment in time. It's a camellium. It is. And we have SpaceX, OpenAI.

Anthropic, you know, all the shiny new toys that are capturing everybody's attention. A trillion dollars is flowing into that stuff that used to go into Bitcoin. So there's a lot of pricing pressure. There's also weakness on Capitol Hill regarding the Clarity Act. It was supposed to have been passed by now. It still isn't and debate about whether or not it will. If the Clarity Act doesn't pass, then people will consider that a negative sign. What is holding up the Clarity Act?

There are some crypto players who think it doesn't give them enough. ability to do things like, for example, pay a yield on a stable coin, et cetera, so it doesn't have full buy-in from the biggest players in crypto. And of course, the banks don't want crypto to become neo-banks. So it seems like everyone hates it for different reasons. You're correct. Brian Armstrong of Coinbase has opposed the bill. He's now changed his mind, but he opposed it originally because the bill wouldn't let stable coins earn yield. Brian wants it Stable coin holders earn yield. They want, yeah, they want stable coins to be able to pay yield, the way a money mark.

Exactly. Okay. And the bill doesn't allow that. Banks don't want it to because they see that as competition. So the crypto community and the banking community started fighting over it, forcing the bill into no-man's land. The question now becomes, will they get past their argument and allow the bill to pass? TBD, Polly Market says no. So we'll have-

market says no by the end of this year or no period they'll never get there by the end of this year they say no okay uh if trump loses control of congress in the midterms then the answer will probably be never so there's a lot of negativity you might have missed their window exactly had the most crypto friendly president ever and congress yet correct and congress and so they they're blowing their opportunity which is why there's such a push by the administration to pass the bill now and there's skepticism in the marketplace as to whether that will occur. All right. So you have new things people can invest in that are more exciting, like rockets and data centers.

Right. Okay. Now you have this political sort of, there was a lot of political certainty. Like, now all the domino is going to fall in our direction. Right. And then we ran into this banking thing and it's not happening. Correct. Okay.

And so all of that contributes to why Bitcoin prices are down. Explain the sailor, the sailor thing. Well, Michael Saylor, the biggest proponent of Bitcoin, has always said he would never sell. And then a couple of weeks ago, he did. He sold 32. For micro strategy, not personally. Correct. And strategy sold 32 Bitcoin after swearing they never would.

But of course, a week later, he bought over 1,500 Bitcoin. So why did he do that? You know, I'm trying to get them on the phone. And so... What are the stated reasons? Surely the company put something in a filing? They needed to create cash to pay the preferred dividend. Okay.

But it had nothing to do with their continuing acquisition of Bitcoin. coin as part of their long-term strategy. So two very separate issues, unrelated to each other, that simply occurred within a period of 10 days. So he wasn't trading it based on the price of it. Correct. It wasn't calling a top and selling 32. No. Because it was quote-unquote high. Correct. Because he still thinks they're going to a million dollars a coin or whatever he thinks. Correct. Okay. But people did react to this. They did because they were all going under the assumption. Michael will never sell. He did. And that question of their own, if they're questioning his conviction, question their own. Okay. So these are some of the headwinds that are going on at the moment.

And as a result, crypto prices generally are down significantly. So, right. But there's a flip side. Well, before we get to the flip side, it's not just Bitcoin, to your point. Correct. Ethereum looks terrible price wise. Correct. Solana. Some lot worse. Yes. These are in 75% drawdowns is. Okay. So they, I guess in a bull market, there's more divergence in a bare market. They all go down. Yes. Is that accurate? That's fair. Sort of reminds you the stock market. Yeah, very much so.

Their ownership assets, their risk assets. So what's the flip side? So the flip side is what's going on in the technological development and the institutional engagement is a story that people are not paying attention to. tokenization. Huge. tokenization of securities is coming. BlackRock, securitize, Franklin Templeton and others. Securitization, tokenization of cash with the stable coins.

tokenization of ETFs by BlackRock. State Street, Franklin Templeton, and others, we're seeing astonishing levels of development and engagement by institutional investors. Ninety-five percent of endowments and pension funds that currently don't own Bitcoin say they're going to allocate by the end of the year. And three out of four, 76 percent that already allocate say they're going to increase their allocations. So there is a huge ground swelling being built right now. They're all going through their due diligence process, their investment committee in board approval process, which takes, as you know, years.

As they complete that exercise, we're going to see astonishing levels of product. People have no idea that when the Bitcoin ETFs were established in 2024, there were nine of them. Today, there are nearly 200 crypto ETFs on the market. BlackRock just filed to release an income ETF that will pay a 15% yield. Goldman Sachs has launched its filing. Morgan Stanley, J.P. Morgan, they're all racing to add product to clients. client portfolios, Morgan Stanley wants their advisors to allocate 4% of client's assets to crypto.

So we are seeing a massive disconnect between the price of this stuff and what's happening underneath behind the curtain. I guess the financialization piece of the crypto story has never really been in doubt. Like people have, even in a bare market, people have been willing to trade it. We don't have to worry about that part. I think the thing for outside observers, even people that own a little, the skepticism, the hesitancy is,

all right, we're in year 17. What does this even? What is the point? We're still outside of you can invest in it, you can make money in it. We all understand that. People have made fortunes in crypto. But then what?

We're still waiting for the answer to then what? The tokenization sounds like it could be. That tokenization is, the future of crypto. Okay, so this will enable things that are illiquid or unable to be traded unless they're in large blocks to all of a sudden be atomized. I'll give you an example. A building, a sports team. Yeah. Okay. I'm with you on that. And we're going to start with the low-hanging fruit stocks. New York Stock Exchange and NASDAQ have already partnered with blockchain companies to securitize and tokenize equities. You're going to be able, before the end of next year,

you're going to be able to trade securities 24-7, 365, with T-plus-0 settlement at virtually no cost. Is there a universe in which that happens, and it does not mean anything positive for the price of crypto? Or if that really becomes widespread, the price of some sort of crypto has to go up. It all skyrockets because the tokenization by definition means you're doing this on chain. You're doing it on a blockchain. So more capital has to come on chain, which means the prices of the coins themselves has to go up. Because when you engage in the transaction on the Ethereum network or the Solana network

or Polygon or Algarand, you're paying processing fees. They might be fractions of a penny like Solana, but when you do trillions of transactions, those fractions of a penny add up. Robin Hood announced the tokenization of some venture-backed non-public startups, and the companies didn't like it. and I think they might have even gotten some cease and desists. And they sort of backed away. They made a really big blustery announcement.

And then I don't want to say they backpedaled, but immediately it sort of went quiet. Would public companies look at something like this and say, yes, we want ours. The securities we issue, we're okay with them being traded in some other format, even though those aren't the securities that we issued. But that's the key point.

Okay. In other words, the pushback against Robin Hood was that Robin Hood was creating a synthetic token. Right. Companies had nothing to do with it. Exactly. It wasn't the actual stock. And the company had nothing to do with it. They didn't approve of it.

And it was trading as a mirror, as a replica. That's not what the NYSE and NASDAQ can do. They want to tokenize the actual security ownership itself. Exactly. So the companies love it because it's literally their security with greater liquidity and access on a global scale. What's not to love? Okay.

All right, got it. Anything else on crypto, or you think we haven't covered? I think you've got. All right. Rick, it's been such a pleasure hanging with you. I always learned so much. So I want to remind people the name of the book is... The truth about crypto and the truth about college.

The truth about crypto. You're like the... Is that your... Yeah, I've got the truth about money, the truth about retirement plans and IRAs, and now these. All right. It's been such a pleasure hanging with you. Thank you so much for coming by. Rick Adelman, ladies and gentlemen, thank you for watching. Thank you for listening.

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