Wealth Formula Podcast

The financial meltdown of 2008-2009 feels like ancient history. And like tragedies that happened long ago, it feel more historical and less emotional. I remember going to Pompeii several years ago and seeing people turned to stone from Mount Vesuvius erupting. It must have been horrific. But time has made it more of a museum than the scene of an awful natural disaster. That's the way most people l...

I'm not a doom and gloom podcaster as a general rule. There are plenty of those out there predicting the zombie apocalypse. However, I have to say that I'm pretty sure I've been seeing some questionable zombiesque characters running around town lately. It has occurred to me, however, that most people are not seeing what I am seeing. After all, the job markets are humming along just great and infla...

My portfolio is not what most would call diversified. I am about 70-80 percent real estate, 10-15 percent permanent life insurance and about 10-15 percent higher risk stuff. My only stock exposure is only high-risk stuff like mining companies on the Toronto Stock Exchange. To be clear, I am not advocating for this approach. That's just what has worked for me up to this point in my life. I should a...

Last week I talked about asymmetric investing and gave you an example of one of my own higher risk bets—Hedera with its HBAR Token. Right now, that cryptocurrency market is still sleepy. So, if you are motivated to do so, you could easily find a few tokens that are 10 percent or less of what they cost in the frothy market of two years ago and grab them. Of course, you would want to make sure those...

Last week I did a back-to-school episode for you on asymmetric risk. I told you that my primary asymmetric risk related investments are in cryptocurrency. As a reminder, asymmetric risk investing means you throw in some money that, if you lose it, isn't going to kill you. But on the other hand, if things go well, could make you rich. Cryptocurrency has done both for a lot of people. In fact, in ma...

So far in our back-to-school series, we have covered asset protection, estate planning and my capital allocation strategy. Wouldn't it be great if you could hit all these important concepts with a single investment? Well, as it turns out, you sort of can. Let me back up and tell you a story. When I was fresh out of surgical residency and started to make some money, I started looking for advice on...

Asset Allocation Diversification and Leverage Permanent Life Insurance and the Wealth Accelerator Multi-Family Real Estate Asymmetric Investing: Taking a Risk How to Avoid Single-Point of Failure?

Zulfe Ali is a broker dealer and investment advisor—but not your run-of-the-mill type in this field. He's been in the middle of the action on Wall Street as a mergers and acquisitions guy for JP Morgan and Bank of America in the 90s and ran a multibillion-dollar sovereign wealth fund for over a decade. I've seen photos of him with world leaders like former UK Prime Minister Tony Blair and others a...

Return to Personal Finance: Estate Planning Do You Need a Will? Is the Estate Tax Stupid? Avoiding the Estate Tax

Those of you who have been listening to me for a while know that I am not really a precious metals guy. I know the arguments and I respect them. Gold has held its price over an unprecedented amount of time. An ounce of gold got a guy a nice toga and sandals in Roman times and today it will get you a nice suit and a pair of shoes. In that regard, gold has been the ultimate hedge if you are looking...

I live in Montecito, CA. It's a small beach town of about 5 thousand people at the southernmost part of Santa Barbara. I moved here from Chicago in 2017 and started living here as a renter. One thing I learned over the years is that whenever I move to a new area, I always end up finding a part of town I like better so it's best not to buy right away. There was also quite a bit of sticker shock whe...

I don't know about you but my kids are about to head back to school. In this spirit of that, I thought it might be nice for us to get back to basics as well. For the next few weeks, I will be releasing at least one podcast that involves the basics of personal finance in addition to whatever else may be on the docket. This week's back-to-school episode is about asset protection and my guest is Doug...

I have a medical degree and am a former board-certified surgeon. Yet that is not my identity. My identity is that of an entrepreneur and investor. This is an identify for which I did not go to school. Without trying to sound dramatic, I was born this way. I think it's a genetic thing. You see my dad came to this country in the late 1960s and trained as an engineer. He eventually got caught doing r...

It turns out that the conversation about getting out of fossil fuels and into green energy is a lot more complicated than just energy. Of course "black gold" has literally fueled our society into its wealthiest state since the beginning of man. No one argues that. But there is a clear movement globally to try and move to clean energy for the sake of the environment. Beyond energy, however, oil pla...

It has been a tough year for real investors. Inflation and interest rates have created distress and uncertainty. But let me remind you of a few things. Investing isn't for the faint-hearted. EVERYONE loses at some point. The idea that you can always win is a fallacy. Of course everyone would agree with that statement rationally. However, our brains are not wired to think rationally in stressful ti...

I was in high school when the Berlin Wall came down. The ensuing decade was really like no other I have experienced in my life. It was the 1990s. There was no more cold war. Decades of fear of nuclear annihilation vanished into thin air. And 9/11 had not yet happened so we did not yet know the new world of terrorism. It could be that I was young and stupid but life seemed good. The news of the day...

Shownotes: 0:00:00 - Advancements in Cancer Detection Technology 0:00:35 - GRAIL Galleri test 0:02:11 - About Dr. Josh Ofman 0:05:14 - Cancer really is a disease of the genome 0:12:35 - Various guidelines for early detection of certain cancers 0:16:45 - Cancer Detection in Blood Biology 0:19:03 - Cell-Free DNA 0:23:38 - How many cancers is the GRAIL Galleri test able to detect?

Why is financial education not part of our school system? To understand that, you have to understand where our school system came from. Our educational system started during the industrial revolution and was influenced heavily by the Prussian system. What do you think of when you hear "industrial revolution?" I think of factories and conveyor belts. This was a time of massive production gains in t...

This week's podcast is about energy. But before we do that I want to comment on a few things about our investing ecosystem. A decade ago when I first started playing around with this podcast concept I was very excited about a whole new world of investing that I was learning about. Why invest in the stock market if you could invest in real estate, oil and gas and other businesses that seemingly mad...

What a crazy ride it's been. Despite Covid, plunging interest rates actually made home prices explode to new highs. In my own neighborhood, housing prices doubled. Then it started to look like the housing bubble had started to burst. There were mortgage companies in distress and laid off thousands. Economists warned the next housing recession was upon us. It all made sense. How could such a wild r...

Last week I called the economy schizophrenic. Actually, that's an insult to schizophrenics. This is simply a dysfunctional economy. It's the product of a good idea called capitalism with excessive intervention—namely by the Federal Reserve Bank of the United States. Today's economy reminds me a little bit of the movie, Jurassic Park. Altering the natural order of things has unexpected consequences...

I am annoyed with this economy. That doesn't seem like a very professional thing to say but I don't know how else to express my feelings any better. You see, nothing really makes sense. Inflation has been as high as it has been since the 1980s. At first, the Fed didn't think it was real and then reacted by increasing interest rates at the fastest rate in American history. Businesses are feeling it...

There is a significant amount of distress in the investor world right now. With inflation and interest rates climbing quickly, it has left the equity and real estate markets in shambles. We will get through this. And while I encourage you to fight against the fear of investing so that you can take advantage of oncoming blood in the streets, I understand if you are reluctant. We've had tough times...