America’s $37 Trillion Financial Reset Just Started - Do This Now! | Andrei Jikh

I think it's true that now more than ever there's more economic opportunity to make money. Do you think that Bitcoin's price is manipulated right now? Probably just because you see these insane swings. Well, in 2025, there's another war for the soul of Bitcoin. There's a fight between two groups of people. One that's trying to say, is Bitcoin money or is it a store of information? There's a lot of nuance to this debate, but in the end, I think this will determine the future of Bitcoin. What would you say is the best investing advice you've ever heard? >> I think like the most important investing quality of people that I've seen that have built wealth is like their ability to delay gratification. You eventually realize that the quickest way to being financially free isn't necessarily by building a bigger portfolio, but knowing what's going to happen next. Are you bullish or bearish for the US economy? I think in the next few weeks there's going to be a huge wealth transfer. >> Graham Stefen Andre Jick, thank you so much for coming on the iced coffee hour. Really appreciate it. >> Thank you for having me. Vegas Graham here. I try to copy all your content. Thank you. >> Huge fan of your channel, by the way. >> Thank you. I try to do exactly the same style videos as you, but slightly better on the editing. >> You basically take my exact same videos, but then do them a day later with way better editing. Yeah, I have Chad GBT sort of repurpose your script and then I'll shuffle them into my own words. >> It's working. You have now almost 3 million subscribers. >> Thank you. Thank you. >> And uh No, in all seriousness, your your videos are amazing. I mean, the amount of work that you put in your channel, the editing, I get really intimidated when I watch your videos because I'm like, how could I compete with like a movie quality video about either cryptocurrency or the US dollar or international affairs? And I'm like, "This must have taken you 3 days straight to edit this video, whereas I'm trying to like slap something together in a few hours." >> No, I appreciate it. It's funny cuz I'm trying to move away from the editing. And I don't know if you're noticing it too, but I feel like the less edited it is, the more it's received. Like, I think people appreciate it more when it's less produced. I think YouTube is going back to that. I've tried it a few times and those videos have done really well, but I'm not sure if it's because of the lack of editing or because I save the lack of editing for really substantial videos that stand on their own without the editing. >> That's a good point. And every time you do them, I feel like the comments are like, "Graham, you look tired." >> It's always when I'm sitting in that chair do people say that, but when I go back to my It's just lighting it. >> I think it's a closer camera, so you look puffier and you just look bigger on this lens. >> Yeah, I love this conversation. Graham looks puffier on the lens. Andre, thank you so much for coming on the ice coffee hour. Really appreciate it. Also, it's funny looking back cuz I first saw you I don't even know how many years ago. You're talking about your dividend stock portfolio and crypto. >> You're talking about crypto on YouTube a long time ago. I mean, 5 years ago, I think we had you on the show and we were talking about Bitcoin when it was at like $20,000, which we all still thought we'd missed the train, >> right? >> Do you think that we've missed the train on Bitcoin still? >> No, not at all. Wasn't I like the second guest on your podcast? You were one of the very first guests we've ever had. >> I remember that you gave me the Pokémon cards and I got the psychic energy. I remember that. Now we're back. >> Yeah. >> No, I Yeah, it's crazy. I do remember that 20,000 was the peak of that cycle in 2017, was it? >> Yep. >> Yeah. No, >> and then we did again in 2020. >> That's right. >> Yeah. >> No. And it's crazy to see it out over 100 now. What do you guys think? You think we've peaked? >> Michael Sailor would disagree. He would say that we're just getting started here. I tend to agree. Also, you know, we just had Robert Kiyosaki on the podcast and that did instill a little bit of fear when he's like fake money, fake money holding up like the dollar bill. It does make sense. >> He's a huge fan of Bitcoin, right? >> He loves Bitcoin. He loves gold. He loves silver. He loves assets when you can't just print more of them. You can. We were talking about Bitcoin and I said, "Are you still buying Bitcoin?" And he said, "No." >> And I said, "Well, give us a price target. How is it at 100,000?" And he goes like this. I kid you not. implying that retail investors are being dragged along. >> Oh, >> he likes instead, he said, silver, gold, and Ethereum. >> And he's not buying Bitcoin uh at $100,000 levels. >> Okay. >> Which is interesting. I thought he would continue to be buying Bitcoin given his stance on the dollar. >> Yeah, from what I've seen, silver and platinum outper and gold outperform Bitcoin this year for sure. Um maybe he's right. I don't know. I think Bitcoin has a long way to go. I think I've always looked at Bitcoin's final price to be inflation divided by 21 million. And what's inflation? That's infinity, right? Like infinity divided by 21 million is infinity essentially. And it seems to be the fastest horse in the race. So I think it'll continue to go up. It might dip below $100,000 though. I wouldn't be surprised. >> Are you still buying Bitcoin right now? >> Yeah, actually the last time I bought it was a couple weeks ago. I bought it at like 115,000. I just bought the IBIT ETF. I didn't know that you've been buying it. >> Yeah. So, I've just bought the IBIT. Um, but most of my Bitcoin is in the commodity itself, the coin. I self-custody. Um, >> so you do the cold storage. Yeah. If you're going to do cold storage on Bitcoin, what's the best way of doing it? >> There's so many devices to do it. Get yourself a uh like a ledger or whatever it else is not sponsored. You can get so many hardware devices. And then look into something called a 25th uh passphrase. It's sort of a plausible deniability wallet that allows you to create sort of a duplicate of your wallet. So if somebody like attacks you, you can be like, "Okay, here's my seed phrase." But you have a secret wallet that's just one more word on top of that where your where your actual money is stored. >> It's called a plausible deniability wallet. It's actually really cool. >> That's interesting. So, for example, when those people like went over to Amaran Amaran's house and they were trying to like attack her and get her Bitcoin away from her, she could have just said, "Oh, I have this code." And then it like looks like it's hers, but in actuality, that's just like a a fake code. >> Correct. You could do that. I mean, at that point, like people always say like the $5 wrench attack. Like at that point, there's no amount of like cyber security you can be like, "Oh, here's >> Yeah. I mean, that's that was an unfortunate thing that happened with her." >> So, when did you first buy Bitcoin? When did I first buy Bitcoin? Uh, I want to say 2014 when it was $600 a coin. >> How much Bitcoin did you buy and why did you buy it? >> I bought like six of them. And I bought it cuz I was reading it was like this internet magic internet money. And I remember reading about it when I was like at $100, but there was no way of buying it unless you were super computer savvy. And then that's when uh what exchange was it? The uh >> Mount Gaus. >> Mount Gaus. Yeah. And I was like, "Okay, I don't understand any of that stuff." But I I remember buying it. I think it was on Coinbase. I bought six of them and then uh I just held on to it for a year. Totally forgot about it and then I checked a year later in like I don't know 2015 and it dropped to $300 a coin. So I sold all six of them to buy myself a DJI drone which is like the 1080p DJI whatever it was at the time. And I eventually crashed that drone. But yeah, I sold it basically all of it. So that drone was about $750,000. >> Yeah. Yeah. It was an expensive like learning mistake, but I feel like everyone has that story in Bitcoin. >> I mean, I told Graham to buy Dogecoin when it was less than half a showed me this the other day. We could go back on the podcast. So Jack told me to buy Dogecoin when it was a fraction of a penny. Told me to invest $1,000 into it in one of our first ever podcasts. And I did. I didn't understand it. I thought it was dumb. And so I had 217,000 Dogecoin for $1,000. >> Wow. >> And I I looked at it and then the next day I sold it for a loss. >> He sold it the next day. Paper hands. He has paper hands. >> So stupid. >> What was it worth at the peak? >> It would have been worth >> $120. That's not as bad as me, but >> it would have been worth about $150,000,000 investment, which meant, and I told Jack this, I would have made more money from that single Dogecoin investment than I would have from the podcast at the time. >> That's crazy. >> So, I put $100 in Dogecoin when it was about4. Okay. >> And then I held on. I diamond hands for a very, very long time up until the night of the SNL thing when Elon was supposed to Yeah. And so I cashed out and then bought this exact Rolex with it. So we call this the Dogelex. >> That's amazing. I remember pleading with you. I was like, "Dude, look into Bitcoin. You got to get some." You're like, "I don't know." Do you remember how opposed to Bitcoin you were not that long ago? >> 20 late 2016 or early 2017 is when I made my first video about Bitcoin. And that was Bitcoin just hit $1,000. That's when I made my first video. You could go back on my channel and see. >> Do you ever read the comments? though like all this age like milk >> all the time. Now in the in the video the thing is >> age like milk dude I wasn't for or against it. It was just I was neutral about it and at the time there was no real use case. It was just people speculating on it like it's not it did not evolve >> back then to where it is today. It just is what it it's a gambling mechanism back then. Now people have a vision for it but back then it didn't have the utility or anything that it does today. >> What changed your mind? Uh, it hit 20,000. It hit 17,000 actually. And I bought one Bitcoin for fun just to see what it was about because everyone was talking about Bitcoin. And I bought it. And then I started getting involved in all like the communities, reading through on Reddit and Twitter and and crypto YouTube at the time in 2017. And I had fun with it. But back then I started like just day trading it. So I would like buy it at 17, I would sell it for like 172, I'd buy back in at 169. And I just did that >> and I made like 500 bucks. >> And then I put all of that into a project called at the time Ryblocks. >> Huh. >> And that turned into 50 or 60 grand and I didn't cash out and I lost all of it. >> Wow. Okay. So, we all make mistakes. That's good. >> But that's what turned me on to Bitcoin. And then I thought at that point, okay, there's no harm in just like investing 1% of my portfolio on Bitcoin. Do you think that Bitcoin's price is manipulated right now? >> Probably. >> Okay, >> probably just because you see these insane swings like all of a sudden I'll check the price at midnight and it drops from like 115 to 109 instantly. Somebody's selling. Who is that? How is that manipulate? And then all of a sudden it'll jump right back up to like 112. >> There there's this concept called rehypothecation. Have you guys heard of it? >> No. It's it's uh it's a it's a mechanism to suppress Bitcoin's price and it's probably happening on it. It's where a lender can essentially take your the loan they give you and your collateral and then they can use your collateral. Like for example, if you're like, "Andre, I want to borrow $100." I'm like, "Okay, here's $100." Okay. But in in return, I'm going to have a claim over your house, whatever. Right? That's the collateral. And then with that collateral, that I owe you, I go to another bank and I'm like, "Hey, I got this dude's house. That's my collateral. I'm going to borrow money against it." And then that lender goes and borrows against that. And then before you know it, it cascades. And now several people and several entities have a claim on the same asset. But now substitute house with Bitcoin. And now you can have five people essentially having a claim over the same coin. And I think that's happening with the ETFs to some degree or another. I don't think we'll know about it until later, but one way to solve that is to self-custody. And that's why I think self- custody is so important because then you solve that. That's why I think like there could be a very violent price movement up. And so when did you then buy Bitcoin after this one instance of buying six coins, selling it to buy a drone that you crashed? I just want to keep reminding you of that because I feel bad because I've lost a lot of money in Robin Hood call options. >> Were you on the Wall Street Vets? >> Yeah, of course. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Sorry. Ask that question again. >> So, when did you then next buy Bitcoin after that? >> Oh, 2017. That was during the uh block wars. I don't know if you guys were a part of that or remember that at all. >> Um that's that that's right now kind of like the biggest thing that's happening in 2025. So, I'm not I'm not going to get like too into it, but in 2017, there was a fight for like the soul of Bitcoin, right? And that was called the block wars. Essentially, people were split into two factions. One half thought, well, what is Bitcoin? One half wanted it to be a currency and the other half wanted it to be a store of value. So, the currency people wanted the block size to be increased to like 4 megabytes. Okay? Right? It was originally like one >> and the uh store of value people were like well let's keep it at one because if you allow bitcoin to become a currency which has a much higher tam or total addressable market size currencies are much bigger than a commodity like gold right it addresses a much bigger market. Okay. So, if we allow Bitcoin to become a currency and increase the block size, then eventually like let's say 5 10 years from now, it'll be prohibitively expensive to run your own node to basically secure the Bitcoin. The only people that can do that will be like big mining companies and big corporations, right? And so, you effectively centralize Bitcoin to big business. And big business is subject to what? Government control, right? So they're like, "Let's not make it a currency. Let's make it a store of value." That was like my introduction to like the craziness of it. And I followed this whole battle. And at the time, the argument that made the most sense to me was to have it a currency cuz I'm like, "Well, if Bitcoin is going to grow beyond this point, it needs to be a bigger thing like a currency." Right. >> In terms of currency, you're saying just something that you use to pay for goods and services >> like a dollar. Exactly. Use it to pay and buy things. Um because even in the Bitcoin white paper it says a peer-to-peer currency, right? And so I was like, okay, so Bitcoin should increase block size. Um in retrospect, I'm glad that it stayed small because then it means it's decentralized and anybody can run. It's pretty cheap to do. >> So that was the block size war in 2017. But fast forward to today and in 2025, uh there's another war for the soul of Bitcoin. Not a lot of people know this cuz it's like really nuanced and nerdy. I mean, I'm not the best person to explain this. I kind of did a lot of the research yesterday, but essentially what's happening right now is there's a fight between again two groups of people. Uh, one that's trying to say is Bitcoin money, right? A store of value or is it a store of information like all information, not just economic data, but all sorts of data, right? So, there is a split between these two. Now, let me just ask you this hypothetical question. What is the best way, do you guys think, to destroy Bitcoin? Like, if if you were trying to take it down or destroy it, what is the best way to do that? >> Unplug the internet. >> That's one way. It's really hard to do, though. It's not really >> in all seriousness, I would say to destroy Bitcoin, you would have to destroy it the the faith of Bitcoin. So, I think if so, starting a business is super exciting, but let's be real, the legal side of things can be extremely overwhelming. You hear people say just start an LLC, but what does that actually mean? 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Please, just try. Do it. Even if you fail, it's worth it to give it a shot. So, if you have an idea, if you have a product or a service, why not go right now, maybe after this episode, but do it. Create the LLC. Do it with Bizzy because it's extremely easy at busy.com. That is biz.comic. Thank you so much to Bizzy for sponsoring this episode. Start the business. I would say to destroy Bitcoin, you would have to destroy it the the faith of Bitcoin. So, I think if >> Satoshi somehow dumped on the market, everyone would lose faith in that. Mhm. >> Um or I I think like a huge solar flare that somehow takes out networks. >> Okay, not bad. So, we can't do Satoshi, right? Cuz like we he's gone. He's never coming back and we can't invoke him to come back. >> How do you know he's gone? >> Because he would have come back at this point. If he was like incentivized financially and Bitcoin is worth hundreds of billions of dollars, at no point in time is is there a person that's like, I'm going to wait. I have a couple hundred billion dollars now. I'm going to wait until it hits a trillion or whatever it is. >> And you can see wallets. That's how you know. >> You can see it. Yeah. His coins have not moved since I forget what >> his coins. >> Yeah, it's in his wallet. >> How many coins does he have? >> Wasn't it like a million? Roughly a million coins. Yeah. >> So, what's the value of that? >> It was like $128 billion. >> Yeah. He's like one of the top sitting in his >> And you've never seen that is his wallet >> transacting. >> It's never moved and it never will. >> It hasn't moved since when? It was like 20. >> I want to say 2011, but I might be wrong. Yeah, something like that. >> So, are people speculating that he's passed away, that he's gone? >> Most likely he's passed away. Yeah. The people who think he was, but the Bitcoin community doesn't really like to talk about who Satoshi is because that's an attack vector, right? Cuz if you figure out who that person is or who that group was, you can attack. It's a vulnerability. >> It's interesting. Michael Sailor has been asked who is Satoshi Nakamoto. And yeah, he just like like it it triggers him like he does not want to answer it >> and he gets like visibly upset. >> Yeah. He calls it the uh the immaculate conception of of Bitcoin, right? Because it's like no one knows who gave birth to this thing. And it's smart. Like we shouldn't really try to figure that out. Um but the point is is that uh the best way to really attack Bitcoin is not a solar flare. We can't induce a solar flare. We can't get Satoshi to spend his coins. The best way to do it is to destroy it from within. Okay. So right now in Bitcoin there's five pillars of power that make it decentralized. Users, nodes, businesses, the miners, and the developers. Okay. So like a lot of criticism that you hear people that don't understand Bitcoin, they'll be like, "Well, how do you know it's 21 million? Like what if they like write in the code and they change it to like 40 million just to give themselves some more?" And it's like they could do that, but they wouldn't be able to get that through without the majority consensus, right? Like everyone would have to agree that it's in their economic interest to do that. That's what makes Bitcoin so cool is the game theory aspect of it. So it's the fundamental rules of Bitcoin have never been changed. But if you were like a rogue nation or or a government and you wanted to destroy Bitcoin cuz you're like, "Hey, this this Bitcoin thing looks cool. Like how would I control it?" Well, I would figure out who the developers are and I might offer them like a salary like a like 20 or $30 million a year and I would tell them, I want you to make certain propositions in the software that changes the core aspect of what Bitcoin is. And I would put out a huge propaganda campaign that's like, what is Bitcoin? Is it really gold? Is it really digital gold? Is it really money? Or is it a a a database of all sorts of immutable information? Right? So, here's specifically what I'm talking about. kind of gets nerdy, but there is this feature inside of Bitcoin called the op return feature. OP underscore return >> and that feature has an 80 byt limit, meaning like that's the storage capacity of it. It's very small. It's about the size of a tweet, right? You can attach certain random points of data like metadata or some kind of proof or some kind of message. Fun fact, in 2017 during the block wars, the core development team which runs the Bitcoin software, these guys are like the smartest like nerdiest people, right? They they do not like having a debate with people. So they shut people down. They censored people. And so the big blockers, the people who wanted Bitcoin to become a currency, they made a decentralized Twitter through this opturn mechanism. And the way it worked is you could send a fraction of a fraction of a fraction of a bitcoin from your own wallet back to your own wallet. So you sent the money back to yourself and it cost you like a fraction of a penny. But in that transaction you embedded a small tweet >> and somebody made that into a website. It was like a decentralized >> into that data >> into that data. Yes. A text a piece of text >> basically, >> right? And so they recreated a decentralized immutable Twitter on the blockchain. That's how it was used. But again, it has that limit of 80 bytes. Actually, I brought a a cool thing to show you uh what that looks like. Um so, here is an image of an 80 uh by size image. Can you tell what that is? >> No, I >> you can't really tell what that is. >> That looks like Trump. >> It does kind of. I could see it. The suit, the blue suit and the hat. >> That is actually It is. >> Wow. >> Did you figure that out? I had no idea actually. >> But it's hard to see. >> Holy crap. >> It's really hard to see, right? >> Mhm. That was good, Jack. Good job. Your eyes. >> Okay. So, so right now the fundamental disconnect in the core development team is that they want to upgrade Bitcoin to remove the limit of the OP return. Right? They want to get rid of the 80 byt limit. What does that mean? That means that within a transaction, people will be able to include images and videos up to 4 megabytes in size. So now that image that looks like nothing to most people, unless you're a an autist like Jack, uh that's the real image. >> Wow. >> Right. That's that's the Trump image. Okay. But but that's like a like a good example. What's the benefit of doing that though? Well, the benefit is now you can essentially have programmable money, right? Like you can have Bitcoin that's somewhat programmable. You can have NFTTS on it. You can do a lot of like more advanced things is sort of like what they're saying. >> Sure. >> But the Bitcoin community disagrees and they're like this is the worst thing we can do because imagine you're you're essentially bloating now the the software now the whole ecosystem with with BS, right? like with images. And imagine if I was like like a like a pizza file person, right? Wanted to send illegal images or videos to somebody and they didn't want to be stopped. They didn't want to be censored. They could now use Bitcoin and attach an image or a video that's illegal to transmit into this transaction. Right? >> So if I were a government, I might want to regulate that. I might be like, "Hey, all these nodes that are handling all these transactions, you guys are transporting and transferring all these illegal illegal images." >> But but here's the thing. Wouldn't that all be on the blockchain? And then eventually, if that were ever to be cashed out, >> you could trace it. >> Correct. >> And so the person who cashes out five transactions down the line, 10 years later, they're going to get caught. >> It's not about who cashes out. It's about you transmitting things that are not necessarily something you agree with transmitting. You have no control over this because they remove that limit. >> Sure. >> But their argument is like, "Yeah, but you'll be able to do like NFTts on it." And people like Michael Sailor and people like myself, investors, we're like, "I'm buying Bitcoin because it's the best place to preserve my economic energy, right? It's like the best place for me to put my time, and I don't want Bitcoin to be graffitied over with data. Bitcoin is not meant to be non-economic data. It's purely for economic information, not NFTTS and videos and pictures, right? So, there's a big divide in the community right now and the core development team, they're proposing that this change goes through. They want to get rid of this limit. The people on the opposite side, the people who oppose it, not that you need to know this, but it's the Knots development team. And this this guy, I think his name is Luke Dash Jr., here which a lot of people don't like but he he's like let's let's just keep it as is and a lot of investors are like let's not change anything Bitcoin's not broken let's not upgrade it let's not do anything so the most likely outcome that will happen in October this is this is this upgrade is going to happen in October is that there will be no upgrade so the nodes and the miners they're not going to upgrade their software to software 30 they're going to keep it at 29 that's most likely what's going to happen so only people like Michael Sailor really understand what's happening but I think in the next few weeks there's going to be a huge wealth transfer. >> So, from a 30,000 foot view, what is your strongest argument for Bitcoin and against Bitcoin? >> What is the strongest argument for Bitcoin? >> Oh, man. >> If you were to pitch me, >> I don't have very much Bitcoin. Maybe like 1% of my portfolio is in Bitcoin. And my portfolio, it's not that big, guys. But like, actually, let me say it is actually really big. >> It's it's it's half a percent in Bitcoin, I think. >> Pretend he is Alex. >> Sure. >> Pitch Alex on Bitcoin. He doesn't own anything. Okay. >> And we've always joked, Alex, if you if you're watching this, whenever Alex buys, >> we're out. >> That's the Alex Alex is our old producer for those that aren't aware. >> Alex, >> I love Alex. Um, so this is borrowed directly from Jeff Booth. This is not my thing, but uh Jeff Booth says something really, really profound. So he says that the natural state of the world and the economy is deflationary. Do you understand what that means? >> Mhm. Yeah. Stuff goes down in prices. >> Stuff goes down in price. Like if you were to just have a fixed supply of money, like let's say I had a hypothetical $100 bill. I don't have one to show you, but like I laid it out and I was like, "This is the world's money." Like it's a $100. There's never going to be more of it. So naturally, the price of everything in that world would always go down forever. It wouldn't go up because as we get better at producing stuff, as we get more efficient, we invent better technologies, the price goes down, right? But for some reason, we don't find ourselves living in that world. We live in a world where prices of everything goes up forever, right? That's counterintuitive to how the universe should work. Why? Well, it's because the government has this special ability to make more than just this $100, right? So now, if we duplicate that $100, the price of everything now is essentially doubled because it costs twice as much to buy that same amount of stuff because the amount of stuff didn't double. It was the amount of paper that doubled. Right with me? so far. >> Mhm. >> Okay. So now that money, that excess piece of paper, all of that economic energy, it needs to go somewhere to maintain and preserve its value. So that's when we hear, "Oh, did you hear stocks went up to an all-time high and gold reached an all-time high? Real estate reached an all-time high." It's because the amount of money keeps increasing and it's always trying to find a place to go to preserve its value, right? So it's basically like the actual value of something doesn't necessarily the value of an asset doesn't necessarily increase over time but the amount of dollars that purchase that >> does increase. >> Exactly right. So when you compare that asset to a benchmark like the dollar it looks like that thing went up in price. Right. You're like oh you know gold went up or real estate went up and now it costs more dollars. That's how we visualize it. But then if you were to take all of those things, right, and compare it against Bitcoin, then literally all of those assets are also deflationary against Bitcoin. Like take real estate for example. A couple years ago when Bitcoin was at what 20,000, it took 20 Bitcoin to buy a house. Now it's like four Bitcoin, like a little over four to buy a house. >> And it'll continue to be lower and lower and lower, right? It'll take less and less Bitcoin. So all assets are being demonetized against a money that is fixed. It is the only thing that exists in this world that is stationary that is fixed a true money. And so through the lens and through the perspective of Bitcoin, everything is going down against it. So I have a couple of questions about that then. What is the difference then between like bitcoin and gold or bitcoin and silver or raw materials that there is a fixed amount of and you could take the same exact example for gold. It's like okay with this much gold right now you could buy like a crazy mansion probably or a really nice house you know with uh this much gold back in the day you could have bought more. >> Yeah. Well gold has certain qualities that not quite on par to Bitcoin and also there's not an exact finite amount of gold. There's also an inflation to gold as we discover and as we dig up more of it. I mean, we could find one on the meteorite tomorrow for all we know. So, like gold is not necessarily finite. >> It's funny you say that because we just had RJ Mitti on the podcast and he said he bought into a penny stock where apparently they owned the rights to an asteroid >> that is full of gold >> that they're going to find a way to mine. >> Right. So imagine if you're not going to but imagine if that were to happen like what would happen >> the value of gold >> right the deflation would or the inflation of gold would increase and therefore the value would be suppressed. >> You know what's funny is that they found a way to make gold >> just like you could make a diamond in a lab like a lab grown diamond. >> They figured out alchemy. >> Yes. They found a way to make gold. The problem, however, because this was a big discovery, is that >> it cost more to make the gold than the gold is worth, right? >> Yes. But the other is that the gold was very unstable and so they were only able to make the gold appear for a short amount of time before it disappeared. >> Right. >> But the fact is >> there is a possibility. It's like it's just it's it was unstable enough to to be a solid form for longer than however many like a fraction of a second or whatever. But point being is that they could find a way just to manufacture gold and have synthetic gold that would be identical to the real thing at some point in the future. >> No, I believe it. Yeah, I believe we will have the technology someday to make and reproduce gold on some affordable economic level. We can't yet, but maybe in the future we could. But Bitcoin is programmed to be fixed forever. Most investing platforms feel exactly the same. You sign in, you see some numbers, and that's it. 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Once again, that is pub.com/ist to get started today. Paid for by public investing. Full disclosures down below in the description. So then what should the average person do with this information? If the natural state of the economy is supposed to be deflationary, things are supposed to get cheaper as time goes on. But because we're working off the dollar, which we could just print more of, it's costing more dollars to buy goods and services. If someone has this information, what should they be doing with their money? Well, >> I think it depends contextually like what that person's situation is, but like for me, um I've diversified enough to where if all of this is wrong and all of this is crazy, I should still be okay. But for me, Bitcoin is a roughly 30% 30 to 35% of my net worth. So, it's kind of high for most people, but it's still not crazy for most like Bitcoin people. That's pretty conservative if anything. Um, so that's just my approach to it. But it's funny cuz like when I look at crypto, I feel like it's such an appealing industry for a lot of people because there's this promise of like get rich quick. It's like it's like a thousandfold of your money. And what I find really interesting is that people make a decision that sounds intuitive, but it's completely wrong. Like for example, I see a lot of people that are like, "Oh, I think XRP, let's just use that for example, is going to go to $1,000." Right? It's like once you've convinced yourself that it's going to go to the moon like that, you've kind of already lost. And at that point, when people have convinced themselves it has the chance to go 1,000x, they put most of their money into it, which is actually completely counterintuitive. What instead you should be doing is allocating a very small amount to a conviction like that. Right? It makes sense cuz then you work backwards. You say, "Okay, if I think this thing is going to 1,000x, I'm not going to mortgage my house and then put everything into it. I'm going to instead work backwards and say like, let's say I put in $10,000 and at 1,000 x's, then I end up with what, a million, right? Cool. Then I made a lot of money." But if you sell your house or the equity in your house and let's say you're like, I'm going to go all in and I'm going to put in a 100,000 cuz I know it's going to thousandx. Okay, fine. But the difference between you being right in that scenario is the difference between making a million, which is still nice, and making $10 million. There is a difference there for sure, but the pain between having a million and having 10 million is way less than the pain of being completely wrong and losing your house. Does that make sense? >> So, if you really believe this thing's going to 1,000x, don't put your entire life savings into it. >> Put in a smaller amount. >> Does that make sense? >> Yeah. I liked Alex Becker uh his approach. He made a video a while back when we were talking a few months ago with Ethereum. >> Yeah. >> And Ethereum at the time I think it was like $1,500. This is recently when everything kind of fell. And he says, "Guys, I think there's a 50/50 chance you're going to lose everything. That Ethereum is going to go from 1,500 it's you're going to lose all of your money, >> right? >> But I think there's a 50% chance it's going to go to 6,000." >> And so that's an asymmetric reward. Yes. risk versus reward that hey you could it's a 50/50 you lose but in the other 50% you could 3x your investment right >> and I thought you know what that's it's a great phrasing and I invested an amount where I'm prepared for that 50%. I bought in at 1,500 bucks and now it's all risk management >> 4200 >> that's that's exactly a great point that you brought up is it's all risk management. So if you see an asymmetric bet that's exactly what I'm describing. Don't put your entire life savings into it. put enough to where if you lose it, it's not a big deal and if you make it, it's still a lot of money. That's essentially a roundabout way of saying that. >> So, how are you investing your money now? If you have 30 to 35% in Bitcoin, what is the other 65% looking like? >> It's real estate, cash, stocks, and miscellaneous things. >> And what's the best investment you've ever made? >> The best investment definitely by far Bitcoin by far. >> Really? >> Yeah. >> And it's not even close. >> Not even close. What's the worst investment you've ever made? >> Oh, worst investment probably. >> I mean, that's not an investment. That's like a consumer thing. I would say probably so far, honestly, out of my bucket, real estate. >> Really? >> Yeah. >> But how have you made money in real estate? >> I still made money, but it wasn't as much money as I could have made if I had bought literally anything else. It was like the S&P 500 or anything else. >> NFTTS, that's not an investment. I never considered that an investment. And I considered it as like a marketing expense for YouTube. But Graham, you buy a lot of Ethereum, right? >> Yes. And no. I bought at 1,500 and I've not touched it since then. I've not added on to it. I've not Yeah. I've just I still had that and it's up almost 200% since. >> What's your What's your like theory behind why Ethereum will be valuable someday? >> I think the fact that Bitcoin is as valuable, I just it's a pure speculation bet that some of that's going to funnel into Ethereum. >> That's it. It's just like it's like a second place thing. >> Sure. Yeah. Like >> Yeah. But then again, when you look at Ethereum in in comparison to my entire portfolio, I think it's like 0.1%. >> Okay. >> So, it really I don't care if it if it goes back down to 1500. I don't care. This sounds so out of touch. So out of touch. There was a Rolex Oyster Quartz that I wanted and it was $12,500 >> and I thought I would invest in Ethereum to pay for the watch. >> Okay. >> And I was going to sell it when it hit like 20,000 in profit to be able to cash out, pay the tax, and that way I get a free watch. And I've just kept it. And now I'm up quite a bit. >> So I got a free watch times many times over from that investment. That that was all it is. It was it was the same thing as me going to a casino except it was that 50/50 riskreward where I was like, "All right, 50% chance I lose it or 50% chance I got three act and just buy the watch that I wanted." >> Right. But you're still holding on to it. >> Yeah. I haven't sold it. >> Okay. Do you buy any Ethereum, Jack? >> I don't think I have any Ethereum. I might have like like like a couple grand in Ethereum, five grand in it. >> Okay. Yeah. from my understanding and and like this is again that goes back to like risk versus reward management >> is uh I think Tom Lee from Funst Street I don't know if you guys had him on yet. >> No. >> Um and uh I guess uh Larry Fink from Black Rockck. This is like their thesis for why Ethereum could someday be like the thing. But here's why I could never like >> put in a ton of money. So So here's kind of how it looks for Ethereum. So, Ethereum is supposed to be the blockchain that will be the rails for the tokenization of a lot of assets across the world, including physical assets like watches, art, real estate, and things like that. So, we're going to digitize and bring things like real estate onto the blockchain, Ethereum's blockchain. So, like for example, JP Morgan, they tokenized what is it? Uh, treasury bonds. So, they actually tokenized treasury bonds on Ethereum. And then Black Rockck tokenized uh money market funds on Ethereum's blockchain. And I thought that was really kind of interesting because I could imagine a world where for example like let's say I'm an investor and I want to buy a REIT, right? But I don't want like a specific REIT that I see as an ETF. Instead, I'm like, you know, I love Hawaii and I love this tree this street or this area like this this this area called Lanekai, right? I think it's going to be a strategic street for real estate. I want specifically this section or specifically that house and maybe that corporation or that owner could issue some percentage of that house like let's say like they issue 50% or 10% or whatever it is so that on my app on my brokerage app I could be like you know what instead of buying an ETF that's a REIT I could buy this area like Summerland or like Henderson or this specific street. So, you're going to get so granular because of this tokenization and it's going to be accessible to everyone. And I think it's a possible reality that that happens. So, and that's the same thing for watches, maybe cars. It's like, well, you know what? I want this like $20 million Ferrari collection from Hamilton, the guy you had on, right? >> And but I can't afford a Ferrari. So, maybe that guy issues some percentage equity in his collection on the blockchain. Maybe that's Ethereum. Does that make sense? Yeah. >> So now I could buy it in my brokerage app. Like that's going to happen. That's what Black Rockck sees is going to happen. And presuming that it's going to be on Ethereum's blockchain, that's when you get all the gas fees and all the burning things, burning mechanisms. And that's when Ethereum could become deflationary. And maybe that's how it becomes valuable. But the point I'm trying to make is like creating this like universe which might happen someday is these are assumptions of assumptions of assumptions on assumptions, right? like we are making so many assumptions about it that like is it going to be this way? Will it actually be Ethereum or will it be Salana or it will be Cardano or something else? We don't know. And so the more assumptions there are baked in, the more you could assume the price will go up. Like in Bitcoin's case, the difference between Bitcoin at a dollar and a th000, there's far more assumptions that were in place than there are from a 100,000 to a million. Like that's only now a 10x and that's because so many of Bitcoin's early assumptions like adoption by Wall Street and the securitization with ETFs and all these things like they've happened. Adoption by corporations, adoptions by countries, like these are all things that have happened already. So now the jump between a 100,000 to a million is only 10x. Like it's still a lot of money, but it's nowhere near the jump between a dollar to $1,000. That's a,000x because less assumptions had come true. So, what has to happen for Bitcoin to hit a million dollars? We talk about like these cycles, like these mega cycles that Bitcoin goes through. I don't know if we'll see another huge one, I think it'll be a a slow, and by slow, I mean like still like 20 to 30% a year, melt up to a million from here on until like 2030 or whatever the year is going to be. Like nothing has to change. Just keeps on going at the same rate that it is. You take all the crazy assumptions out of it, I still think it ends up at a million like inevitably. So, isn't Bitcoin about 110th the market cap currently of gold? >> Yeah, about 113th or so. Yeah. >> I can't help but think that it has to be at some point one/ird of gold or half >> I think it's inevitable. Yeah. >> But then I can't help but think, if I think that way, it has to be priced in. >> Yeah. >> Like that this this isn't isn't like some mysterious sort of like no one's ever thought of that before. People are paying the price today with everything currently priced in as to what they believe is going to happen with it. >> I I do you remember Chris Camilo from Dumb Money? >> I really like his thesis on Bitcoin. Like he does not care about Bitcoin. He's like, I'm just a pure like social what is this thing? >> Social arbitrage. >> Social AR, right? Social arbitrage. And his entire thesis is is really simple. It's just a reshuffleling of monetary assets from things like gold and real estate and all the things that we will inherit from our from our parents and our grandparents. And it's like, well, thanks for the $2 million house. I can't afford the property taxes on this thing. Uh, I'm going to sell that. And gold, thanks, but I don't really get gold. It's not part of my generation. I'm going to sell that. I'm going to put some of it in Bitcoin. I'm not going to put all of it, maybe, but some of it. And it's just like a a simple reshuffleling of assets and money from all of those back into Bitcoin. and a little bit from each little bucket from, you know, bonds, from gold, from watches, from cars, from real estate, they might not be able to afford to keep up with, and it goes into Bitcoin. And that's like a slow melt up to a million. >> Gold is becoming cooler now. >> It is. Yeah, that's true. >> That's the other thing is that I'm seeing a lot of people, you know, our own age now interested in gold just for the fact that it's gone up in price. They don't give about it though, but they just know, hey, it was, you know, a,000 bucks 5 years ago and now it's, you know, almost 4,000 an ounce. And just on the basis of that, it makes money. I like it now. >> And so gold is coming back in style. Um whereas before it was kind of unpopular, but it does seem like overall people are more likely to buy Bitcoin who are younger than gold. They had to choose between the two. >> I agree. I don't think I'm that particularly old, but I miss the gold train. Like, I don't own any gold. I wish I did, but I don't have any. And I imagine the younger generation is totally out of it, too. Maybe they're a little more in tune with it now that you said the price has gone up, but I don't own any gold at all. What do you think about altcoins? >> I think there's a lot of interesting projects. I'm just not into any of them. I think they're a a distraction for the most part. I'm just focused on Bitcoin mostly. And even Ethereum, I'm like, I I don't know. Like all those assumptions we talked about, they might come true over time, but I'm not interested in venturing beyond it. >> You know what's going to be really interesting? At some point, they're going to do an ETF of the top 10 crypto holdings, just like the S&P 500, >> except of that. >> That is going to be very interesting. And I think that is going to spur the market because I would place, let's just say I have 5% of my portfolio in IBIT. Yeah. >> But then they offer an ETF of the top 10, >> right? Oh man, I would probably put a percent or two into that, >> right? >> I think that that is a huge opportunity because there's a lot of projects out there that are interesting that I would never invest a dollar into on their own, but I would into an ETF. What's also interesting is that years ago, I did this whole analysis on the top 10 cryptocurrencies by year going back to like 2015. And the consensus was that really almost all of the profits in cryptocurrency came from Bitcoin and Ethereum and that the chance of making money on anything else was pretty much like a moonshot. It was like a one in a 100 chance. And so even if you invest in a 100 different projects, you're going to like break even because 99% of them are going to lose money, but that one is going to have a 100x return. And so it's just going to balance out between how much you make and lo. But overall, it was really just the majority of profits came from Bitcoin, Ethereum, and that's it. >> Yeah. Europe actually had a product, an ETF that combined the top 10 cryptos for a long time now. But I imagine that if it came in the US, depending on how it was like allocated, if it was weight based, which I'm guessing it would be like 80% Bitcoin, 10% Ethereum, whatever it would be. Um, I think it would be a really interesting product, but I also think it would be kind of like a Trojan horse. I think companies like Black Rockck would make a ton of money on the expense ratios and the management fees, >> but I think from a performance perspective, they would just be diluting it. Like, it's not worth it. I wouldn't I wouldn't be buying it, but I can see how it's interesting, too. >> It's also interesting to see how many brokerage coins are going up in price like the BNB. >> Yeah. >> $1,000. >> That's interesting. >> Wild. >> Yeah. I'm not messing with any of it, man. I'm just keeping it really simple. >> Good. Same. I I just do IBIT. >> Yeah. >> It's so easy for me to do IBIT in a stock account and then I don't have to worry about self-custody. >> Yeah. >> Losing access if you forget the the password. It's like I I hate all of that. I like the simplicity of IBIT. And I would and all I care about anyway is the investment purpose of it. >> The downside of IBIT, though, is that the year-to- date performance is there's a delta of like 6%. Which is pretty significant. Like if you look at Bitcoin's year-to- date performance, it's 6 or 7% higher than IBITS. And I'm trying to figure out why there's such a big delta. Like that's a big delta. I know the expense ratio plays a small part of that. Very small. But the reason is that the IBIT trades on a price that doesn't isn't onetoone with Bitcoin. So if everyone's buying an IBIT, there's going to be a premium that the stock's going to trade at a higher price than the underlying coin itself because there's more demand. >> Yeah. The also might be there could be at some point it trades less than the underlying asset and there might be an opportunity to arbitrage that >> if that ever were to happen but yeah right now there's so much demand it's trading at a premium right I mean that's that's a lot of premium to give up though 6 to 7% like imagine if it's 6 to 7% every year compounded over like 20 years like that's huge isn't that a huge argument for self-custodying it >> could be but then you're also paying quite a big spread on a place like Coinbase like I remember seeing it recently even a Robin Hood is actually one of the cheapest places to buy Bitcoin it was trading at 1165 and if I want to buy it I have to pay like 117 and if I want to sell it I sell it for like 115 and that's how Robin Hood makes their money on that spread but that's a pretty big spread >> it is but I don't think >> that's 1% right there to buy or sell >> for sure but like 1% compared to 6 or 7% that's still not >> could be too Early to tell, too. I'd like to see that over five or 10 years. >> That's true. That's true. We should look at it from >> It's a bit new, but yeah, sure. Up until this point, depends if you care about buying the Bitcoin itself. Like, what are the advantages of actually buying Bitcoin and custodying it yourself? >> Well, that those coins can't be rehypothecated. They can't be lent against by someone else. Um, if something were to happen, you know, you have control, full control over your coins. If an exchange collapses, you have to rely on the government to pay you back. And that sometimes takes forever. There's a lot of cool benefits to it. >> Yeah. What about NFTTS? >> What about them? >> What happened to NFTTS? >> I don't know, man. They they just the fad died out, right? The whole uh I remember talking about it on my YouTube channel. I'm like, you know, when we hit a peak when people are spending millions of dollars on pet rocks, like JPEGs of pet rocks. Yeah. >> I remember this. You're going for $400,000. >> Sure. >> And people were joking that you could just right click on it and then like have the same thing. I never understood the NFT. >> My theory behind why NFTs blew up is it was hugely a result of the government print. That's all it was. It was the PPP money. It was the stimulus packages. It was all of that stuff. Like people didn't know what to do with their money. And it was just boredom from sitting at home. And I think that was that phenomena. And I actually think NFTTS will come back, but in a completely different way. Like it's not going to be, hey, look at my pet rock. It's worth millions of dollars. It'll be maybe more in the digitization of like like events like if you want to get like some concert tickets or something that'll be an NFT, you know, or the maybe depending on how they securitize real estate, maybe those will be some forms of NFTTS, but I think they'll come back from a utility perspective, but I don't think they'll be the same as once what they used to be. >> And what about crypto punks or crypto kitties? >> I don't know anything. >> What happened to board apes? >> I don't know. I don't know. I have no idea. I'm not following any of it. I know they're down like 90%. >> Down a lot. Cryptounk seem interesting to me. >> Yeah. Well, doesn't Chris Camilo own like a bunch of them? >> Dude, Chris, we were talking in like 2021. He was buying I forget what it was like these nuclear sheep. And he's like, if you buy these nuclear sheep, they give milk and the milk you could use to then buy more. It sounds dumb. It's It's in a video. We have it in a video in a vlog where we're recording this. I didn't understand it, but you could like milk these sheep that give and then use the milk to buy more nuclear sheep and they're they're about to like spawn. You could breed these nuclear sheep to like give like offspring, but then it's randomized to like one. It's >> And it reminds me a bit of like a game >> Axi Infinity. Yeah, I remember that. Yeah. a bit where people were making like thousands of dollars a month playing this game and then like breeding the birds or something. I don't >> Jack, do you play with this stuff? I don't know, man. >> I do not play with this stuff. This is more up Graham's wheelhouse right there. Breeding and playing with birds, milking sheep. >> Put that in the intro. >> I don't know. The only alts I have are are just like the same ones I've always had. OMI and my NFTts, like the Spider-Man one, and it I have no idea what where they're at or what they're doing. They're still around. I still have them. And would you sell them? >> I totally sell them. Yeah. Like I've forgotten about them. But if they're ever worth anything, maybe I'll come back to it someday. Maybe they'll they'll actually return. I don't know. But they're still around. I still have all of them. I never sold them. What's crazy is that uh you know, we used to have this vlog channel. >> Yeah. >> Uh Graham Stefen After Hours and all the videos there >> and we were covering a Logan Paul box break. >> Okay. and Grant Navar purchased a pack of cards I think for like $20,000 a first edition pack. But then in addition to that, Logan Paul was selling the NFTts of the box break. >> Okay. >> All of them were sold out and all the NFT was was him pulling out a card and it was like a hollow and he was selling these for like $18 to $50,000. He wasn't forcing anyone to buy them, but people were spending $35,000 to get an NFT of just Logan Paul opening up >> the card and showing a a hollow. You know what I think? If if it ever comes back and is worth anything, my theory is that it'll be like 50 years from now when we look back at these moments at our youth. We look back at these memories so fondly and we're like, remember when that was a thing? And we're all like crypto billionaires or Bitcoin billionaires? like I'd buy that again. Like that I I could see >> Pokemon cards. >> Yeah. Like it's like like a nostalgia thing. Like I could see it becoming a valuable thing when it becomes nostalgic. Like right now it's just too close to home. It just happened kind of recently. But I can imagine if like 50 years from now we'll look back at it like that was the first NFT ever, the Cryptoun Punk or like the Spider-Man or whatever it is. I could see that kind of like Pokemon. >> I try to think of that all the time of what is going to be the nostalgia play today, >> right? all the time. Like the the 2005 Ford GT Yeah. was a nostalgia play. They used to trade it like 120 grand. They couldn't sell the cars. And now it's like you you get that car because that was the car you admired. Pokemon is a good example of that, too. >> But are you ever afraid that that's sort of such a moving target that beyond a certain generation, it just it's not a thing anymore? >> Yeah, of course. I I like old 1920s cars are plummeting in value because the audience for that is they're passing away and no one no one cares. That wasn't a part of their childhood, right? >> But the original iPhone in the original packaging is now selling for like $70,000 or the original iPod, things like this that were like revolutionary. Now you go back and and that was something recent. And I wonder what is that today, >> right? >> What's out there today? cuz there's something today that is going to be, oh my gosh, I I could buy that right now and just keep it sealed and in 20 years I'm going to make a fortune. >> 100%. Yeah, that that's the Chris Camilillo investing, right? It's a social ARB thing. And but it kind of also makes you think the other way like when is the top? Is it when I'm 90? Is it like, well, our generation is the last one that remembers these NFTs, that remembers these Pokemon cards, that remembers the GT40? I don't know. But what are you nostalgic about today? That's what I think. For me, it's Pokemon cards still. I don't think anything tops that >> and now they're back up in price. >> Are they? >> Pokemon, my gosh, went through its craze. >> I think we're getting wildly derailed from it. Interesting. >> People love this. People love this, dude. And we'll get back. >> I know you've checked out. >> I've completely checked out. >> I know. I can tell. >> Pokemon went up, crashed, >> went up now even higher. >> I think the new sets have gone up, right? No. >> Nope. The Charizard is now selling for like $450,000 again. >> Really? First edition Shadowless Charizard. >> Wow, I'm rich again. >> Yeah, >> I still have my base set. >> Yeah, >> Jack needs uh what is what is it below the screen here? This subway server engaged. >> Okay, >> he's not We could just talk about this, but >> you make a lot of interesting videos about global affairs. >> Yeah, >> the Russian economy, like China economy, Japanese economy. What would you say are like the top competitors of the US economy? Do you think that the US economy is falling from grace and that and and what are your predictions for the US economy over the next like decade or so? Yeah, I think the biggest competitor is definitely China. I actually went down this deep rabbit hole of like looking on YouTube of technologies and cars that China's coming out with. Dude, it's unreal some of the car brands and the features and the price. Like, it's no wonder that it's not allowed to sell these products in the US because none of our companies would compete or be able to hold a candle to these products. They are so much more advanced. Like, Xiaomi released a a phone that was kind of a carbon copy of the 17 Max Pro that just came out and they actually called it the 17 Max Pro, I think. like it was nearly an identical name. But I watched a review of that phone, dude. It is legitimately like better on every front. Like it has such cool features and I'm like, dude, if these products were sold here in the US, none of our companies would keep up. >> Reminds me of the uh the sports car that they came out with. Doug Deurro reviewed that headlights of a McLaren and the body of the Perangu Ferrari. It's it's crazy. And has like 1400 horsepower. Uh, >> if that were in the US, everybody would buy it. Like, I would gladly pay 50,000 over asking. It's just so unique and so cool. >> Technologies. >> Yes. >> It's like a $40,000 car, dude. It's unbelievable. >> $4,000. >> $40,000 car. It's unbelievable. Has like 450 mi of range. Like, ridiculous. And so, >> but it makes you think, why can't we do that in the United States? >> You tell me. I don't know why. My understanding is that loose labor regulations, working conditions, things like this, uh, and and they don't quite have the guard rails in place for like the government like meddling with every little thing that allows these companies to basically produce this for such a low cost, >> right? >> I've also heard that they don't have the R&D. So they basically we spend all of this money developing then China goes and looks at this studies it and says oh okay well that's how you do it and then they can make it without any of the initial investment >> right that's that that's very true yeah combined with a low labor cost and then you have a product that people actually buy if it was made here in the US like sure we could make it but it'd be like 300 grand and nobody would buy it >> for sure that's a huge part of it but back to your original question is I I think it's separate like from From an investment perspective, I think the United States is still far and away the best country to live and make money in and invest in. But from a quality of life perspective, I I think this is not the best country to live in. >> What do you think is the best country to live in quality of life perspective? >> I think Switzerland is far better. >> Interesting. >> Hold on, let me let me bring out I think I have a chart here of of the average life expectancy of people around the world. And uh we spend twice as much on health care in Switzerland, I'm sorry, here in the US than Switzerland. And we are on average we have a much lower uh life expectancy age. Let me find this chart. Check this out. >> I have a I have a rant on this. >> So look at this. Do you see all that? >> Jeez. >> Like this is the United States, right? There's a dip with CO, right? Makes sense. But that's a massive dip. >> Wait, why did we dip with CO so much more than >> What is that? we have a higher rate of obesity >> and so we had more compromised individuals getting CO and so they were like >> I imagine for them yeah I imagine that's a big part of it >> the other thing could be in fairness >> that's insane >> we reported a lot of deaths as co >> because hospitals were incentivized to report >> correct so that seems to me highly skewed >> I think that's probably true too but I think to your point or what you said about yeah certain health conditions and pre-existing conditions I think we're worse off So, I want to rant about this. This this was really eye opening to me. I went to the doctor for a checkup. I had not been in 3 years. >> And she ordered a blood test and I wanted to do all these additional tests. And she says, >> "Oh, man. >> I can't order those tests." >> Yeah. >> I said, "Why?" She says, "Well, because you need uh symptoms." >> Yeah. >> To be able to order these tests. >> You need to be dying. And so she said, "Do you feel tired and lethargic >> sometimes?" "Okay, well, we could order that test." "Do you have uh you know, foggess?" uh you know, brain fog. Sure. Okay, we could order that test. And she kind of goes down the list of these symptoms that >> Yeah, I sometimes I wake up and I'm tired. Sure. So, we order these these but but in total it's like eight tests, >> right? and they bill my insurance $1,300 and my co-pay is something like 10% of it. So I pay like hundred and something dollars of it. But anyway, I get it back and it turns out that I have like high thyroid antibodies which suggest either high stress, I'm overtraining, lack of sleep, could be any one of them. So I thought that was interesting. And then I ordered my own blood tests and I paid out of pocket through a separate company and they were charging like 500 bucks for like a 100 biomarkers. And I did that and I got the results basically instantly within a few days and it turned out I had no idea that I have like high LDL cholesterol. uh my my heart biioarkers were like really genetically high, giving me a predisposition for like heart disease and building up plaque in my arteries even though I'm like active and healthy. It's just a genetic thing. I never would have found that out if I didn't test on my own. And I started making these changes in my life now. Now I have a whole stack of supplements that I take on a daily basis, morning and night. I've adjusted my diet a little bit and it's been about 3 weeks now and I feel so much better just doing that change. I never would have figured it out had I not done it myself like but but the whole healthare system is just designed to treat the symptom. >> Dude, I wish you had told me this before. When did you do all this? 3 weeks 4 weeks ago. I could have told you this because Okay, so Cory and I went to Thailand specifically for that reason because we wanted to test everything about ourselves. And we went to this hospital. I forget the name of It was like Bum Run Grod or something like I don't know how to pronounce it. And we go in and it's this like 10story building, super high-end. There's like royalty there. I feel like from the Middle East, just people of all sorts of walks of life, right? So, we make an appointment. We get the executive package. Cost costs like $1,000. I want to say I want to pay I paid like $1,200 maybe. So, we go in there and they do like every test known to humankind. Like everything. They do chest X-rays. They do like uh everything for your organs. They they do a a heart test. Like they have you run on a thing. They they monitor like everything. They have you pee. They have you poop in a cup. They take your blood. Dude, they do everything. And I got I have a like a 10page report on everything on my body. And uh it turns out I have like fatty liver, which is a very common thing for Americans. >> But you're right. It's like you can't order these tests here in the US because you have to exhibit symptoms. And in in that place where we were at, they just do the diagnosis. They don't do any kind of like treatment for it. And that's probably because they don't want to have a conflict of interest, maybe. I don't know. But the hospital doesn't treat against anything. It just purely is a diagnostic center. And they did just about like every test I could ever think of for $1,000. >> How long did that take? >> And it took three hours. And I got the results within 8 hours. No, dude. It It's amazing. Like, so if you ever want to do that, I would highly recommend going to Thailand. >> Thailand. >> In Bangkok? >> In Bangkok. Yeah. >> Interesting. >> Get the executive package. Cory got like everything. >> And how much was it? >> $1,000. >> That's not bad. >> No, it's amazing. I wish you had an option to opt out or like just some sort of like some sort of health insurance that's just catastrophic over like $50,000 because so far what I've done I found it cheaper just pay for everything out of pocket. Like I'm buying prescriptions out of pocket. I'm going and just telling them I'll pay cash. I I did a whole heart screening. >> It's cheaper off of and I I was asking like okay they asked me do you want to go through insurance? Uh, and I was like, "Does insurance cover this?" They're like, "Sometimes, but we're going to be booked a few weeks out." And I was like, "Can I just pay cash and come today?" And she's like, "Can you come right now?" And I was like, "Yeah." Okay. I paid 165 bucks, went in the same day. I just left, did it, and got my results back in 3 days. >> Does that ever make you wonder like as you get older if you realize how corrupt and how unfair the healthcare industry is, does that make you think outside of that and like how many other things are not good for you? like the the food and that we eat and like everything about the quality of our life here in the US. Do you ever think about that? >> I I saw uh it was an Instagram post or like a Tik Tok that says like >> you know when you're growing up when you go to the grocery store and you realize that 90% of it is extremely unhealthy and now it's all I see. I walk in the grocery store and thinking, who would eat this, right? >> It's awful. Like everything has a ton of added sugar. They had sugar. The amount of sugar in ketchup, >> right, >> is surprising. Like sugar in that really. And then you start looking at the sugar content of everything. They put sugar in everything. >> High fructose corn syrup is in everything. Yeah. >> Yeah. I don't know. I feel like the older I get, the more I become a conspiracy theorist about everything. Sound like that grumpy old guy that's just like, I don't trust anything. >> I don't trust anyone. I don't know if you're noticing that about yourself. >> No, it's just just when it when it comes to >> Okay. governmentrun running things. >> So everything [Laughter] >> No, not necessarily. I mean, healthcare, I don't think that's a governmentr run thing. I think it's just the insurance companies that are just finding ways to gouge and and a lot of that it like certain things are really run up by lawyers and like insurance costs are high because it's so easy to litigate and so they have to be high because your chance of litigation is high because lawyers are very quick to serve you with something. Okay. Well, I guess we'll agree to disagree. I don't know. >> I've definitely become a lot more skeptical of things. >> Yeah, >> for sure. Everything. When I was a kid, I was extremely naive. And then you get burned a few times because you're naive and then you just have to become selective with what you decide to trust in, >> right? >> Not trust. So, but I I agree. Yeah. And really quick, I just want to say it is wild that we're almost at the end of the year, which means holidays are approaching. And for any of you who have hosted, you know that it could often be expensive and stressful. But it doesn't have to be that way because our sponsor, Wayfair, helps you tackle everything you need in one place at prices that just make sense. Wayfair has something for every style in home. You'll find holiday decor like wreaths, trees, and lights, plus everything you need to host, cookware, serveware, and festive touches to make the space feel complete. And yes, you can even get a full Christmas tree delivered to your front door. 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Now, really quick, I just want to say that when Jack and I first started the Ice Coffee Hour now over 5 years ago, we had to figure out everything ourselves from the best cameras to use, the best editing equipment, how to get guests on. Every day was a brand new challenge. That's why if you're starting or running your own business, you know how valuable today's sponsor is, and that would be Shopify. Shopify is basically your all-in-one business partner. They power millions of businesses worldwide, from major brands like Mattel and Gym Shark to entrepreneurs just getting started. And here's a fun fact. If you've shopped online in the US, there's a really good chance it was actually through Shopify because they power about 10% of all American e-commerce. What's really great about Shopify is that they give you access to a complete design studio with hundreds of readytouse templates to build a beautiful online store that perfectly matches your brand. There's no coding needed and their AI tools even help you write product descriptions and enhance your product photos. Shopify also makes marketing extremely easy with simple email and social campaigns to reach customers wherever they're scrolling. Plus, they handle everything from inventory to shipping to returns. Basically, all of the complicated stuff you do not want to deal with. So, if you're ready to sell, you're ready for Shopify. Turn your big business ideas into So, sign up for your $1 a month trial at shopify.com/ic or just click the link down below in the description. Seriously, guys, it is one of the best ways to start a business. Shopify.com/ic. I could not recommend them more. Thanks again to our sponsor Shopify. And now, let's get back to the episode. Are you bullish or bearish for the US economy? >> From an investment perspective, very bullish from a quality of life. And I don't think it'll be the best country to live in for the next 50 years. I don't think it'll be the safest. I don't think it'll be the highest quality of life or the longest uh lifespan. >> You think Switzerland? >> I think Switzerland's far better. Yeah, for sure. >> What about Japan? >> Probably better. Yeah, probably better. >> Yeah, >> I think we're going to see a lot of people our age retiring in other countries. >> I think so, too. >> I think that's is just the only way they're going to be able to do it. If you have $200 to $500,000 saved, >> right, >> and you're 60 years old, >> nobody by the time they're 60, like very few people get to that amount. >> If you're lucky enough to have $500,000 saved at the age of 60 and you're done with work and you want to retire and you lose your job because a robot just took it, >> you can go anywhere in the world and live a fantastic life on $500,000. >> I totally agree. Yeah, there's a lot of alternatives. I I think that's going to happen. In terms of the US economy, what are your leading bullish indicators >> terms of an investment perspective? >> Yeah. >> Well, I think the same reasons that uh got us here in the first place. I think we'll still remain the world reserve currency. And I I do think there will be a challenger. I think Jerome Pal even said that he's like it's okay. There's going to be probably two competing ones. There probably going to be China's currency. It's going to be our currency. But as long as we have the world reserve currency, I I think it it will always squeeze asset prices up no matter what because we have the money printer. And as long as the world is still in need of those currencies, of those units, then we'll always export our inflation to the rest of the world. And with that money, they'll be buying our assets. They'll be buying our treasuries cuz they'll want an interest on it. And that'll push everything from equities to treasury bonds. That'll always >> What determines the world reserve currency? Is it just like who has the strongest military? >> I would say that was a big part of it. Yeah, I think that definition is changing obviously which is why the dollar is losing dominance over time. Like not to be that guy. >> I'll show you that. >> The dollar has had its worst year I think since 1972. >> Yeah. 2025 we've lost 10%. And here's what's interesting. If uh here strong versus we don't let's see. Oh, there we go. So in 2025, the Dixie index, which is measures the strength of the dollar, in 2025's lost 10%. Which is kind of crazy. So what that means is like I opened up my investment account. I look at my stocks. So year to date on this portfolio, I'm up like 14%. Which sounds really good. Like cool, like that's great. 14% that's not bad. But the reality is I'm only up like 4%. Right? Because the dollar's lost 10%. Which means if you didn't get a pay raise this year that was 10%. Then you lost money in terms of purchasing power. So that $100 at the beginning of this year now buys you $90 worth of stuff. That's literally this year alone. Which means we're all forced to participate in the market. Which is another answer to your question like why is the US going to continue to go up? Because we are literally forced to put our money in these assets. If we don't, we lose purchasing power. But here's the thing I'm noticing in terms of daily purchasing power over the last year. You say it the dollar's down 10%. >> But I'm not seeing real estate cost 10% more. I'm not seeing groceries costing 10% more. I'm not seeing gas costing 10% more. I I'm seeing a lot of those basically in line. >> Do you go to grocery stores? >> Yeah. >> Where do you go? >> Trader Joe's. >> Trader Joe's? >> Yeah. Why? >> That's like That's not middle class. Trader Joe's. No. Trader Joe's is nice. I like Trader Joe's. Yeah. I thought you said Whole Foods. >> No. I know. Where' you go? Arrowan. >> Awan. OB. It's still the same price, >> dude. The $20 strawberry is still $20 per strawberry. >> That's funny. >> I'm just not seeing everything rise by 10%. If anything, I'm seeing gas prices are down a little bit. Um, energy prices are more or less the same. >> Um, I don't know. But but maybe that's because I'm so isolated here in Vegas. >> Potentially. Yeah, I mean I think we're definitely losing purchasing power over time. We're making more. We're printing more money. It's constantly something that's going to keep happening. Um, one thing I actually found really interesting is I don't know if you saw this. Um, did you see that? So, Bergkshire Hathaway, Warren Buffett's company, in the last 27 years, it's actually matched the price performance of gold. Look at this. So in the last 27 years, gold >> gold and Birkshire Hathaway, they've basically been the same. >> So what does that tell you? >> And then there's this one. So the total returns, it actually goes back to 25 years. This is just a 20-year against the S&P 500. So literally a shiny rock has outperformed all the smartest people on Wall Street, all the innovation. That's kind of nuts. Sometimes I worry that these are very selective dates. >> I knew I thought you were going to say that, but like 25 year period. It's not like I was like, let's start right here and at a very recent time. It's a 25 years worth of innovation. But sometimes going back 30 years could change the picture quite quite a bit. or when you look at it from 1978 to today, you get a bit of a different idea because gold, my understanding is that gold just hit its inflation adjusted price as to what it was back in the 1980s. >> Yeah, it's caught up for sure. >> It's caught up. So, if you invested in the 1980s, you would have the same amount of money today as you would back then adjusted for inflation. And that's after >> what is that 40 years, 45 years, almost 50 years we'll call it. And you have the same amount of money as back in the 1980s if you invested at the >> P. Sure. Sure. But the most brilliant investor like Warren Buffett 25 years hasn't been able to outperform gold. >> It does make me worry too that maybe Bitcoin could be one of those of like Bitcoin's version is the 1980s version of gold, >> right? Where it doesn't do anything for 25 years, right? >> And then 50 years later you're like, "Oh my gosh, it just hit $2 million. It's inflation adjusted." >> Could totally happen. Could totally happen. Yeah. I don't know. I don't know what to draw from that conclusion. It's just like that's that's kind of crazy to me though that a shiny rock was able to outperform >> some of the smartest minds in the world. >> I think it's just the lack of confidence in the United States dollar right now is really contributing to that. And tariffs I don't think are helping confidence and I think people just want a safe place to store their cash. And in terms of a safe safe place to put their money, stocks investors feel like is overvalued. the dollar. They don't have faith that it's going to be worth the same three years from now. Bitcoin is a bit too volatile. Where do they put it now? Gold, silver, real estate, but even real estate is expensive relative to the current interest rate, >> right? And also, >> so it seems like Yeah, it makes sense how how gold >> and also interest rates are going down, which weakens the dollar. So, you know, less demand >> from foreign countries to buy our treasuries. So that also weakens the dollar which partially contributes to the 10% loss in purchasing power. It's a lot of things. Yeah. >> I'm curious, have you made more money investing or with YouTube over the past year? >> So far, definitely YouTube. By far. >> Definitely. By far. >> By far. >> Have you ever had a year where you made more investing than YouTube? >> Before YouTube. >> Oh, yeah. >> Before YouTube. But I hope it doesn't come across that way on my YouTube channel. I'm not like, "Hey, I'm the investment guru. You should follow me because I make more money." I think I'm pretty transparent about YouTube being my main source of income. But I think on a long-term scale, I think obviously investments will make a lot more money than YouTube, but investing just takes forever. >> Yeah. But you can't compare the two. Like even if you're in the market earning 8%, you can't compare that to like a job that you're working at 8 hours a day, 5 days, six days a week. >> Yeah. I I think most importantly, as long as I don't position myself and I'm not dishonest with people and I'm not like, "Hey, look at my portfolio and look how much money I have. you should buy my course cuz I know what I'm talking about. I hope I'm pretty transparent about that and I don't think that should be a secret that YouTube is, you know, mainly it. >> And so why did you give up investing in dividend stocks? >> I didn't. I still have all my portfolio. >> So you you still held on to them, but you you didn't continue buying more of them. >> Correct. Yeah, I still have all of it. >> What What do you make annually on your dividends? >> Like 30k. >> That's not bad. >> That's not bad. That's that's an income. >> Why were you doing dividend stocks instead of just normal? Uh, I think it made it really easy because the FIRE community, you know, they preach the 4% rule and all these things. It's really easy to plan for retirement because you can see what your monthly income is. And I really like that aspect of it. And the reason that I changed it now back to index funds is just because of my tax rate. Like I think if it wasn't being taxed at the rate that I am, I'd be totally okay with staying in dividends. I think dividends are extremely powerful and I I would never knock anybody for being a dividend investor. I think it's really powerful. I know you don't like dividends. I know you're mostly an index fund guy, too, but >> it's just the taxes. I look at the taxes and I'm like, "Oh my gosh, when when you're earning so much from a job and then you get a dividend, uh, you know, obviously if it's qualified, that helps, but it's still it's a forced tax payment. So, automatically 20% >> gets gets taken to the side and then if you pay a net investment tax on top of that, there's another 3.8% 8% and then there's potential state taxes on top of that. Uh it really adds up. Like imagine living in a state like California and you have a short-term capital gain. You're paying 37% federal. Then you could pay another 10% to the state uh to the state and then another 3.8 as a net investment tax. So you could very easily all of a sudden pay more than 50% >> right >> investing your money. That's no sense. Unless you had it in a Roth, in which case it would be tax free, >> correct? >> Right. So that's a workound, but you're obviously limited to like what 7,000 is it now? >> Yeah. >> Yeah. So I want to also talk about alternative investments because you bought a bunch of Pokemon cards. >> Yeah. >> So you have that. I >> still have that. >> How much money do you have in Pokemon cards? >> Uh probably like 150 to 200. >> 150 to two 150 to $200,000. >> Yeah. >> Andre's got an amazing collection. He He has something that I want. >> You could buy it. >> It could be yours for the cheap price of 300. >> No, I'm kidding. I'm kidding. I'm kidding. >> So, you have $150 to $200,000 of Pokémon cards. >> Would you Would you spend these Pokemon? >> That's I will say that that's the principal cost. Like that's my initial cost. What What is It might be less. It might be more. I have no idea. >> If I offered you I think you paid 150 grand >> for the base set. Yeah. >> If I offered you 150, would you take it? >> Uh I don't think so. You wouldn't take it? No, I don't think so because you can't find that set. So, my set is one of 11 known to exist and one of only 15 that will ever exist. And the reason that we know that is because there's one card in it. There's this card called Chansy. And the shadowless PSA 10. There's only 15 of them known to exist. And it's still been at 15 through the Logan Paul era. Like remember when Pokemon blew up and everyone was buying and everyone was grading cards? Dude, it's stuck at 15 the whole way through because that's like the hardest card to grade. So, from that set, a PSA Shadowless Chansy is like impossible to get. So, there's 11 known sets like mine that exist and all the people that own them are like multi-millionaires. Like, they don't need the money. So, you're not going to get them to sell unless they just absolutely need it. So, that's that's >> I would buy it from you. I'd buy it at the price you paid. If you just want to say, "I want to cash out of it." >> Yeah. I'm sure you could also probably sell it for more. >> Maybe. I I think over time probably, but I just I don't I have not seen that set since I've bought it. This set, here's the thing with with Andre set and just Pokémon in general. With your set, they don't trade and so you don't know what price it's worth. It's also really difficult to sell because the market for that is very, very, very small. And usually the the the trades that do happen, like the buys, they're off market, so you're never seeing them. It's not like it's on eBay or something. >> That's interesting. >> Yeah. >> And and and what about watches? I remember we were all in Japan at the same time last year. You ended up buying what watch? >> Uh I bought a long zona a data graph. It's a platinum data graph. I believe the reference number is like 403.035. It's a platinum data graph. And the watch is like iconic cuz it's a chronograph and it's one of the most iconic chronographs that was ever released. I think it was released in like 1998 and it was the it was the watch that changed high-end watchmaking or high herology as people call it cuz it forced brands like PC Philippe and AP to make their movements inhouse because prior to that watch they were all manufactured and modified from a company called Lummania. was the Lummania movement. So all these high-end watch companies, they would buy that movement, they would tweak it, and they would put it into their watches. In 1998, during like the the watch whatever gathering that they do, that watch came out and like stunned the world. And from that moment onward, the new benchmark for a high-end watch was an in-house movement. And so then what is the what did you pay for that watch and what is the current value of it? I want to say that because we talked to Nico Leonard. We talked to like another watch guy. >> Yeah. >> And got his opinion on it and they said that it was the most likely the cheapest uh data graph in the whole world like that I found in Japan. >> And I asked the the sales associate I was like when was this watch listed? And they literally said yesterday. I was like are you just saying that? And they're like no we just got it in yesterday. I look at the reference number and it has it it matches to like my birthday, like how old I am, like like crazy stuff. And I was not planning on buying it, but I've always wanted one of those watches. So, I paid 54K for it. 54 grand. >> It was the cheapest one by probably $20,000. >> Yeah. So, like I think the next cheapest one I don't know what the next cheapest one on the market is, but probably in the '7s, like low7s. And this was at a time when the US toy yen conversion rate was really good. >> Yeah. >> Like it had just ticked >> and there's no sales tax. >> And there's no sales tax. >> Yeah. >> And so you got a smoking hot deal? >> I think so. Like if I wanted to get my money out of it, I think I easily could. >> So I'm curious, why are watches in Japan such a good deal? I've seen so much media on the secondhand luxury watch stores in Japan and how you can go and get like the craziest deals imaginable on some of the nicest, you know, watches like Rolex, PEX, APS over there. Why is that? I think, well, at least part of the reason is because anything that's used in Japan, just because like their culture, they keep everything in such like neat condition. It's like pristine. They have things that are like vintage from like the 80s and they look brand new. And they also don't like to like Japanese people don't like to buy secondhand. They always go for new. I think because culturally maybe there's like bad things associated maybe with like buying used things. So from that reason alone in Japan their market is not necessarily for Japanese people. So all the people that are buying the watches are foreigners that are flying into Japan. So that's a smaller market than the entire country of Japan obviously. So, I think the the prices are generally lower. At least that's one of the reasons why I think that >> Yeah, there's more supply than demand >> for sure. >> Uh Japan is also really against anything counterfeit. And if they're caught selling any fake watch or any like kind of Frankenstein watch, they're going to be blacklisted forever. And these businesses have been around for decades with perfect ratings. So, you don't really have to worry about like getting ripped off or getting like a fake watch. >> And we asked, we're like, "Do you guys sell fake watches?" are like, "No, you can't do that here." Now, what's also interesting is that I heard that uh a lot of Japanese people believe that when you buy a secondhand watch, the original owner's soul comes with that watch, like their soul is somehow attached to it. Okay? >> And so when you buy that watch, you get a part of their soul. >> And so it's not considered like good to you don't know what you're getting in that sense. And so they just don't want to buy second. >> So from a culture perspective, yeah, there's a little bit of uh superstition to it. >> Correct. >> Yeah. >> So yeah, >> but you get a great deal. So the other interesting thing is that they will not really negotiate is that just they they price it at a point where like if it sells great, but if it if it doesn't like I tried to negotiate uh a Zenith Rolex Daytona and I was saying like hey can you bring this price down here? Can we save here? Can wouldn't do it. And then Macy found a ring that she wanted. And I'm like, "Okay, but if I buy this, can we throw in the ring at like half price?" No. The the most they did is they said, "We're going to throw in a complimentary like an extra Rolex box >> and we'll give you the extra box if you buy it." Okay, fine. >> But yeah, they don't negotiate either. >> No. So that that's that's part of the reason why I would say. >> But what's cool is that they can take AMX, which is really nice. And they don't charge you an extra fee. >> Well, we did get Why are you laughing, Jack? Because it work. No, because the points just imagine putting that on a 2% or imagine the Robin Hood credit card 3% back or the Coinbase card and get 4% >> Gemini get some Bitcoin back. >> Yeah. I'm just saying it's it's like not only are you getting no sales tax, a favorable exchange rate, but you could then put it on a credit card to get an extra 4% back. >> Right. We bought our watches within a day of each other. Yeah. >> Yeah. So that was >> How much did you spend on your watch? >> I think total including because I count the exchange rate and I count also getting points back on the credit card. It was like 19 something. >> And what do you think it's worth? >> Lowend. I'm talking like fire sale 21. And that's like fire sale. I got to sell it in 24 hours. I think it's probably worth 24. Wow. >> Did I tell you that I that I bought a ring in Japan and I appraised it and what happened? >> Oh, I didn't tell you that story. Oh, dude. We were walking right by that store that Graham and I bought our watches from. It was called a Okura. Um, and I look and I'm like, dude, that's that's a really cool ring. It was it was a women's black opal ring. Okay. And I I'm for whatever reason just obsessed as Graham is like with aquariums. I'm like obsessed with Australian opals. And for whatever reason, I just know it like disproportionately more than most people know about opals. And I was like, "Dude, that ring is so cool." So I go in the store and I'm like, "How much is that ring?" And they're like, " $600?" I'm like, "There's no way this ring is $600." Is a platinum ring with diamonds and a black opal stone that's like 2 or three carats? And I'm like, "This is a $10,000 ring. There's no way $600." And I was like, "Is this an Australian opal or an Ethiopian opal?" Cuz there's two types of different opals. Ethiopian opal which is I think hydrophonic which means it absorbs water or doesn't one of the two and then the other opal was Australian opal which repels water. It does not absorb water but they have different characteristics. And I was like which one is that? And they told me that it was an Ethiopian opal. And I was like that that's not an Ethiopian opal. That looks like an Australian opal. I know my opals. Okay. And everyone in the store who was shopping there, they were like no that that's definitely Ethiopian cuz Australian opals are only black. I'm like that's BS. I know that's not true. So, I I gamble it and I risk it. I'm like, I'll just I'll buy it, right? $600. And I'm bringing it back to the US and I go to get it approved or uh appraised. And the appraisal came in at like $9,500. A ring that I bought for $600. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. It was crazy. >> I guess you never know when that niche knowledge is going to come to your >> Yeah. Like that was like again so so Jack and I talked about this like you guys ever like go through life and then something happens and you're like I live in a simulation >> all the time, >> right? Like we talked about how I this is true story. It was like it was like midnight. It was like past midnight and we were I was in a random arcade store with me and my friends in Kyoto of all places in Japan. Kyoto. >> I don't even think I knew you were in in Japan. >> We had no idea that each of us were in Japan but we were in Japan together. And I look and I'm like, "Dude, that that's freaking Jack." We go up like the odds of us being in a city that we didn't plan to meet at past midnight at a random arcade store in a city like Kyoto. Like that was insane. And just like like the whole random knowledge of like an Opal ring and I'm like what are the odds that like I would find this random store that had this random ring that I knew so much about. >> What have you done with the ring? >> I still have it. I got it appraised and I'm keeping it. And you know, once I get married, that'll be like my proposal, right? >> Oh, that's nice. >> Yeah. Yeah, that was cool. >> Paid for the trip, too. >> Well, if I sell it, but I'm not going to sell it. >> But but it does go to show you that if you come in with some knowledge, >> basically go to Japan, buy the right thing, and pay for the entire trip, and basically get the trip for free. >> Yeah. Yeah, that's true. What would you say is the best investing advice you've ever heard? I don't know. I I think like the most important investing quality of people that I've seen that have built wealth is like their ability to delay gratification. It's just their ability to project into the future and see that there's an older version of themselves that is grateful for their younger self saving and investing money and delaying that grat delaying buying the things that you think will make you happy. And on that note, I don't know if you guys agree with this, but like for me, when I want something and I'm like, I really don't want to buy it, but I really want it. And when I buy it, I feel this like sense of relief. But I figured out that the relief comes from not in owning that thing, but in the peacefulness that comes with not wanting it anymore. Does that make sense? >> Mhm. >> It's like, oh, I'm so glad like I have it now. I don't want it, and now it's it's not bugging me as much. And so if you're able to extrapolate that into the future, you could be like, "Okay, I could buy this thing, but maybe I can just skip the buying part and then go directly to the not wanting it." >> A lot of the pleasure is in being able to buy something. >> Exactly. >> And also, I I heard some wisdom which was not wanting something is just as good as having it. >> Right. That's And so you could take someone that like, you know, really really really doesn't want >> a a really fancy car for some reason >> and they're living just as good as someone that like bought that fancy car just because it doesn't matter to them. Like they have other priorities, other things that make them happier such as an aquarium >> or other things that are just more significant to them. But if you don't want something, it's just as good as having it. >> I remember reading a piece of advice like on the old fire forums that was like, >> "Oh, use this one trick." It was like I could buy that. I was like, "Oh, what is this?" And I clicked on it and it was like if the next time you want to buy something, save up enough money to buy it and then see how you feel about it. >> And often times just the ability like you said to buy that thing is as good as owning it. So like it's like a it's my I could buy that trick. >> So the key is you could either save and make enough money to be able to buy the things that you want or you could just want fewer things. >> Exactly. Yeah. you go directly to that part if you can. >> Um, and then also like I think this is the dividend brain of me which is like most people I think when they when they compare if they want to buy something they're like well how many hours of my work does it cost? Like if something's $100 and they get paid $20 an hour like okay it cost me 5 hours of my life to buy that thing. And that's how most people think about purchasing things. But what what dividend investing has really taught me is to instead think about things in terms of 4%. So it's like how much money do I have to have for that thing to passively exist in my life? And that's what we talk about all the time. >> That's how everything is. >> I love that the 4% rule. So like how much money do I need to invest? If you don't have that much money invested in the market, then you have no excuse to own that thing. Like you can't afford it. That's I've always looked at affording. >> So is that 4% per year or 4% of the the >> Well, if it depends if it's like a recurring cost like for example if it's like a Netflix subscription. What's Netflix right now? Per$12.99. Let's say $13, right? Times 12, that's $156 a year, right? >> That's 25 >> or divided by 04. That's $3,900. If you don't have $3,900 invested in the market at 4%, >> you cannot afford that. >> You cannot afford that $13 a month. Like, that's just how you think about it. I've always thought about it that way. I think that's the coolest way to think about it. And so that that's what motivated me to to build a dividend portfolio cuz then I could be like, "Okay, now I know how much money I'm passively making and now I can delegate what things I can and can't afford." >> It's so addicting once you start doing that though because I remember >> in a separate vein, it wasn't dividends, but for me it was YouTube income because I viewed that as all passive because I would have done it anyway. And I remember making a dollar a day and thinking, "Oh, wow. that pays for an all you could eat sushi every single month for free. >> And then it started to become, wow, I got a free phone bill every single month at $50 a month. And then my car insurance is hundred. Oh wow, my car insurance is now free. And everything starts to like stack and then pretty soon it's like, wow, my mortgage is now free, >> right? >> This is free. This is free. Now I just live for free because I would be doing this anyway and I'm making money. Yeah, that's so cool. And then you eventually realize that the quickest way to being financially free isn't necessarily by building a bigger portfolio. It's literally by removing those recurring costs cuz that's way easier to do than needing that money invested at 4%. Just like, hey, if I could remove this this car payment or this like I just saved a h 100red grand from like retirement. That's like that's the coolest way of thinking about it. >> Yeah. Do you think that the money printing in the United States is a strategy? This is this is a conspiracy theory right here to keep people poor. >> That's a really good question. >> I don't think on that level of conspiracy to where I think that is an intentional thing that we're doing. I don't think people are that organized to be like this is what keeps people poor. Let's keep doing I I don't think that's the case. What do you think? You think it's intentional? I tend to not buy into conspiracies, but also if you think about it, any money printing drives up assets. Assets are owned by wealthy people, not poor people. Poor people suffer with inflation. It's just what's happening. And they're printing money to try to help the poor people, but it's like clearly not. So, I don't understand. >> I don't think money printing has anything to do with poor people. Why would they want them to be wouldn't they would benefit more from people having more money because they spend more? Like if if you gave $100,000 to an average person, I I almost guarantee an average person it'll be gone almost instantly. >> They're not going to save it. So it's better for people to make more money. Like there's no incentive for the government to keep people >> Well, technically speaking, poor people are going to be easier to control with the government. What I what I think is more systemically realistic is that the school system teaches people just to work and follow in line, listen to another person, do as instructed, you take your lunch here, you start here, you end here, you do this whole thing so you could work for someone else. It's just a very outdated system that I think is probably more likely that they keep people in like a working hamster wheel and then they shove it down throats of like, oh, it's good to go to college and then now you borrow money, now you're in debt. And then it's, oh, but you have to buy a house because that's the American dream. Now you buy a house. Now you now you have a $50,000 student loan and a $300,000 mortgage. You're not going anywhere. and now you have to take that job to keep making those payments because you don't want to lose your house and you can't default on your student loans even with bankruptcy. So now you're kind of stuck. But then you're 35 and you think, "Oh crap, I'm getting to an age where I should probably have a kid." So now you have a kid. Now you definitely can't take the risk to start your own business or do anything. So now you're stuck working that job you don't like to pay for the house, to pay for the student loans, and now you have a kid to support. and now you're just kind of and so you keep working till you're 70 and then you die. >> Right. So you're saying it's kind of a result of our own decisions and kind of as a byproduct of a shared delusion that we all have about what it's like to live a >> I heard that a lot of the school system was was created by a factory owner. And this could totally be untrue and I'm just rephrasing what someone else told me. Was dictated by a factory owner who wanted more workers. And so they they set up a whole system to basically keep people in this loop of like learning how to work for somebody else. And that makes sense. >> Makes perfect sense. Yeah. >> So I don't know if that's true or not, but >> I think that's separate from the money printer question, but >> the money printing I think is purely a result of the government getting out of control in their spending and this is the only way they could get out of it is just like what do they do? >> Here's how here's how I see the whole money printing thing. The money printer allows governments to do whatever the hell they want, whenever they want. Because if we operated on a fixed supply kind of system, how long do you think people would put up with fighting wars or whatever the government wants? Cuz like if you were to fund a war, let's say, you actually have to tax people. You actually need the money and the revenue from people. But if you couldn't print money, if you could print money, then you can do whatever you want. And so I think that's a byproduct of power being exercised beyond what what's in our best interest. And that's what Bitcoin is trying to fix. Like that's why people are obsessed with Bitcoin is because it's a fixed supply and therefore governments have to be responsible. Therefore, they can't just do whatever they want. >> So then what would you say is the main thing that is keeping people poor? Then >> just a lack of financial education and literacy mostly and lifestyle decisions. I don't know. For whatever reason, these questions make me think of uh George Collins. Do you guys know who that is? The comedian. >> He's like, "Oh, yeah. The rich exist to like kind of inspire the middle class and then the poor exist there to scare the out of them." >> What do you mean? >> Well, because it's like keep keep being in the hamster wheel. Like if you don't if you don't want to be like these people, you got to keep working. You got to keep doing it. >> And the keep working is look at this guy who just bought a Ferrari, >> right? You don't you want to be like that guy? But you definitely don't want to be like that guy. >> It's keeps you stuck in the middle, >> right? I heard somewhere that the worst thing you could do to someone is pay them $80,000 a year because it's just at the right point where they're making enough where they don't want to risk it, but it's not so little that they're forced to take big action and make significant moves to do something that would drive their income so much higher and give them so much more opportunity. It's like that safety middle where it's just enough to keep you going and especially if you get promised like a raise to 90k to then 100 you like you see the trajectory going up you're going to want to stick on that and not do your own thing. >> The slowly boiling crab, right? I don't know. I just feel like in order to be like if you think about it mathematically in order to be the one like if you think rich is to to have a lot of money if that's your definition of rich then you got to do like what the 99% don't want to do like to become the 1% which is literally the opposite of what everyone else does like not going out to eat in restaurants and saving money and not owning a car and bicycling to work. It's like that's what it takes just have enough escape velocity to get out of that. And I think that's what I focused so much on in my early 20s because my parents were immigrants and they didn't understand money and I was like, "Okay, let me not do that." >> I've really been following a lot of Alex Becker's videos. He has this new channel, Alex Becker Business >> and he talks a lot about what people have to do today who are young >> to make a lot of money. And he talks about just like if you want to be the that 1% who succeeds and does something like really big, think of what everyone else is doing and then don't do that, >> right? >> And you put yourself in uncomfortable positions. And one thing I really liked is he said the the moment you turn 18, move out of your house, >> live with five roommates, just have a mattress on the floor and a computer and figure it out. >> Yeah. >> And I think that that's pretty good advice. >> That's a great point. Yeah. I think a lot of people would benefit from doing that. And no Netflix, right? No video games. I think all three of us did our own version of all of that. Like I know you've done that. You've lived with like five roommates and you were house hacking. I know you did that. I did that in my own way with Airbnb and I was renting out a room. I was subleasasing. Like we all had to do that and do what I think 99% of people just would not put up with. But if you can just get to that escape threshold, like that escape velocity to where you're not reliant necessarily on that paycheck, even for a little to go out and, you know, build a business or whatever. >> It's interesting. I get really frustrated lately when I see people who are like 18 to 21 not doing anything and just kind of like coasting because I'm like they have no idea how much opportunities out there and just what they could get involved in. And I'm like, "Oh my gosh, it's just it it frustrates me to see it potential being wasted." >> You know, I've thought about that, too. And I'm I'm kind of like the devil's advocate on that because I think it's true that now more than ever, there's more economic opportunity to make money with so many different things, right? With like the Ubers, the Airbnbs, and like the the Task Grab, it's like the task economy. I I get that. And also with social media obviously like the the biggest opportunity, but I also feel like if I view it from that perspective, it's also very selfish because those are my interests. Like I'm interested in those things. So I'm like why aren't you doing that? But I feel like for a lot of people like what if they're not interested in that and they like look at the the last generation and you know their parents and like how they got screwed by the system. I could totally tell like why they would feel that way. I just feel like as a young guy, because that's like that's our audience. It's like 90 something% male. >> Uh you have to create some sort of value, right? >> There's got to be something that you're doing to stand out. >> And when you have that like that energy when you're young and you don't need to sleep 8 hours and you don't always look tired in videos because you didn't sleep and you're stressed, it's just like this. You have so much opportunity. That's where I get frustrated. >> Do you ever think you're lucky sometimes to be interested in the thing that happens to make a lot of money? >> Sometimes I look at Warren Buffett and I'm like, that's a cool skill that he has, >> but it's so like one-dimensional and he happens to exist in a world that rewards him greatly for it. >> I I think I got lucky in the sense that I >> I'm naturally a saver. No, I think I would have made money no matter what I would have done if if it were aquariums. I I know I would have made money doing aquariums because now some of these businesses that like the aquarium businesses, they're profiting like 3 million a year >> doing aquariums. >> That's cool. >> It's it's like incredible. It's a really really really good business, >> right? >> I would have done that. >> There's just like whatever interest you have, I bet there's a way to make at least one to 200,000 a year on schedule. At the end of the day, it's about like not necessarily your interests, but are you the type of person to like roll onto your back, right, and just like kind of let life happen to you, or are you the person that like comes up, fails against something, and then tries to learn from it and then uses that as like a tool in your belt to then, you know, help solve a problem later in life. It's just your ability to provide value and learn from failure. >> But then again, is that are you born with that or are you raised with that? >> Right? That's the That's the trillion. >> And here's an interesting one between Jason and Brett Oenheim. Twins raised same parents, same school, same experiences, completely different. >> In what way? >> Jason is very like type A, very motivated, business, works all the time. Brett is so laidback and chill. >> Is he lazy? >> No, I I wouldn't say he's lazy. Actually, no. I would I would not say he's lazy. I would say that he just isn't interested in that constant grind and hustle. He just has zero desire to work himself beyond what he needs. And I remember like this is years ago, but he would basically do enough business in real estate to chill for the rest of the year. >> Obviously, if there's a client or something that came up, he would do it. But some of these years, he can make, you know, quite a bit of money and then just like, "All right, I'm going to Greece for a while, just relaxing." And then if he needs more money, he'll just be like, "All right, I'm going to go and make more money." He just makes enough. It's just appear. He's He's got a natural ability to just go and make money. >> I really admire people like that. I don't think I'm one of those people. I'm not like I need to constantly grind and make more money. >> I don't know. Sometimes I feel like people are so poor that all they have is money basically. It's like if that's the only thing that drives you, that's cool. I just I can't relate with that. How has your definition of success changed then going from being like from an immigrant family not having a lot of money and then going through life earning a lot of money >> now to now having you know quite a bit of money post tax just like chilling. >> I think my definition has changed a lot like nowadays if I see someone with kids I'm like that's wealth to me. >> I don't know why I just view somebody with a family as as like being wealthy. probably cuz it also costs a lot of money to have kids and maintain a good family. But that's just to me like more important at this point. But also realize it's a privilege perspective because I didn't always have that perspective. It's obviously easy to have that when you have money. >> Speaking of family and relationships, what is the best relationship advice you've heard? And what does the red pill movement >> oh my god >> get right get right and wrong about dating? >> I don't think I I know enough about the red pill movement to like represent what it has right. You tell me. >> I don't know. >> You know what it is. >> You were telling me all of this red pill jargon. >> That's red pillar. >> Right before the podcast, you were like saying the craziest stuff. >> I was. >> Yeah. I was like, what do you >> So, what's the best relationship advice you've heard? >> Oh my gosh. I don't I don't think I've ever heard relationship advice. >> Never. >> Never. No. Not really. >> What is the best relationship advice? Like, what works for you in your relationship? >> Uh, yeah. I growing up I saw my parents have a very tumultuous and like very bad relationship. And I always equated having a like a crazy relationship where you always fight as like love. And I think over time that definition has matured and changed. Like I was like, "Oh, I'm clearly I'm fighting with like my girlfriend, so therefore that means we really love each other. And the more we fight, the more in love we are." Does that make sense? >> Mhm. >> And I think that's a really toxic way of viewing it. I think as I've matured and I've gotten older, I've realized that you can be chill and, you know, have your own time to yourself and not get like, you know, bothered by a lot of things and that can be love. And I didn't see that growing up. So, I think that's just like experience and time of realizing that. And also just being so much later in life to have kids or like to want a family. And I think that just comes from maturing, which I did not see my parents do cuz my parents had me when they were like 19. So, >> it's always crazy to me because I think, "Oh, man. If I had a kid at 18 years old, how old would they be now?" It's like 17, >> right? >> It's to I always do that. I'm like, "Hey, instead of having Bailey, if we had a kid, they'd be like 5 and a half years old." It's weird. >> But if you But if you had a kid now, do you think you'd look back on your life and be like, "I wish I didn't have a kid. I wish I could have just made a couple more million before I did it." It's less about that and more about just the the the time. I if I had a kid today and this a child appeared, I would regret not having traveled more and done experiences that you just can't do quite the same after having a kid. And I think travel is a big one. And I would have been like, "Oh man, instead of spending all the time working, I should have done all these other things that I just postponed." >> Really? I don't think you'd feel that way at all. I think you eventually get to do those things whether it's with your kids or after. >> Bill Perkins would he we cuz we talked about this on that podcast really opened my eyes and he's like your window is closing of you before kids >> and once you have a child the you that's sitting here today is never going to exist again in the same capacity. >> Yeah. >> And he said now is your time to do these things in your life because it's your last chance. >> And I was like oh wow he's he's correct. So, I'm in the mindset now where like, hey, now is a good time to travel, >> right? >> Take it a bit slower, do these things that uh I just don't want to keep putting it off forever. >> That's true. I don't think you traveled quite a lot, right? >> Yeah. >> Japan, >> right? >> Uh but I want to spend a year and and over the year maybe spend two months of the year just spread out throughout the year just traveling different places around. >> Do you have like a checklist of places you want to go and then you're like, "Okay, I'm ready for a kid." Or is it like how you feel or what's it based on? I think obviously I'd love a checklist, but I think you don't need to hit everything on the checklist, but you know, hitting 50% on that list would be pretty. >> How many places do you want to see? >> Probably four or five. >> Okay. >> But spend like a week and a half in each, >> right? >> So like two months out of the year, >> you know, every other month being away for like two weeks. >> Okay, >> perfect. Maybe every 3 months being away for >> Do you think you're working towards that, would you say? >> Yeah, we're planning uh to go away this year. doing a few little trips and then next year I want to plan and get >> because I feel like at the at the rate that you're traveling that I know you to travel like you're gonna take the next 10 years to get to the next five places >> cuz you don't travel a lot. >> I said that like Graham will treat everything as his priority. Like for example, some gas valve will go out on one of his rental properties and he has to spend like you know 6 hour of his time 6 hours of his time comparing quotes from different contractors stressing out about it. And that's just something that like should realistically be so insignificant in his life. But at the same heent [Music] places, it's like you should be spending that time optimizing for life fulfillment, purpose, meaning, quality of life, >> figuring out a few places you want to go to, picking some people you want to go visit them with. It's like that right there is actually like being meaningful with the way that you're spending your time. >> Yeah. >> And you you you prioritize so many other things that realistically you hate doing. you don't need to be doing over the things that you want to do but you don't do. >> Yeah, that's true. >> That's a great observation. That's a really good way of putting it from from what I've observed of you being the way you are. And I I'm similar in the sense like once something's on my mind like I got to do it right now. But then the things that are so important to us, we sometimes forget to do and plan for and just think they're going to like happen organically, but they don't. And I just feel like, man, I think about having a kid and I'm like, I'm 36 years old right now. When my kid's 36, I'm going be 72. That's that's kind of depressing to me. >> I think we're going to live until into our 90s. >> But will we have the same like quality of life and health? Like right now, you're in your prime in terms of how you observe and view the world and experience it, how your health is like when you're 70, like okay, you might live to 100, but are you going to be as fit and will you care about all this stuff? Like probably not, you know? >> I don't know. I'm planning to live to like I want to hit 100. I'm just saying >> planning to do it. >> I want to hit 100. I think that would be that would be ideal. So, I'm doing everything I can to live to 100. >> Okay. I I would love to live 100, but >> you got to go to Thailand and get those buyer markers. >> You do, man. >> That's going to be the saving up now. >> Not take more than 3 hours. Hopefully. >> Could be days, man. I don't know. >> We've come full circle. >> I just can't. >> We've gone full sand. I'm not like you where I could just like >> Wait, so are are you are you planning to have kids? You think >> one day? >> One day. >> Like when? >> I don't put a win on it, but uh at at some point, yes, I would like to have kids. >> Do you think you'll be like literally everyone that we know that's like if I had known I would have done it sooner? >> Do you think you'll be that way? >> It's impossible to say cuz I'm not there. Maybe, but maybe not. But I just feel like we've heard that and I've heard you tell me that is just anyone who has kids is like ah like I was scared and I was putting it off but I wish I had done it earlier. And if you know that now does that affect anything? >> Maybe. >> All right. >> But maybe not. I don't know. Just because other people say it doesn't mean I always follow it, right? >> I think you just come to your own conclusion. >> Yeah. I wouldn't know either. I don't have kids yet. >> And then what is the ideal amount of money to have? Enough to do anything you want with but not too much to where you want to do nothing. >> How much is that? >> Somewhere in between. >> The amount you got to give an amount. >> The way I would define it is just enough. Like enough is different for everybody. >> So what's enough for you? >> Um enough to do to do what with though? Like just to live? >> Yeah. For what's the perfect amount of money for Andre Jack? I I would say I'd be happy with it with like $2 million. >> Even a million. I'd be happy with I would make it work. >> What do you mean? I'm asking what's the perfect amount? >> You could just select an amount. >> You could just select an amount. Yeah, sure. >> So, select an amount. >> What's your guys' the ideal like a perfect? That makes no sense to me at all. What does that even mean? >> I would say I would say the perfect amount of money for me is 10 million bucks. I was going to say 10 million too initially, but I'm like, yeah, but like five million is fine, too. >> 5 million's great. >> Yeah, exactly. So, like, how do you answer that question? Five million is fine. 10 is better. 20 might be better. >> But 50 might be even better. >> You know what I'm saying? >> When I asked when I asked you the question though, you're like, well, it's not so much that you don't want to do things. It's also not because you know what? On the age you get the money, too. How old are you? Like at 30, I'd say it's a different age than at 60. Dude, I do believe that having so much money though, like can be a curse at a certain point. Like I don't I haven't had enough to where it's like it's become a curse. But >> here phrase it. >> Yeah. >> You could gift somebody a lottery ticket >> and you could dictate how much money they get. How much would you give them >> and it wouldn't ruin their life. You don't want to give too much. All of a sudden it screws everything up. >> But you don't want to undercut them either because you could decide how much they get, >> right? Yeah. Yeah, I would say 10 million is a great amount. 10 million is great. >> I would say like like 4 million bucks. >> What's that 4 million? >> I would probably 4 million would be buying yourself a house, putting some money in stocks, spending a little bit of money. >> Give me like a picture of like how you've allocated that $4 million. You have $4 million net worth. What does that mean? >> $4 million net worth. Uh recently or this hypothetical situation? You said 4 million. >> Let's say you take 4% from that. That's $160,000 a year. Let's say you take 3% from that. it's 120 $10,000 a month. That's what you can spend. Realistically, they're going to go f off with some of the money. They're going to spend it. But if you have $10 million instead of $4 million, I do think that once you add the extra digit in there, people are going to be like, "Oh, I need a Ferrari. I need a Lambo. I need this. I need that." With $4 million, realistically, people are not going to be buying Well, I'm sure they will, but like I think 4 million is solid because it doesn't appear to be this insane insane insane amount of money where you're going to go buy a bunch of new Lambos, some Ferraris, and you could still just put it away in some stocks. But you're saying people or you? >> People. >> People. Okay. >> I bet they would. >> I think they would. I think for you give anyone a million dollars, they they'd be gone in a year. >> Okay. So, what's the perfect amount for someone to win in the lottery then? 50 bucks. >> But that's what I'm saying. Like, but I'm I'm assuming you're asking me or and I'm asking you, Jack, like what is your amount? Not not like hypothetic. >> Perfect amount of money I would say would be >> probably between 5 and 10 million. >> Okay. Mhm. >> Okay, that makes more sense. Yeah. me personally >> or for the average person cuz you were talking about average >> you personally >> 50 million >> 50 million. >> Yeah. Cuz it's not enough where you could just private jet all the time but you could get a nice piece of beachfront real estate, >> right? >> You could be by coastal. >> Sure. You could take first class plane tickets without really thinking through it and you could have a great collection of something that's unique. >> You don't think you do that with 20 million? >> No. No. You're not buying first class plane tickets with two beachfront prop dude. A nice beachfront property is going to be 8 to 12 million. >> It's that expensive property. Yeah. >> Just it. But you could even have just a normal 2500 ft house on the beach in a great location in Santa Barbara and that's going to be $12 million. The the thing that I take away from this conversation is that I'm very glad I am not in your perspective. I am so glad that I don't have that same perception of like how much I need. I think that's like a burden that I don't have that you do. If that makes sense. >> I don't think it's a burden. >> I think it's a complete burden. >> How is that a burden? It just is. >> Okay. So the the way I would define happiness for people is the difference or the delta between their reality and expectation, right? It's like where you are today and where you'd like to be. And the delta between where you are and 50 million or 100 million or billion is like crazy. Now once you've reached like let's say uh I guess it's like why are some of the richest people some of the most miserable people in the world? because their reality is like at utopian levels. Mhm. >> Where do you go from that point? There is no more expectation there. Like there's nothing money will increase. So therefore their happiness level there is there's no space there. There's no >> I would say I'm I would say I'm pretty happy though. I'd say most days like 10 being the happiest I've ever been in my life and one being like really unhappy. Most days I'm like a solid eight >> to like >> Yeah. 8.5. >> I'm not saying you're unhappy. I'm just saying anybody who ties their happiness to like some perceived like wealth level is it's like it's not a burden. >> I like I like having a goal and then going after the goal and always having something >> of like hey this would be cool like like your Pokemon collection like the 150 grand thing >> that's that to me would be like that would be cool >> that would be awesome to have. Yeah. Yeah. And so then I think, oh, I just aspect of something like here's an example of something I postponed for a long time. I really want a Tesla Model S and a used one, too. Like a 2023 Tesla Model S long range. >> I could go out and buy that thing right now. >> Okay. >> But I I purposely don't buy it >> cuz you're edging yourself. >> Yeah. way. But it's just it's just the just the idea of like but I could but I have fun going and looking and like every day be like is today the day that >> because you subconsciously understand that by owning that thing it's like that happiness that you have right now that excitement like that's what you're holding on to cuz you don't have it but you could get it anytime you want. That's exactly what I'm trying to prove. Yeah. But my point being is I'm still happy just not getting that thing as I am just looking at them online and maybe getting one one day. >> Right. That's fine. But that that proves my point that like there is some burden that is attached to like thinking that you'll be happier at like a $50 million thing. I I think at some point I get the car. I get the 2023 Tesla Model S. I get a good deal. I really really really enjoy it. >> And then after a year or two I think, oh wow, maybe this Model X. And then I just edge myself a little further. But like I'm but but I'm constantly just leveling up. It's like every year is a little better than the year prior. >> But here's the way I view it is once you're on that hamster wheel and like you'll find the next thing to edge yourself with, right? You'll never find finality in that spectrum. >> I would hate to find finality though, >> right? And I agree with that. But if you only attach that that level of like happiness to just material things that that's fine. I'm not saying it's wrong. But like for me, I think there's so many different aspects of life that you can chase and edge yourself with that are not necessarily attached to like some financial figure and still find happiness. >> But here's the thing. To get to that financial figure, you're not just making money out of thin air. You have to do something productive and you have to do something meaningful. So in the pursuit of that, you're doing something that's that's hopefully bigger than yourself. That's true. That's part of the process. >> Yes. But but that's financially, but then there's also so many different ways to explore that. Like that's you're talking about depth. I'm talking about broad, right? If that makes sense. Like you're talking about depth of >> have length and girth. >> Well, so I'm a kind of guy. I think you could still I think you could still hit that beachfront property with a nice yard that goes out into sand. the waves break. You could still do that while at the same time. >> Listen, I I rented an Airbnb in in Hawaii for like dude, I spent stupid amounts of money for like a week. I spent like 15 grand for a week on like it was like a $20 million house on a beach and I lived there for like a week. I'm like, this is cool, but like would I dedicate my entire life to chasing this thing? Like I'm like, no, I'll skip it. Like I I I don't want to attach my perception of like the journey of life to this thing that I just got to experience and it's cool, but like I'm cool without it. It's not the end of the world for me if I don't have that. It'd be nice to have, but I don't want to spend the rest of my life like not traveling or not having kids or not having more meaningful experiences in lie of this thing. >> I think you could do both. I think you could still pursue that and still have a meaningful life and have a family and all that sort of stuff. >> I think it for sure. It depends on how you want to structure your life. >> So there's nothing at this point that you want besides a family. >> I think so. Yeah. There's no nothing that I'm like, "Oh, I got to build a business cuz I want this thing." I'm so glad I don't feel that way. It's >> But what about a yard with a pool? >> That's nice. >> See, I got you thinking now. Now, here we go. I got that. You You don't have a yard in a pool. >> What? Well, I don't need a pool. You know what? It's way more enjoyable to have a pool to go to a friend's pool cuz they pay for it and they maintain it >> only if they heat the pool, which they don't do. >> My friends don't do cuz they don't want to spend the money. >> Nope. Because it's expensive. >> Dude, we went to Graham's July 4th party and he's like, "I'm not heating up the pool." Like, dude, I'll pay you $5 to heat up the pool today. >> Way more than $5. How much is that? I got to get that beachfront property, man. That $5 compounded in Bitcoin. >> I don't know. Haven't you like had the same experience where it's like eating someone else's snacks is always more enjoyable than like having it yourself or like going to swim at someone else's pool? It's just so much more enjoyable. >> I like to to have it myself, but I also don't I'm I have very few like desires. Like there aren't many things that I feel like I need in my life to be happy. >> Why is that? >> I I think it's >> But don't you want a beach house? No, no, no, >> no. Because because I just got another house and it's such a pain in the butt and I'm like, uh, like I just I want few things. >> But if you have $50 million, you don't have to worry about that. >> I would rather just rent it. You know, >> you could rent the house, Jack. There's nothing you have to buy. I like what I really love doing, what I absolutely love doing, and I wish I could do it more often, is work throughout the day, see my friends, eat some good food, play pickle ball at night. That's all I want. >> That's all I want. And I'll be extremely happy, and that's it. >> Do you think that's like boring or like wrong or like not at all? >> Okay. >> No. >> Okay. >> But then again, you walk in Jack's house and there are 30 pairs of shoes. The dining room is a pingpong table. >> Okay. >> The furniture is completely mismatched. >> And there's >> the new house. The new house is gonna be nicer. It's gonna have, you know, I'm gonna dress it up well. In fact, maybe I'll put some pictures here or at some future episode of the before and after old house, new house. >> Yeah. You got to subscribe because in like two months, you're going to see this new set and it's going to be amazing. >> Look incredible. >> Oh yeah. We have a big announcement to make here on the ice coffee hour, guys. this set that we've been using for the past few years, it will no longer be the set of the Ice Coffee Hour. Okay? If you want to get a behind thescenes glance at the set, tell you what, we'll post a picture on our membersonly page. Okay? We'll also unveil it as soon as it's done done. And I'm telling you right now, the Ice Coffee Hour is going to have a massive, massive upgrade. Massive upgrade. >> How about this for the members? Do a tour of the warehouse. Sure. >> That's cool. >> What are you going to turn this bedroom into? >> Guest bedroom. >> Okay. >> This is a guest bedroom in Graham's house. And we've long overstayed our welcome. And on top of that, it's just so small in here. Like, you guys can't really tell how tiny this room is, but it's it's cramped. I hit my head on that light all the time. And so, we are going to be making an upgrade. And it will be insane. That's all I'm saying. Not many podcasts out there that are going to have a set like the ice coffee. >> It is beautiful. And the funny thing is, too, I do really good work from the bedroom. Like my favorite is to be in bed with my laptop, coffee to my side, and just work. Yeah. >> And so I'm gonna use this as my office to work in. And I just work from the bed. I don't know what it is about that. Just waking up and just being in a bed. And we have windows over here that overlook the tree and everything. So like I'm looking forward to to having that. >> Oh, that's cool. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. I like that. It's a nice bedroom. It's got attached bathroom, too. >> Mhm. >> It's nice. It's on suite. Good talk. >> Are you going to buy a new house? >> Am I? >> Yeah. >> I So Jeremy has been trying to get me to buy a new house. Like every week he's like sending me listings and like look at this and look at this. And he's like, "My agent found a house and we could go see it this weekend." And I'm like, "No, Jeremy." But I do look at the market daily. Me, too. And I would say if there's a house that came up that is perfect and if if I could get it at a price that it just I I'd be dumb to turn it down, I'd do it. >> H what's the price range? >> It just it's it sounds dumb. It's less about the range and it's more about how good of a deal I could get. >> So it's like if it's worth this but I could buy it for this, >> I'll buy it. >> Huh. >> But it's got to be but it's got to be perfect. And there are very few places that I've seen that have been perfect. In fact, in the last 3 years, >> there has only ever been two places in Vegas that I loved. One of them I couldn't get at the price that I thought I would need to pay to do that. If you go back in time, do you wish you bought it? >> No. No. I'm happy without the house. Um because the the monthly increase, cuz where I'm at now, I I have like a 2.8% interest rate. I put so little money down. It's it's it's not stressful for me to be here. Spending the money on the other place would that additional stress just wasn't worth it. Like I I I would get a a benefit like a happiness boost of five, but I get a stress boost of seven, right? >> And so that's not worth it. So I need a happiness boost and a stress boost to either be lower or the same. >> And this was not. But it was a beautiful house. The other one sold for $15 million, but the house was perfect. I'm talking like as perfect as you could possibly get as a house. >> This was it. It was one of a kind. It's truly trophy property. Uh with a view of the strip, with a yard, it was everything was perfect. But obviously, it's 15 million bucks. I can't do that. But but if that house were six, I would have done it in a heartbeat. >> Heartbeat. I would I would find a way to make that work. That's cool. So, if it got sold for less than 50% of its value, then you would have made it work. >> Way less. 15 million to six. Yeah. Oh, yeah. But it's just it wouldn't. But I I bet at some point there will be a perfect place at a perfect price. It's going to happen. >> Okay. >> But it could take 10 years. >> Huh. Well, I'm excited to see it. >> So, there you have it. >> Every day it's like uh unboxing a pack of Pokémon cards. When I check the the market and I see what's on Zillow, it's like, "Oh, there's a new listing that came up. Let's see that, >> right? Yeah, it's cool. I look at houses all the time, too. >> Final question. This is kind of an interesting question we've asked quite a few people on the podcast. >> Uh >> oh. >> Would you rather fight 100 duck- sized horses or one horse-sized duck? >> One horse-sized duck for sure. >> Andre, >> yep. >> Thank you so much for coming on the ice. >> Thanks for having me. >> This was a blast. Great to talk to you. Nice watch. >> Thank you. Likewise, >> by the way. Oh, thank you very much, Graham. Nice watch. >> Thank you guys. so much for watching. It really means a lot. Shout out Andre. Andre's information will be linked down below in the description. Shout out that health thing that you did in Thailand. Shout out the other thing that you shouted out, the biomarker thing that you guys got tested. >> Function health. And don't forget to sign up for the memberships to see the tour. Again, uh Mike Mikey, our editor, loves this. He's been telling us to promote the memberships more. We've been terrible about it, but uh it really helps support Mikey. So, just uh you know, do that for Mikey. I'm sure he'd really appreciate it. And you get to see all of the episodes before they go live publicly. You get to see them in full without any censors or anything like this. And uh I think you'll like it. And if you don't like it, you could always just cancel, but don't but don't do that. >> Shout out Gavin. Thank you for listening to the audio. Thank you guys for watching so much. We wouldn't be here without you. Till next time.