Inside the Trillionaire Mindset, with Ben Cahn & Emil DeRosa

Hey, and welcome to What Future. I'm your host, josh Wa Topolski, and we have got a barnstormer of an episode today, which I'm excited about.

Now.

You may or may not know this, but my day job is the operation of a media brand called Sherwood Media, which is interested in and thinking about how money moves, how the markets function, what's going on in business and technology and the worlds of finance and geopolitics and all those fun things. And so I'm thinking all the time about money and about you know, where the markets are shifting and what it means culturally. And there's a great podcast that I've been listening to, and there are these

I was going to say, actually it is so everybody can take it to the bank and if they want to act you luck.

So what Ben says is financial advice? Emil, what do you are you?

Also?

Yeah, doing financial advice?

Uh yeah.

Unfortunately, for the record, we are joking. We absolutely really you don't want to get a fine? Yeah, I don't want be fined. We can't do that.

You guys have a podcast called Trillionaire Mindset true or false?

True?

True?

We needed a party. I don't know anything about Trillionaire Mindset. What would you tell me? How would you describe the podcast to me?

I would say, I got to go to the bathroom here, let him answer it for you, and then defer to a meal.

I'd say, you seem like a lonely guy who's uh, could maybe use friends, and.

So you can't explain it. I got no, we can explain it.

It's it's we're taking the piss out of all out of you know, the entire financial and economic system. So we're breaking down kind of any story surrounding that, and it includes like all kinds of financial, economic political stories, tons of current events, but we're joking about them and explaining them and making them fun.

Yeah, you're turning heavy stuff into lighthearted topics.

Yeah, we want to make what otherwise is boring to younger people, well an audience of all. We want to make what's otherwise boring and uninteresting interesting and not boring.

Right Emil, are you British?

Out of curiosity?

You froming anybody in your family from England? Now what you said take the piss which is an expression that I really only hear British people say, and I always it's a big red flag for me if there's any British people involved.

Mindset is actually staunchly anti British. Yes, yeah, we are on record, so as it should be. I retracted my taking the piss out, and I would like to say we're making fun of them.

Yeah, it's more like it. That's an America, that's the American way to say it. That's good. I like it anti British stance. I don't have any personal grievance against the British. In fact, they've been very good to me historically. But I don't know, it just feels like I need to have a couple of like grudges to hold, and I think the British seemed like an easy target.

Perhaps they're so easy to make fun of, right in the most loving way.

Nothing against British people individually.

Yeah, no, well, I mean, I don't know, maybe something against them. Yeah, did you guys watch the coronation? That's a big that's a big news event.

That's a huge We tried to get in and they denied our visas.

You need a visa to go to the coronator.

I guess so I think they might have I think they might watch our show.

Wait a second, did you actually try to go to England for the for no King Charles's coronation?

We have a running joke that we're always at important events that we're actually not at.

Yeah, I say, I say, I actually watched the I watch you guys on YouTube. You have a great desk. Where do you get a desk like that? So he make it for you? Did you purchase it? Is that something that like I want to know about the How did you get the desk?

Yeah? This guy, I don't know if we've been told all sorts of stuff about what not to talk. It's fine. Some guy builds those sets. That's it, he's I don't remember.

Well you told you're not supposed to talk about that. I don't know.

They like to keep the guy because he's built a few sets for the network, and they kind of like to keep him their own little secret, which is kind of fun.

When you say the network, what do you mean are our network that we're under? You're okay, yeah, no, right, okay, because it does remind me of a kind of like late night kind of desk. It's but it's for.

Two yes, yeah, yeah, yeah, that is the vibe we were going for.

Have you ever had a third person at the desk?

You've had two other people at the desk? Oh? Really?

Yeah, but that makes sense because you've got quadrants. But if you've got a third, I guess you. Guys said on one side, is that how you arrangement?

We stick them right in the middle, Right in the middle, we say, head on, Yeah.

No, for really, you put the person in the middle. That's crazy. That's a crazy arrangement. So you make that person have to look back and forth between the two of you, and that's very strange.

No free rides at trillion our mindset.

So so trillionaire mindset is, but there's obviously a through line. You talk about all sorts of stuff like you talk about current events and politics. In fact, I was just listening to you guys. We're talking about Biden and his re election campaign, and I think this is your most recent episodes from a few days ago. You were talking about the Republicans using AI to make an ad, so very political. Yeah, and you guys are both hardcore right wingers.

Would you say, yeah, what's the word crypto fascist?

Yeah?

We described oah yeah, right, okay, good neo conservatives.

But there's a through line, Like there's a money through line, right, Like I mean you guys are like interested in money and in the markets, and I mean there's some investing stuff'll y'all talk about. It's like you talk about hedge fund guys like they're you know, household names. So yeah, how do you end up doing a podcast which is very funny and obviously for entertainment purposes, but it's also like quite seriously about like stuff that is very nerdy, like market stuff.

Right, this has been speaking Hello. I I am a trader and I've been a trader for I don't know fifteen years in a professional trader only professional for the last few I got licensed a year ago, but before that, I was trading for myself for since like twenty eighteen.

So you have a job at a brokerage. Is that at a trading firm?

Yeah, at a proper okay, And yeah, I'd always been interested in it since I was a kid, and I made a lot of money doing it in my late twenties and then I no need to brag, but then I lost a lot of money too, oh okay to taxes into a couple bad investments. But I've always like it. Yeah, I've always I've always had an interest in the stuff.

Find that on Instagram.

Yeah, it was called Office Fire. I think it's under Office Fire show. And we both it was like a Beavis you're doing voices, yeah, voice We were writing it hand, doing voices.

It was one of the strangest times because it was peak pandemic, peak lockdown, and they said you can't, you can't come into the studio. We don't have a studio. We're allowed to have you in. So they sent us mikes and we and it was so hot it was that summer, that first summer, and so we had to turn off the AC because of the sound, and we had to put blankets over ourselves. So the sound would sound and it was just we were just sweating and Ben department recording this animated show.

I know I got you off track from the background here, But but was that fun or was that like a nightmare?

Because I think it could go either way. It was. It was a good time.

It was incredibly fun. I wasn't leaving the house at that point.

You know.

We would record, and then we would also just have these long conversations because I hadn't talked to anyone in weeks.

Yeah, and I would be telling him about certain trades that I had made that day or things that had happened in the news that like, hey, here's someone to talk to about it. And he'd ask me questions because he didn't fully understand. He'd at this point had known very little about the markets and stuff.

And you weren't you weren't playing the market, you were.

Not in the game.

I'm not a market playboy.

Interesting.

Interesting, And I'd kind of break it down from him, and he found it entertaining, but would also make little jokes and make me crack up. So when Noel asked me who I would want to do it with, I knew exactly who the right person would be. And then we months later recorded a pilot episode and it went really well, and then we were off to the races.

Yeah, so that was mit you said, like peak pandemic. You said twenty twenty or later.

Well, we ended up launching the first episode in October twenty twenty one, I think over twenty twenty one, just right around my birthday. It's a very special time.

That was your birthday present from us.

Thank you.

I appreciate that. That really hit the spot. So then you're doing this stuff all day. They're like actually engaged in the art and the craft of tradeing. You were playing the market very poorly. Yes, okay, okay, that's I'm sure your employer loves to hear that. I'm sure they're like, we love what our guys are, Like, I suck at this.

They do not give a rats ask because they're collect in their desk fees and whatnot, and they take ten percent of my profits. So even if I'm unprofitable, they're still making money off of like commissions and whatnot.

Oh okay, So it's a it's like a boiler room kind of set up there, right, Is that in my mind?

Not quite? But the way that it works is you give them a little bit of money as a deposit, as a security deposit, and then they give you like twenty x leverage, oh to trade with.

This sounds a little bit like MLM. It's not no right at all? No, Okay, are you sure? Positives you might be you might be involved in an extremely complex scam.

Well here's a possible. You've got fifteen minutes. I promise you I can change your life. Okay, so you can decide for yourself it's an MLM or not. But I guarantee you it's not. You're not gonna be.

Thinking that I'm interested in getting in on the ground floor on something.

Well, the thing is if you can then get three people under you to sign up for this program, yeah, then the money that they make. Okay, this bit has gone on for two now.

This is great.

I love this.

I noticed you do a thing on the podcast. Actually, speaking of your bits, you're very like, uh, maybe this is because I guess your background is not and you're not a professional comedian like Emiala. Is right, you're a you're a professional pro comedian. Is that what I'm meant to understand?

I mean, that's a loose sure, I make money off comedy. But uh yeah, I mean we're both we both met in the comedy world, that's the thing.

Okay, So wait, so then you are a comedian that I don't know when.

I think we both have similar weird backgrounds where we have like professional backgrounds, but we're in comedy. So I am like, weirdly a non practicing lawyer.

So oh wow, you just really that's interesting, A non practicing lawyer. But you're you could be a lawyer if you wanted to be.

I'm like licensed, passed the bar, all that kind of stuff. But right, what kind of law I just don't. I mean, the only thing I do you don't want to say. I mean, the stuff I work for is is pro bonus stuff. I'll do legal aid stuff, okay, but I don't work in any real capacity.

You know.

My focus is all on comedy and our show. And it wouldn't it wouldn't be right to right be fully representing people as I'm he.

Doesn't want to spread himself too thing, right, I get it.

You can always fall back on being a lawyer if you need to, but you don't do that right now.

But so you know, But yeah, so we were introduced to each other through comedy, friends and stuff, and we both kind of had these weird other things outside of comedy that.

Like normal, normal lives.

Yeah, sure, that made it fun, and I think we each had an interesting perspective rather than just two guys who were like, let's start a pod and just start chatting.

Yeah, you want to distance yourself from other men who started a podcast, is what I'm hearing.

We are standing on the shoulders of two guys with a microphone everywhere.

Right, that's beautiful. That's beautiful. But how long have you know? Did you know each other before you started doing the podcast?

We probably knew each other, Yeah, maybe foursh five years maybe.

Were you like casual buddies or like you were hanging out all the time.

No, so my very good friend, my best friend in the world, actually was he met Ben online when Ben was moving back to LA and what you guys got lunch? Got lunch and he talked to me after and was like, I met this guy. You guys would love each other and then.

He both freaks.

He said, yeah, he said, you guys both absolute freaking interesting, and he was right, Yeah, we hit it off. If we started hanging out all the time, climbing, going to the beach.

Yeah, oh, you guys climb, you're like sporty types and.

Not anymore though he doesn't climb anymore. I don't climb anymore.

But we both go to the same gym. Still, well, you can't risk your body now that you're worth so much. It's truly on our mindset taking off. You can't risk it.

I stay climb a little bit. I'll go outside and stuff. But yeah, it is, it is a bit.

Going outside is just that's not climbing.

Though, climbing outside rather than the gym.

Oh I see, I see. So I don't do any sports at all, so this is all news to me, like that there's could be an indoor outdoor consideration.

But I was hurting my back a lot, so I switched over to you, you know, started playing more tennis, and then he hurt his knee and his elbow instead. We're working it out.

Should you maybe not just don't do any sports at all?

Hey, that's the whole question. In your thirties, should you just give it up?

I guess so? Are you in your thirties? I don't know your ages. I don't want to be presumptuous.

I'm in my thirties.

Yeah, I'm middle thirty. It's a great time. Have you met a trillionaire? Have either of you met a trillionaire? Do you feel like you have ever encountered one in real life?

No, but we have met billionaires.

Oh yeah, Okay, who's the richest person you've ever met?

I guess it would have to be the CEO of Robin Hood led Tenant when he came on her show the time, worth like a little over a billion dollars.

I know Vlad his body of mine. Yeah, but he's done a body. But I got to work for him technically speaking.

I encouraged him to quit.

Encourage him to quit Robin Hood.

I said, why don't you quit? Man? I still stand by it.

I can't believe I have not watched this episode. I should have really bound up on it before I had.

You guys know, it's an okay one. But I my logic that it's a pretty good sport. From what I could tell, he was a great sport.

It was a very strange thing because they asked to come on, and we said at first, why, because you know, our whole thing is like making fun of this, like.

The PR team was like, hey, or have you ever thought about having laid on the show?

Yeah?

Yeah, and we were obviously like we're down, but just we just want you to know what the show is show and they were like, no, no, we get it. We think we should still do it. So we did like a pre production meeting with them, and we were very upfront, like we're gonna make fun of him and we're gonna ask, you know, a question, tough questions, and then they were like, what if instead we did you know, you guys talked about how Robin Hood is now offering crypto and we were like.

That's not you know, you can't blame them. I mean that's their job. They got to like do the promo stuff. You know, it's good.

So we were very much like if you don't want to do it, don't do it, and uh they were like no, let's do it, and they he was against bored. They let us do. They let us do our thing and it was it was very fun.

Yeah. I got him a custom hat that he put on it said oops, sorry about that because he was kind of in the middle of his unofficial apology tour for right.

But I think he's kind of a podcast fan. It's possible he listens it's your podcast, because we've we've talked about it a few times that I think he's, uh, he's sort of into the art.

Wait.

But so when you said he's your boss.

What does that he is my Well, technically how does that? Well, I'm the I'm the president editor in chiefs was something called Sherwood Media, which is a subsidiary brand of robin Hood, which is a new media company. And you guys didn't even google me. Didn't fucking if.

I knew about that. I'm building along.

You didn't even go check out. There's a great Axios article about it. You can read, Yeah, I'm building this new media thing that is adjacent to but no longer actually like a direct part of robin Hood. So so, you know, a couple levels up there's Vlad.

I still stand by the suggestion that he quit. And part of it was so let me, let me explain.

What was the motive? What what were you're thinking?

I said, look, you you've gotten a lot of bad pr a lot of the monkeys what are they called the apes out there? Yeah, I hate your guts and the market the stock was at fifty two weeks all time lows. I said, if you were to step out of the out of the spotlight, out of the limelight, and just announce that you're stepping down, you would no longer have to deal with all this shit. Plus the market would probably like it, and I'm sure that the stock might rally tend to twenty percent, thus making you

Deal like you're doing a like a self blood sacrifice that also drives the price.

Nobody's going to care about what you do.

It's interesting, hardly a sacrifice. I mean, the guy is a billionaire. It's like that's yes.

That is true, that is true. I think he legitimately likes the product a lot. Like my impression of interacting with him and seeing him interact with other people is like he's legitimately excited about like the concept of Robin. I think it's like, I don't know. I mean, I think about this all the time. Like, if you're very rich,

Talk about this all the time on shore. Oh really, because you know so many of these guys are getting into trouble, right, you have these guys. It's like, we're just talking about Carl Icon, who's what eighty six?

Oh no, what did he do? Did I missed some news?

Who is it?

Henny Hindenburgh, the short sellar basically released a lot of information about Icon enterprises, and so they're trying to weather that storm. And we're just talking about Carl Icon, who's a billionaire and he's probably eighty two, and yeah, yeah, our minds were like, how do you not just go away? How do you not just quit? I'm done, I'm not gonna again.

I don't have I'm not in the trillionaire mindset or even the billionaire mindset for that matter. But I can imagine a future state where I am in that mindset. And my feeling is I have like a lot of creative pursuits and things I'd like to do that have nothing to do with like working or generating more income.

Oh, I mean he completely torched his own reputation for.

I was just talking about somebody spit on my tesla the other day?

Is that real?

And uh, well, okay, now, in fairness, the guy was wearing a full Jack Sparrow outfit, riding a bike in the opposite direction alongside my car, and as he drove by, he spit on it.

Come on my model?

Why? And I was like, that's definitely because it's a tesla, although maybe it's because he like, I know, there's like a Tortuga situation going on or whatever the island is called. I don't know. I mean, he could have been something else, but no. A friend of mine was just telling me that in Brooklyn people are taking their tesla that goes off the car because people like fuck with yeah if they're you know, and it's like that didn't have to happen. There's no reason for that to have happened.

It's funny because you know, there was a ton of valid criticisms of Elon way before he kind of took this hard turn, and we talked about a lot of those, but those were pretty i don't want to say fringe, but like specific and unless you were really digging into Elon's whole you know, business practices and views and all history yeah, history then you weren't really privy to it, and he was just kind of the guy who might save humanity or no.

Right, he was like a weird avatar. You're like, oh wow, there's this like crazy genius doing all these things.

Right.

No, the Tony Stark era was very good for him, like, and you didn't hear a lot from him. He wasn't really talking.

Now it's strange because like normis are just they hate him. I mean I was at a yeah, I was at a super Bowl party and when he came on screen, they flashed him on screen and everyone booed. I was like, oh my god, yeah, okay, It's.

Like it's like when he came out the Chappelle concert.

Right right, right exactly.

I forgot about that.

Yeah, you forgot about it, you kind of there's so much it's almost it is Trump like in this just gonna say that. Yeah, yeah, because like remember you remember like with Trump, it was like it wasn't like one thing a day or one thing a week. It would be like there'd be eight completely insane situations happening every day.

Guy in a case to really beautiful, right, yeah, which he won, by.

The way, he fucking beat He beat the chargers on the pedo guy case, which is I guess impressive. But yeah, it's like I just think, like, man, I mean, whether he's a brilliant person or really stupid or somewhere in between. I think probably somewhere in between. In between. I just feel like, don't just why tweet? Yeah, like why get on there? Like like you could do anything, I mean literally anything. You could go anywhere, be with anybody you want.

I think you start to believe the fairy tales about yourself, especially when you become the richest man in the world. You then feel like, well, I have an moral obligation to truly save humanity, and there are many ways in which I could do that, and starting with free speech, which is under a tech and I've got to take over the very platform for free speech, the only one

It's a classic tale and then you end up a soul, you end up tainted. Yeah, yeah, doing a podcast, Yeah, you end up with a podcast about investing, but it rocks. I do love it right well, I mean it's going well right like you guys, are you feel like it's things are growing like this? The podcast world is hard. I mean I say this as a person who's had multiple podcasts, and like, you know, here we are on

Yes, I would say the most interesting thing. And it's kind of like what we were expecting to get later on we got first, which is that we got people first who aren't interested in this subject matter. Right. The way it worked was TMG gave us the opportunity to tap into the audience that they had already built and

Yeah, I think that's a magic trick that is really valuable. Like I think if you can make stuff that's really complex and seems impenetrable, like understandable, but also if you can make it funny or fun like, that's a huge that's a huge deal. And not that many people can do it, Like, I think it's a pretty rare talent.

So, yeah, you're talking about you know, how we feel and you know the audience and all that stuff. We just did our first live show in New York and it was that was just huge. I mean, because we've been doing this thing. It's basically it's just like this, except you know, we're on our set and we're doing it to we're doing it to nobody basically, and right like.

Well there's somebody there, right, there's somebody behind it.

But you know, we're going, is this even funny? Are we? And then to do it in front of a crowd and then you know, they all hung out after and wanted to talk to us, and it was like, oh my god, this is so great. It's not just some guy behind a screen going like ha haha, or sometimes like heat you, I can't believe you said that or whatever.

No, live sh it's the best. I mean, that's amazing, absolute best. Where did you guys do it? Bellhouse?

We're actually going to the Bellhouse soon because.

There's a lot of a lot of live shit.

We did a caveat because we we we had no idea if we could even sell tickets or not.

We just how big? How big is?

It was a one hundred and fifty people that one.

Oh okay, ok, it's pretty it was uh.

We we put the link up and I remember I was about to get in the show, and so we threw the link up and then when I got out of the shower, Benet texted me and said they were all gone.

So oh yeah, no doubt. I mean I would have.

I would have definitely. I mean, if not that you would need to come and ask me for advice. But if you'd be like, hey, it's one hundred and fifty percent venue, I'd be like, you definitely can get more people than that.

Yeah, I mean we just had. Yeah, so we're going to do the Bellhouse this summer, and.

Uh, that's exciting. I got to come. I gotta come and check it out.

We love that.

Oh yeah, I love live. I think live is great actually, I mean one of the things. I mean, at some point we'll probably do hopefully do some some roadshow with this. But like, because I used to DJ and playing bands and and there's it's pretty magical when you get like a room full of people just vibing, like no matter no matter what's going on, like if it's if it's a comedy thing or if it's music or whatever, it's

Yeah, I want to do it as much as possible. It's like, it's so fun and it just feels so nice to be in the room with the people who like just enjoy it so much. They seem to be just so excited to like be hanging out with us and watching us do it.

Yeah, did you record it and then you put it in?

I ordered it.

We haven't put it out, Oh okay, probably not gonna Yeah, we want them to kind of be I don't know. Sometimes people are like, we're going on tour and you can listen or watch to watch every single one we do, and.

Us we say cancelable things, no, no, really do yeah horrible things really?

Andrew give me an example, I.

Mean, name a racial slur.

Oh, Wow, Okay, I mean even that is could we cancel? I mean, do you actually feel like you cross a boundary and a live No?

Not at all?

Really yeah, and.

It's very cool.

Definitely not, although we have to go back and listen to be sure. No, I get it. I've I've been in conversations with people, I mean, even on this show, and I'm like, am I saying something right now? That's going to really sound wrong when I listen back to. Of course, we have the power of editing. Well.

I think that's another thing. Even sometimes when you're saying the most benign things, you kind of find out later that some commenter is like, I can't believe you would say that, you're implying blah blah, and you're like, ill, no, I'm not.

That's really Yeah, you've gotten a lot Have you gotten a lot of any feedback like that? People were like, you crossed the line? No, not a lot, and it's happened here and there. Yeah, And I think that's the weird thing.

Sometimes we'll respond and we'll go like, oh, we did not mean that at all, Like I think you're missing and people like just back, They're like, oh, I don't you know I'm sorry, Like it's a very weird no.

No, responding to critics is actually substantially impactful. I've found I actually many many years ago. Actually, do you guys know a journalist named Walt Mossberg. He is a technology journalist. He's been around forever. He's retired now. But I was like giving him shit on Twitter about something. This is many years ago, Like this is like a decade or fifteen years ago or something. And he called me on the phone. He did not tweet back at me. He did not email me. He called me, and I was like,

I like that.

But yeah, but people will be reasonable if you respond to him.

Yeah. But so that's where I think the live element is much nicer, where I think it feels to people like, oh, we're all just here experiencing this. At the same time, it's not, I don't know. There's something about online recorded things where people watch them and they just kind of feel like, I don't know, they want to like pick it apart or interrogate things.

And right, well, part of it is also context collapse, right, Like you get people will take us a bit of something out of context, out of not part of a conversation. You don't hear the rest of it, and you're like, there's just that clip that plays or whatever that somebody's sharing, and it's like, okay, well context matters, right.

So Yeah, I've had that happen with TikTok, where we've taken clips from either our show or when we've been guests on TMG or something like that, where it then gets picked up on TikTok and someone's ripping me apart in the comments or ripping someone else and it's just like, God, you guys just fucking.

I mean it's good though in a way, like I think it's a sign that you're doing something right if you've engendered an emotion as strong as like a hater. Yeah, if someone is like legitimately like this guy fucking sucks, I hate his guts, like that, you're doing something right, You're succeeding. Maybe this is just a gag that you do, but you analyze a bad joke that you've done, like

Yeah, I feel like it's a little bit of both. I feel like, a, yeah, it becomes a bit and it also if it if the joke doesn't land, well I'm just gonna drive it into the ground and agree with the unspoken word that that was terrible.

Yeah, no, you did h on the on the last episode, the one that I was just watching, uh something about Jenny Ellen saying that something's gonna come quicker. Oh you we thought or whatever, and and you're like, that's like what my wife said. Then you did. Like there was like a solid like forty five seconds of you going over that.

Joe he tries to take it again.

Yeah, And I was like.

Trying to figure out if like I'm trying to figure out if, like you're if that was a legitimate I actually, I mean this perhaps is your genius again, Emil, I don't mean to focus on Ben and his great comedy. Does the same ship? Does he because he's Oh god, I feel like he's so much more put together on the show. I feel like he's got a ship so much more together.

Oh no, we're both maniacs.

No, there's actually a super cut of me screaming at the editor cut that, and because they never cut it, they go.

Like you legitimately upset.

No, No, it's a like if I up. I'm like, oh please fucking cut that.

And they're like, yeah, that's good. People want to see that.

Realize it is the parasocial relationship is the thing? Is the is the one point one jigawatts of podcast fucking uh. You get where I'm going with that.

Yeah, that's how you're going to travel to the to the past, the future of this future you have. Yeah, you have to go backwards to go forward with Yeah, that's what they say, at least based on the film, based on the sequence of the film. That's my understanding.

That is true.

Okay, so let me ask you this. So, so you're a trader band again, Emil. Sorry, I apologize, but this guy's so interesting. I find him so fast. I mean, like, you know what am I going to say? You know, we're talking about law. We're gonna talk about you doing like pro bono work for people down in their lockdown.

Any questions you got for him? Shoot him Adam.

Yeah, well you said you mentioned earlier. I'm just curious. It was in the back of my mind you were like, I made a ton of money and then I lost a ton of money. Yeah, when you say you made a ton of money, what are we talking about, because obviously scales are all scales right different, But like, you give me a range, and then I'd like to know how you made it and how you lost it?

Sure, so real fast. I will plug our very first episode, Episode one, called get rich or die crying. Okay, I lay it all out as as kind of our primer primer or whatever for the audience.

Primers is not so I would like technically speaking, do yeah.

But anytime someone says that in the future, okay, yeah, fucking edit that. But we won't. Let's see, I'll just cut right through it. My dad died when I was twenty three, and when he died, I got his third of a you know, substantial inheritance of like two hundred grand because then my grandmother subsequently passed a few years later. And yeah, yeah, it's you know.

The story is not fun so far, just so you know, it's just kind of a downer. So I'm hoping it gets it.

Gets it gets uh, it gets better. But up until that point, I had been trading and working, and funny, all my money would go into my trading account and then into the ether because I would lose.

You were invested in ethereum.

No I wish. I remember being told about ethereum at three bucks and I was like, that's oh my god, stupid. Yeah.

No.

The worst is when you've had some bitcoin when it was worth five cents.

I remember when it first debuted, and I was like, this is fucking stupid, and it just this will.

Ever be anything. Now we could have been fucking millk I know, just by doing nothing.

It drives me. You're so stupid. But so I had been trading at that point for close to ten years.

Did you go to school for that or was this like a self taught thing?

No, I studied. I studied philosophy in college. Total waste.

And okay, well that's kind of a way to get to yeah a little bit, I find critical thing. Yeah, but you're good at math, I said.

Oh, fucking terrible. I'm so bad.

Okay, so God kind of a gut thing as well.

Sure, that's how I thought. I'm like, I'm I could do this. I'm smart enough. God damn it, I can handle it. And I was I would find myself making trades. But then because of the small account size that I had, I couldn't hold on for long enough. I couldn't endure the losses that you have to endure if you want to be a trader, because you need Part of it is losing. In fact, most of it is losing.

It's just that's I feel like the really successful guys don't do as much losing as you're described.

They do, but successful traders lose all the time. It's about it's about cutting the losses early and about knowing how to let the winners ride. But so I just took cut to it.

This is not financial no, no, just chime in with that.

I keep going. But I ended up at there was one year where I made like one hundred grand or something, and then the very next year I made a little over one point two or one point three million dollars. So that's huge fucking money, which when you're twenty eight or however, all.

That was crazy. Any any age that's like over a million dollars making over a million dollars investing is like a very good You've done a great job.

At the peak, my account size had gone from two hundred k to like two million.

Just out of curiosity, what were your big drivers there? I just want to know.

I caught a lot of the marijuana stocks, oh okay, and when they really really had a big, big rally. But among that were some options trades that I that I did okay at. But so when I go on to say I lost a bunch immediately after making that money, I learned about how much I would have to pay in taxes. You hadn't factored that, man, I mean I did, but I didn't think that it would be almost half of that money just immediately vanquished. Gone.

Yeah, but still, I mean sucks. Have you heard of decentralized currency, because there's a really you know, you could just float out.

Yeah, I should have done that.

Cryptocurrency is very hot. Tax corn tax is very easy to avoid. It made would have been nice. You gotta stay liquid, you gotta stay right, you got it. You can't really okay, but anyhow, so you so you find you get your tax Yeah.

I had it. I had like a panic attack cause I felt like, Okay, I've made more money in just a couple of years than my dad made in his entire life. And in my brain, the next thing, the next logical step was to die like he did. So I was like obsessed with death for this couple months, and I'm smoking weed and getting heart palpitations. And then

Yeah, and it just I probably lost a guy you knew or a person you just like looked at or watched on. The guy I knew, okay, who had tipped me off to one of the big stocks that was the bulk of my profits, and he was like, I'm putting all my profits into this other thing.

And I was like, well, he can't be fucking wrong. He's a he's a genius, and he's way smarter than me.

Yeah.

Right, All that's to say, I overstayed my welcome and I lost like a little over half a million dollars on that other things. So I was like, oh, that's cool. I mean I had other things going for me that that did, okay, that kind of offset that. But so yeah, I went from my friends. It was very hard because a lot of my friends were like, what do you you go to a million dollars? I'm like, no, I fucking don't anymore?

Right I did?

I did?

Did you show me your tax.

I would tell him, I'm like, hey, I look at this.

Look what the governments they took all this. Did you feel like you were becoming radicalized by the way when you saw the tax bill. Did you still to think about how you needed to like hide your money from the government you didn't want to pay taxes?

Yes and no. I definitely was like, this is fucked up. I just got this money. Do you have to take it right now? Can I just can I just do something else with it first? Like really in my accountant.

Like reinvested in a sure thing thing, yeah, double or nothing on a sure back.

But put it on roulette like the FedEx guy did.

So you cashed out of stuff then, I mean you didn't. You didn't stay in the money like you were. You took the you took it out. Yeah, well that was your mistake right there. You gotta stay in the market. You gotta you gotta migrate that to a nice slow and steady.

I should have done that. That that might have been smart. I should have brought I should have bought Nvidia. I should have bought Tesla. I should have Ugh.

I mean, the most dangerous thing is that it's possible to have success when you don't really fully understand what you're doing. And then once you're up and you've got options, that's when like it becomes very complicated, Like you can make a lot of really like, I actually, I mean this is in any way comparable. But I had a couple of a couple couple of things I bought that just on I actually like the businesses, some solar stuff that I was like, I like what these guys are doing.

I like this.

I'm liking the feel of that. Just absolute huge waste of money went to almost to zero at this point, complete like never coming back, like penny fucking stock and my probably my largest amount of money I spent on a single on a single ticker. So you know, you can't wait them all, you can't win them all. But I was like, that's like small potatoes because I believe. I don't believe in my ability to gamble at all, like you do? You gamble in Vegas?

Do either of you?

Are you either of you gamblers?

Never?

No, No, you don't go. You don't hit the you don't hit the blackjack table.

I've done it before, but it's not like a I'm never like, oh I want to go gamble.

Yeah, same Emil. Are you investing like now? I mean, because you're obviously like in this you're in this conversation, the ongoing TRILLIONAI mindset conversation. Have you become more of a so Ben?

What Ben does is trading. I don't trade it all, but I have I buy like index fund.

You're like long term like retirement stuff. Yeah, you're like a normal person.

The smartest thing.

There's no like huge return like sudden dip situation.

Yeah, I know that's so stressful.

That's not well. This is why you guys balance each other out so well, because you got this the impulsive gambler over here, junkie junkie, right, gambler junkie is willing to risk it all.

You know, you a gambler me.

Yeah, No, I don't. I don't.

I've never learned to play poker. I'm still not sure how poker's played at all. Like I couldn't tell you the first thing about how the game is played. Nobody really knows, no, but people play it for sure. People love poker. People are and I'm like, I don't know, Like whatever this is, it's impenetrable to me. And I can play, I can do very complex things, like I can build a computer, but like I couldnt tell you how to fucking what a poker game does. No, I'm

Said, don't know you had it like that? That's sick.

I know a guy. I know a guy, an old coworker of mine who could count cards or basically count cards. He could get close enough that he could go to a blackjack table and win a lot.

Wow.

And I was like, Michael, here's like five hundred dollars go play this. For me, I was like, I'm not going to fucking play, but I'll but happily watch you spend my money. And you know, it's like, I don't know, we ended up a little bit up, but like that's that's as far as I'll go, Like, I will delegate my gambling to a person who knows better than I do, because.

I have friends who like to gamble, and I think seeing them, it's so unappealing when you're when you're around people who really like it, it just feels so gross and weird.

Yeah.

I remember we were in Atlantic City. We were there for the weekend.

No matter what you're doing there, yeah, already, already it's a dark it's a dark vibe.

And I remember, so we had a house that was it was nice because we were by the beach, but and we were away from all the kind of heart of the darkness. And the first day our friend comes back and he said he was down like eighteen hundred bucks, and I was like, damn. And then the next night he comes back and he's like, let's go out. I'm up nine hundred bucks and I said, holy shit, you won. What's eighteen hundred plus nine twenty seven hundred.

Yeah.

I said, oh, wow, you won twenty seven hundred bucks and he was like, no, I won nine hundred. I was like, wait, but you're still down, Like, dude, don't be such a like oh, don't be such a spoil And I was like, oh, all right, I didn't.

Well, that's the that's the that is the that is not the trillion there mine mind set.

That is resets every every day.

Does That's the thing. But that's isn't that the trick of it?

Right?

Like you go, well, sure I lost some money, but you know, out of sight, out of mind, right, let me go hit the get some more of the chips or whatever they give you. It's chips, right, Yeah.

So watching people actually do it, I was like, I'm not built for this.

Let's do predictions real quick, and then at a later date we can come back and check your predictions. All right, let's let's see. Okay, you give me some predictions on what is going to be the most overhyped topic of the year in the world of business, the most overhyped, most overhyped trend.

I feel like I think a little bit of AIRR is going to come out of the AI stuff. I mean, so a lot of people are comparing it to cryptos, and I think there is a lot of comparisons there. Right, A lot of the money that's coming out of crypto is going into like every business being like, oh my god, we got to find the next big AI scheme whatever. It's being implemented into all these businesses and everyone's like, and now we're powered by GPT four.

Yeah.

And I do think it's different in it's different from crypto in the sense that like there is a use case for it. There's you know, there's there's utility in the way that crypto took you know, ten years to start and they still don't have one.

But well, you can generate value if you do it right, right.

Right, But it was just purely a speculative asset that there was no real right. But so I don't think it's going to go away, but I think it might die down a little bit.

That's a good call. I agree.

I think I will jump in and say, like, we'll come back and revisit this prediction. But I think AI will prove to be the most overhyped whoa new thing. I just think it's this year's it is this year's metaverse or whatever. Like crypto is a good I mean, but that's like two I feel like two years ago.

But the but the real difference feels like there there are use cases here, right. For example, when Duo Lingo is talking about implementing their chat butt where you're now you know, talking to someone where you can.

I'm just thinking of the thing just making up fake words. That's the kind of shit that it.

Does, right, yeah, right, right, that's the problem. But if it can get to a place where they can actually do these things and and the if the promise is real, then you're like, okay, that's kind of you know, there's a real use there.

There's a real sure No, I agree, I agree. AI is definitely a more interesting technology, and I think has u the prospect of it turning into something real as much higher. But there's no killer app yet. There's like cool tricks, right right, like and cool tricks don't make like don't make a business.

Yeah, but I mean, I mean, I do think it is putting some people out of business. For example, I think art generation is a real oh yeah thorn in the side of any kind of graphic.

Do oh no, it's fuck eddy images.

Yeah yeah, I actually uh made It's funny because I was time of making music, but I've been doing it like as a hobby now and I just I was, you know, I'm putting out a new song on a new track, and I was like, I need I need art for this, like just for fun, and I use mid Journey and it produced like fucking very cool results for the thing that I wanted. And it's like, yeah,

Kidding, don't put.

Also, they got to be the first. But also like you could turn the fucking robot off. People are acting like I hear people talk about the future of AI like destroying humanity. It's like, you know, like we don't have the good robots right, Like they're not really that great. Like the Boston Dynamics dog can only jump around for like ten minutes before it needs a fucking charge.

They're getting pretty good.

They're getting good. They're getting good, but like they're not gonna kill you, Like you can like put them in water and then they stop functioning.

I welcome it, honestly. Let the Bosting Dynamics dog kill me already.

Let it fuck my wife.

Dude, Wow, are you even fucking married? No, you made an ex wife joke and now you're making a wife joke. But I liked it. That's you're saying.

That's great. We love to do that. We we both we we love joking about our non existent wives.

Neither one of you were married. You're both single. Ye single, you're out there.

In our minds.

Were married, but I am single and thirty five.

Wow, you're looking for love?

Can you describe it?

Can you describe your perfect partner? Let's hear who you're looking for, what kind of person you're looking for? Maybe we can make this happen.

Let's see, she's got four legsic body.

Made in a facility in Boss.

I know, I know, just.

Boston Dynamics dog. But with a great rack.

They can do that. They can do that for sure, that's one they can do, no problem. Like a Boston Dynamics dog with great tits is definitely a thing that can happen.

So my other prediction, my other prediction is that Ben will be married to a Boston Dynamics dog.

But Bus, I feel like you just use it. I feel like you're just using recent data on that. All right, we need at least one more good prediction. I'll let me think of, let me think of. Oh, oh, here's a good one.

Oh, let's hear it.

Will Elon must be the owner of Twitter and or will Twitter be in business by the end of twenty twenty three.

I think he will still be the owner. I think that to mask a bad Tesla corder, I predict that he will probably announce someone is stepping in to take over as a CEO of Twitter, which will satisfy the market enough to further booie Tesla's stock price, because I think Tesla's scene has its best days behind it in terms of the stock price.

Yet what about the what about the actual product?

Uh? When I drove a Tesla years ago, I fucking loved it. I was like, this is how driving is meant to be. And I'm really pissed off that I didn't buy the stock back then, even though at the time it was valued at like eighty billion dollars and I thought, well, it's it's all priced in at this point. I missed it. But I think that the competition is has caught up, and I think the damage that he has done alone to the to the brand value is irreparable.

I've least two don't like it because I feel like I want to upgrade every time every few years. I'm not going to get another Tesla, like I won't buy another Tesla or well no, I know, like like there's a ton of great shit out there. I mean, yeah, but that's the but it is like I mean, Ben as you were saying, right, it's the one two punch. It's like the brand has been kind of tarnished and there's great competitors in the market now, so it's like what's the edge.

Right, Yeah, Because he was untouchable for so long, he could continue to make lofty promises that the market chose willingly to look past or just blindly believe. And I think his douchebaggery is starting to really have an impact on the things and the promises that he makes, and people are starting to not just blindly swallow the bullshit anymore. Yeah.

I gotta say, though, I will say one thing about about why I don't want another Tesla. I mean, yes, like his all of his stuff definitely colors it, like, but they're legitimately some dumb fucking things about the car that drive me that are so minuscule and yet so preventable, so avoidable, and drive me insane. Like, for instance, this is the one that probably bothers me the most. You know, when you flip down, you know the visor you can

My big beef with it is that they put a lot of things in those cars that then other car companies started to be like, well, this is what people want. And one we complain about often is that now every car thinks that every car company thinks that people what they want is a huge fucking screen in the middle of the car that has every you know control. Yeah, and I just saw an article that I guess companies

It's crazy. No, it's great. I have to I have to go into a menu to open the glove box. Literally literally, that's all it's not. That's not an exaggeration. There's literally like a I have to open a menu and then there's a little symbol and it's like you hit glove box and you open it. You can also put a pass code on it, by the way, if you've got your gun in there or whatever, which I assume you know most people.

Josh, you'll like this. That reminds me of when right before the iPod first came out. I was a big mini disc guy. I fucking I'm a big I'm a fan. I get it, and I just I would rave about it to my friends. But then when they would ask me how it worked. As it was coming out of my mouth, I knew that it sounded so impractical. It's like, oh yeah, no, they're like, can you buy mini discs with the music on it? I'm like, like some maybe a dozen artists on it. But here's the cool thing.

I mean, you're listen, you're you are right, And yet there is something just innately cool about the mini discs, Like it's like the one of the most cyber of all products ever made.

It was fucking awesome.

It's like the matrix. It's like a matrix object and it actually there are many discs in the matrix. In fact, I think the software that Neo is given is on mini discs. Yeah, which because because the Waikowski is new. That's fucking cyberpunk and that's how you do it. Okay, one more quick thing and then we got we gotta wrap up because we now it's like fucking two hours of this nonsense. Apple VR heads, have you heard this rumor? Yes, here's my take on this. This is never going to happen. Like,

I mean, isn't it already? Hasn't it been? Like it's like every year they're like, oh, we're doing.

It well, and yeah, it's like the car. Remember when every talking about the car was going to happen, or the TV. There was a it was talking about they're going to make a TV. Yeah, there's just products. I think they're real inside of Apple. But then somebody goes like, that's not it.

This isn't gonna work.

Yeah, we're not gonna go to sell a bunch of this. I just think anything you gotta put on your face is fucking da Yeah.

I think that the only way that it could work is if there were no there was nothing covering your eyes and it was more of an ar experience.

Yeah, but like you used to have to wear something on your head, you just think about it.

Do you wear glasses? I used to up until December and I got LACEI.

Why'd you oh, because why'd you stop wearing glasses? Glasses are cool because I just I want I didn't want to wear glasses.

It was impulsive. I'd been wearing him for like a decade.

Is there some reason you didn't want to have them on your face? Is that what I'm UNDERSTANDE. I just was like, yeah, I mean I gotta change it. You think you'll wear the Apple a R Thing?

Nah? No, it probably wouldn't be me.

What do you think would you wear the Apple a R Thing?

No?

I mean I've tried. I've tried uh VR stuff. I don't want anything on my head.

You doesn't want to get bullied by high school Nobody wants That's right.

Nobody wants anything on their heads. So unless it's fucking invisible, Yeah, Like I would do an eye like a contact that is like AR that might be cool. I go for that. They're not releasing that they don't have that they have they have like a visor like Jordie LaForge and fucking Star Trek the next Generation something like that. All right, great, that's not really nothings been a real prediction about that. I guess I'm making a prediction that it'll be infinitely

We didn't prepare for this.

Oh really a lot of second Yeah, go ahead.

I'm been fuck they already know.

Uh you you should go subscribe to our show on you too. You should also go find it on whatever audio thing you listen to podcasts on rate us and listen to us.

Truly, if you just google trillion in our mindset or put punch it into Apple Music or Spotify or whatever, you'll find it and you'll listen to it, and we think you'll really really enjoy it.

You're the only trillion in our mindset, right, There's not another one.

Yeah. We get a lot of like, oh, I'm not really interested in that kind of thing. But you guys seem fun. I swear the show is still fun, and you might you know, are you.

Telling yourself out of the audience. I feel like the show is fun. I've just seen it and it's enjoyable. Yeah.

Yeah, but we get we get people who are are maybe afraid of the subject matter sometimes, but we often say give us a chance, and when people do, they go, wow, this is very fun.

No, I think it's good. I think it is a lot of fun. And I think you guys are like, you know enough to be dangerous, but you don't know so much that you're so sure of yourself that it's like a Joe Rogan experience or whatever.

Like that's exactly know what we want. I think.

No, I mean, I think you could get to a Joe Rogan experience level in terms of your power. But I think what's what's interesting about listening to what I what I have enjoyed from what I have heard and seen, Well, one is the desk is great. That's number one. If you're gonna it's a great It's just a great, wonderful desk. Got nice colors, nice shape. It's really really actually kind of looks like those one of those Bow's wave radios. Do you remember the ones that were kind of tall? I don't know.

Yeah, designed it was designed with that in mind.

It has kind of a shape of a Bo's wave radio. But no, I think what's good about the show is that you guys are not you're not taking yourselves too seriously, and you're making things that are often like a real down are like pretty pretty accessible. And I think that's a huge that's a huge asset and like the fact is like you're not, like you don't have an ego

Yeah, so those guys are kind of like our I guess issues sometimes where I think we get lumped in with them. When people hear about the show, they go, oh, finance bros. Pass and it's like.

No, no, no, a glance. I mean, look at you. I mean I understand, Like right, they see you, they see the still frame, they see trillionaire mindset. You got a couple of bros.

We thought that the name itself indicate that we're being ironic.

Unfortunately, in that world people are like, yeah, I could do a trillion I can get there.

It's our fault for picking an ironic title. Yeah, exact, it's good.

I think it's real. I thought I think the titles great, and I think that the right people will read it, thank you the way you want them to read it. And the people who'd read it the other way are stupid and suck and you don't have to worry about them.

All right.

Any other closing thoughts before we before we go into that grade to beyond, just that this was very lovely and I appreciate you having well, I feel that it was lovely as well. I really enjoyed this conversation. You guys are super fun duo. You have a lot to say. You've said a couple of things that are cancellable, but I think you know you can weather the storm and you know, yeah, we gotta do it again. We got to come back and we got to see if any of these predictions are We'd love that. Yeah.

Maybe if we're in the same location, we can all do it irl.

Yeah, well you guys are in La right, Yeah, that's where all the That's what it all happens. Yeah, it's all happened anyhow.

This is great.

Thank you so much for doing it, and we'll do it again.

Great, Thank you for having.

Us, Josh, Well, look that is our show. I think you know, I think you know where I've had it with this. That is our show for this week. Because it was it was a big one. We covered a lot of ground. We left no stone unturned. We got the full reveal I would say spoiler alert. We said it all and so we've got to wrap up. But we will be back next week with more what future and as always, I wish you and your family the very best