My Worst Investment Ever September 2023
Ep732: Gino Barbaro – Buy Right, Finance Right and Manage Right
BIO: Gino Barbaro is the co-founder of Jake & Gino. He is an investor, business owner, author and entrepreneur. As an entrepreneur, he has grown his real estate portfolio to over 2,120 multifamily units & $280,000,000 in assets under management.
STORY: Gino invested and lost $172,000 in mobile home parks that he didn’t even know what they looked like or where they were.
LEARNING: Know your values before you form a business partnership with anyone. Do due diligence to understand what you’re investing in.
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Ep731: Robin Wigglesworth – You Can’t Outsmart the Markets
BIO: Robin Wigglesworth is the editor of Alphaville, the FT’s financial blog. From Oslo, Norway, he leads a team of writers who dig into anything deeply nerdy or plain delightful that they spot in markets, business, or the global economy.
STORY: Robin invested in an ETF in Norway, a consumer durables company, and a fertilizer company after the 2008 financial crisis. These companies did incredibly well. Unfortunately, Robin reacted to short-term headlines when the European crisis started erupting and sold out.
LEARNING: You can’t outsmart the markets. Always let your winners ride.
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Ep730: Sheryl Garratt – Shove Your Ideas Out There and See What Happens
BIO: Sheryl Garratt is a coach who helps creative professionals do their best work – while also living their best lives. She was a journalist for more than 30 years, the editor of The Face and The Observer magazines, and has published several books, including Adventures In Wonderland, a history of British nightclubs.
STORY: Sheryl’s perfectionism, which she wore as a badge of honor, has made her miss out on great opportunities over the last couple of years.
LEARNING: Shove your ideas out there and see what happens. In business, you should be iterating often.
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Ep729: Kim Ades – Slow It Down
BIO: Kim Ades is the Founder of Frame of Mind Coaching™ and Co-Founder of The Journal That Talks Back™. Recognized as a pioneer in leadership coaching and thought mastery, Kim uses her unique philosophy and quirky coaching style to help leaders identify their blind spots and learn to direct their thinking to achieve extraordinary results.
STORY: Kim had partnered with a friend and her ex-husband to start a business, but as her marriage unraveled, the partnership became hard. Kim decided to sell the company to her husband but didn’t take the time to understand the deal. Three years later, Kim learned that she owed the government $300,000 in taxes from the business she’d sold.
LEARNING: When things are very stressful, it’s a good idea to slow down instead of speeding up. Don’t be forced into a decision without understanding all the elements.
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Ep728: Nick Hutchison – Have a Proof of Concept Before You Dive Into the Big Idea
BIO: Nick Hutchison is the author of Rise of the Reader: Strategies for Mastering Your Reading Habits and Applying What You Learn and the founder of BookThinkers. This growing 7-figure digital marketing agency serves mission-driven authors.
STORY: Nick envisioned the first iteration of BookThinkers to be a grand mobile application. He got partners together, and they started working on the idea. Without much research or due diligence, the partners contracted an Argentinian company to build the app. Unfortunately, the company in Argentina went out of business under a year later.
LEARNING: Failure is a great thing. Before you dive into a big idea, have a proof of concept and spend tens of thousands of dollars on it. Do more due diligence and understand the process before jumping into it.
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ISMS 30: Larry Swedroe – Do You Believe Your Fortune Is in the Stars or Rely on Misleading Information?
In this episode of Investment Strategy Made Simple (ISMS), Andrew gets into part two of his discussion with Larry Swedroe: Ignorance is Bliss. Today, they discuss two chapters of Larry’s book Investment Mistakes Even Smart Investors Make and How to Avoid Them. In this tenth series, they discuss mistake number 18: Do you believe your fortune is in the stars? And mistake number 19: Do you rely on misleading information?
LEARNING: Stop thinking about having your fortune in the stars. Avoid actively managed funds. Be cautious when evaluating claims about fund performance.
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Ep727: Laurie Barkman – Quit Often Quit Fast
BIO: Laurie Barkman, the business transition sherpa, is the former CEO of a $100 million revenue company that was sold to a Fortune 50 company.
STORY: Though Laurie has had a flourishing career in the startup world, she regrets not spending that time building her own business.
LEARNING: Quit often, quit fast. Don’t hesitate, or stay in something that doesn’t bring you value. Pay attention to your instinct; don’t be afraid to act on it.
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Ep726: Mark Venables – Do Your Best to Secure Your Crypto
BIO: Mark Venables, originally from the UK, is a serial entrepreneur and, among other companies, owns thecryptomerchant.com, offering the largest selection of crypto self-custody devices on the planet.
STORY: Mark bought crypto in an exchange, but ironically, despite being surrounded by 1,000s of cold wallets, Mark didn’t take his crypto and put it in a cold wallet. The crypto company got into some financial difficulties and went down in a blaze. Mark’s crypto was frozen for about two years.
LEARNING: You don’t need hundreds of thousands in crypto to get a cold wallet. Whether a veteran or newbie crypto trader/investor, habitually put your crypto into a cold wallet.
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Ep725: Tania Reif – You Can Be Right and Lose Money
BIO: Tania Reif is the Founder and CIO of Senda Digital Assets. Prior to her cryptocurrency focus, she built her investment pedigree at top macro hedge funds, including Soros Fund Management, Laurion Capital, Citadel, and Alphadyne Asset Management.
STORY: Around the end of 2017, Talia believed the dollar would stay strong and rally. Unfortunately, it tanked in January 2018. It only started rallying three or four months later, but by that time, Talia had taken her chips off the table and didn’t profit from her view that played out a few months later.
LEARNING: Reassess your investment model and make discretionary decisions to avoid getting into trouble. You can’t always be on top of everything in the financial world. Don’t fight the flow.
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DISCLAIMER: This content is for information purposes only. It is not intended to be investment advice. Readers should not consider statements made by the author(s) as formal recommendations and should consult their financial advisor before making any investment decisions. While the information provided is believed to be accurate, it may include errors or inaccuracies. The author(s) cannot be held liable for any actions taken as a result of reading this article.