Thank you for attending the Casual Cocktail Conversation on Sunday, January 11, 2026. This material is designed to reinforce what we discussed, whether you attended for the full session or only part of it. You can start with the video, then take a look at each audio segment. Below the audios you will find the written version online for you to read. At the very bottom you will find both a PDF and an e-book version available for download.

Note: The audios will play on your screen if you view this page on your computer; however, when using a cell phone, a new screen will appear with the audio. This is the way it works using industry standards.

Good, Bad, Ugly

Buckets of Income with Clarity

Sunday, January 11th - 2:30 PM - Stonewater Club

The straightforward, sensible approach to retirement income. Separate fixed and flexible money into well-defined buckets so you always know what is safe, moderate, growing, and what is truly spendable.

Fixed Cost Investing™

Fixed Cost Investing is a compensation model where the advisor charges a predetermined, transparent fee for services rendered—typically a flat dollar amount or fixed retainer—rather than a percentage of assets under management, commissions, or transaction-based fees that create inherent incentives to gather assets or generate activity. This approach represents the purest fiduciary standard because the advisor's compensation remains identical whether they recommend you invest aggressively, conservatively, hold cash, buy real estate, pay off your mortgage, or give money to your grandchildren—eliminating the structural conflicts that exist when an advisor's paycheck grows by keeping more of your money under their management or by selling you products.

The Truesdell Professional Building
200 NW 52nd Avenue
Ocala, Florida 34482
352-612-1000 – Florida

Paul Grant Truesdell, J.D., AIF, CLU, ChFC, RFC
Founder of The Truesdell Companies

Truesdell Wealth, Inc.
Truesdell Insurance, Inc.
Truesdell Consulting, Inc.
Truesdell Media Group

I am a lifestyle business where business is a lifestyle.

© 2025 Paul Grant Truesdell. All rights reserved. This material, including but not limited to text, audio, video, and graphical content, is the intellectual property of Paul Grant Truesdell and/or The Truesdell Companies. Unauthorized use, reproduction, distribution, or modification of any part of this content without prior written consent is strictly prohibited. Truesdell Wealth, Inc. is an independent registered investment advisor. This material is provided for informational and educational purposes only and may not be relied upon for legal, financial, or professional advice. Past performance is not a guarantee of future performance. And lastly, All trademarks and service marks referenced herein are the property of their respective owners.

January 22, 2026

In the beginning…

I doubt you've been to a seminar or workshop conducted the way I conduct my casual conversations. I call them Casual Cocktail Conversations or Casual Coffee Conversations. Today we're doing one where we're serving chili because it's a perfect day for a couple of drinks and some chili.

Let me explain where all of this comes from.

I've been giving talks quite literally since I was about twelve years of age. My father did the same thing and he taught me what I know and what I do. I've never had any real problem giving a talk. I think I got nervous once or twice but I got over that pretty quickly. I've laid a few bombs over the years. Sometimes you just don't hit the audience right. You didn't think it through properly. I remember one occasion where it didn't make any difference what I said because the audience was completely tuned out. That's what happens when you're the last speaker on a conference schedule. I've always made sure never to let that happen again.

In the end, this is all about storytelling. It's about knowing your facts and figures and telling the story in a way that makes sense. I avoid twenty-five dollar words. Instead I stick with twenty-five cent words. Because if we can't communicate, I'm wasting your time and mine. I don't want to waste either. You'll see how I feel about time when I talk about time, effort, aggravation, and money as you get through this series of audios.

When I began doing this work, I realized people simply didn't retain information the way I thought they needed to. So I started using cassette tapes. You remember those, the tape in a plastic little box. I actually go back to the days of reel-to-reel tapes. When cassettes came out I thought they were fantastic. I built a cassette duplicator where I could record three or four tapes from my master at once. Once I started doing that, my productivity and communication effectiveness went through the roof. What people were retaining skyrocketed. I would hand out the tape at the end of my discussion and say when you have an opportunity, put it in your car, put it in your cassette player. Listen to it again. That was a real winner of a way to do business.

Then came eight-tracks and Beta and VHS. Eight-track eventually went away. Beta lost to VHS. So I started creating VCR tapes. I built a VCR duplicator and got to the point where I could do ten duplications at one time. That was a lot of effort. Then came CDs. We never did DVDs. I never saw the need. But we did a lot of CDs, a lot of audios. I built a CD duplicator too. I have to thank my oldest son for helping me with a lot of that technology after he was born. He has a natural gift and skill set for those things.

Then came thumb drives. I never used thumb drives because my client base rejected them. Plugging something into your computer was not common back in the day. Hardly anybody had a computer. Nobody had a mobile phone. You have to remember how far we've come in such a short period of time. People were worried about viruses. You remember John McAfee before he died. He basically created viruses and then created the software to fix them. I won't go into all of that, but viruses and hackers remain a real problem. Nobody wants to plug unknown things into their computer. They just don't.

As time went on, more people embraced the Internet. I've been podcasting before there was an iPod, before that was even a name. We called it Internet radio. Back then most people were using AOL and dial-up connections. We had to make sure the compression of our audio files was really small. We did a lot of broadcasts in those early days.

As time went along, I've embraced every cotton-picking form of social media in some way. Social media became a problem when everything became controlled by leftists in this country. I was shadow banned on YouTube. I had a big audience on both Facebook and YouTube. I got angry and dumped it all. Dumped tens of thousands of followers because I was tired of it. I don't cotton to being discriminated against. Nobody should. I slowly began using social media again but here's the problem. They still shadow ban you and you don't really own your material.

Over the years I've adopted the philosophy that I'll think it, I'll create it, I'll research it, I'll record it, and I'll host it on my own website. I don't really care if somebody in Portland, Maine or Portland, Oregon listens to anything I do. They're probably not going to be clients. The probability is low. I work on the law of probabilities.

As time goes on, we've developed more capability for doing what you're experiencing here. Video is one thing. Audio is something else. Audio allows you to do other things while you listen. You can go biking. You can get in your golf cart. You can go for a drive. You can play mahjong. Audio is often an audience of many. Put on the speakers and you, your spouse, family, and friends can all listen to what I have to say.

I've had clients conduct seminars for me in their own homes. They brought people in and said hey, I went to this guy's talk and I liked it. They copied my material and basically ran a book club. It's been very profitable for everyone. When people do that, I thank them very much. I've never not gotten business out of somebody who did that. Eventually most of the room winds up becoming clients. That's a great thing.

What we've done here is a video, but I'm not putting my face on camera. It's primarily just a way of having visuals with some words that emphasize key points. Periodically you'll see my Wall Street Journal headshot, a few photos of my office, and my professional photo. But we've intentionally done these as audios. You'll notice I add live recordings periodically as well.

The entire script is available in written form. Over thirteen thousand words. You can read it. We'll put everything online. You can scroll to your heart's content. We'll put it up as a PDF and an e-book format. Why do we do this? Because I'm not going to waste my time or yours repeating the same things over and over when it can be done efficiently with digital media in today's modern world.

With that, I look forward to hearing from you. Thank you for attending. If you want to get together, all you have to do is text or call 352-612-1000. That's 352-612-1000. You can use the contact form or email, but you know and I know that texting seems to be the way to go.

Now, let’s get down to business.

Good, Bad, Ugly

There's an individual with a group coming to town. You've probably seen the flyers or the ads. Some outfit rolling in from who knows where, setting up shop for a weekend to tell you all about the good, the bad, and the ugly of annuities. Sound familiar? It should. It's the same playbook used by folks like Ken Fisher, who built a media empire telling people he hates annuities. Bold statement. Great for television. Lousy for nuance.

Here's the thing. Every financial product on earth has good, bad, and ugly components. Every single one. Stocks, bonds, mutual funds, real estate, gold bars buried in your backyard. Nothing is universally perfect because nothing fits every person's situation. That's not a flaw in the product. That's just life.

Think about it this way. If you spent years training like Arnold Schwarzenegger or Lou Ferrigno, you'd be magnificent for bodybuilding competitions. But try running a marathon with that physique. Try making it through Navy SEAL training carrying all that bulk. Different goals require different approaches. Fitness isn't one size fits all, and neither is financial planning.

What bothers me about these roadshow seminars is the fear factor. They blow into town, scare the absolute daylights out of people about some specific product or entire industry, and then conveniently offer the solution. Funny how that works. Scare them, then save them. It's a sales technique older than dirt, and frankly, it's lazy.

Look, I understand wanting to make a sale and acquire new clients. That's business. But demonizing an entire category of financial tools to get there strikes me as immature and misleading.

Most folks I talk to want something simple. They want to work with someone local who actually lives here. Someone they can build a real relationship with, professional but friendly. Someone who will be honest and direct without an agenda. And they want to understand how that person gets paid, because compensation structures matter.

So here's my advice. Whenever you see a headline screaming about the good, the bad, and the ugly of any specific financial product or industry, do yourself a favor. Walk away.

Do You Hate Your Social Security?

When you hear someone say they hate annuities, I want you to remember something. Never forget it. Social Security is an annuity. That monthly check showing up like clockwork from the federal government? Annuity. Same structure. Same math.

If you're fortunate enough to have a defined benefit pension plan because you retired from the military, the federal government, or one of those increasingly rare private employers that actually kept its promises, that steady income arriving every year for the rest of your life is also an annuity. Same calculations. Same principles.

Commercial annuities sold by insurance companies? Same actuarial foundation. Charitable gift annuities from your favorite nonprofit? Same underlying math. The structure is identical whether the check comes from Uncle Sam, your former employer, or an insurance carrier.

So when somebody stands on a stage or appears on television proclaiming that annuities are bad, understand what they're actually telling you. They're saying Social Security is bad. They're saying your military pension is bad. They're saying any guaranteed lifetime income stream is somehow flawed. That's the logical conclusion of their argument, whether they admit it or not.

The real question isn't whether annuities are good or evil. That's a false choice designed to get your attention. The real question is what kind of income do you want in retirement. Do you want fixed income you can count on, or flexible income that fluctuates with the markets? How much time and effort are you willing to spend managing your money? And perhaps most importantly, do you want contractual guarantees backing your retirement, or are you comfortable living without a financial safety net?

That's it. That's the entire conversation stripped down to what actually matters. Fixed versus flexible. Effort versus simplicity. Guarantees versus hope. It's never any more complicated than that, no matter how many scary seminars roll through town.

Do You Hate Your Pension

If you have a pension, there's a high probability you don't hate it. Oh sure, you might wish more money was coming in. And sometimes you probably sit back and think about how somebody in upper management who did a whole lot less actual work than you is collecting a whole lot more because their salary was higher and pensions are based on income. It might not seem fair, but it is what it is. That's how these things are structured. I don't have any control over it and neither do you.

What you do have control over is how much guaranteed income you create through a commercial annuity. You have a say in how that contract is designed. That's the difference.

Now let me tell you something personal. I did not retire from the Tampa Police Department. I was seriously injured in 1984 and was scheduled for medical retirement, but I wasn't going to be one of those fellas who just accepted it. I rehabbed, came back on the job, and through good fortune became a financial analyst effective October 1, 1986. Since then I've learned the art and science of true fiduciary based investment and wealth advice and management. I built what you'd call a family office approach to serving clients.

Over the years I've had the opportunity to attend reunions with the men and women I worked with at the department. Not a single one of them complains about having a pension. Every one of them wishes they had more, naturally. Some can't believe how well their pension has done because it's properly funded and managed better than most. But nobody hates it.

What they do complain about is this. If you retired in your late forties or early fifties, which isn't unusual when you start the job at twenty-one and put in twenty or thirty years, you discover that Social Security is still a long way off. Inflation takes a real bite out of things. Health insurance comes out of your own pocket. And some of these folks, well, let's just say they made some choices. A few of them blew through their 457 deferred compensation plans within a year or two of retiring. Quite a few had to go back to work as security guards, private investigators, or with other law enforcement agencies.

But not one of them hates their pension. Not one.

So whenever you see somebody on television saying they hate annuities, or some outfit rolls into town promising to reveal the good the bad and the ugly, understand what's really happening. These are people trying to upset the apple cart to reposition your money and assets for reasons that become obvious once you understand how compensation works in this industry. I made that very clear during our casual conversation, and it will become even clearer as you continue along with this audio series.

Broker/Dealer

What exactly is a broker dealer? The phrase gets thrown around constantly and most people don't truly understand what it means. If you're one of them, don't feel embarrassed. You're in good company.

Let's break it down into plain English. A broker is simply a person who brings together a buyer and a seller. In the world of securities transactions, they're finding people who want to buy and people who want to sell, then facilitating that exchange. For their trouble, they earn a commission. This isn't some exotic Wall Street concept. Your local grocery store operates the same way.

Now what exactly is a dealer? A dealer sells from their own inventory. They own the product. They put their money up front, hold onto the goods, mark up the price, and sell it to you. The markup is how they make their money.

Think about it using the grocery store example. When that store goes out and buys a truckload of cereal, has it private labeled with the store brand, and stocks the shelves, they're acting as a dealer. They invested in the inventory. They marked it up. When you buy that box of cereal, they profit on the difference between what they paid and what you paid.

On the other hand, when the store carries name brand products and earns a percentage based on every sale without actually owning the inventory themselves, that's the brokerage function. They're facilitating the transaction between the manufacturer and you, taking a cut for making the connection happen.

A broker dealer does both. They can sell from their own inventory when it suits them and broker transactions between other parties when that makes more sense.

The bottom line is straightforward. With a broker dealer, every time you buy or sell something, there's going to be some form of compensation involved. In this world, that compensation is typically called a commission. Every single transaction. No exceptions.

Registered Representative (Person)

Let's talk about the term registered representative. The broker dealer is the company. The registered representative is the individual person who works for that company.

These men and women take licensing exams and then go out into the world calling themselves all sorts of things. Stockbrokers. Bond brokers. Financial planners. Investment consultants. Wealth advisors. You name it, they've come up with a title for it. But technically, the correct term is registered representative. No ifs, ands, or buts about it.

Now I'm not going to get my way on this. I really do wish more people in this industry would use the proper terminology the way it's intended. But the government isn't going to change things because it's old school and there are too many power players who benefit from keeping the language fuzzy. So it stays the way it is.

What matters is that you understand the reality. A registered representative is duly licensed with a broker dealer, and they work with one broker dealer. It's extremely rare for a registered representative to be affiliated with more than one broker dealer because it's simply not allowed in most circumstances.

So when somebody hands you a business card that says they work for Acme Financial Planning Firm, you need to ask a very simple question. Who is your broker dealer? You need to know the name of that company. Then you need to verify that this individual is properly licensed to do business with you.

This matters more than most people realize. The broker dealer is the entity that supervises and takes responsibility for what that representative does. Knowing who they are and confirming proper licensing is pretty darn important. It takes about five minutes to verify and could save you from a world of trouble down the road. Ask the question. Get the answer. Verify it.

Registered Investment Advisor (Company)

Now let's talk about a registered investment advisor. This structure goes back to the Investment Advisers Act of 1940, which created a different kind of relationship between financial professionals and their clients.

A registered investment advisor was designed from the ground up to be a fiduciary relationship. The compensation is based on fees, not commissions. You're not paying every time a transaction occurs. You're paying a fee for ongoing advice and management.

Now here's the problem with fees, and we'll discuss this in more detail later. The industry has become overwhelmingly corrupt because they charge something called assets under management fees. Assets under management is really just an ongoing commission dressed up in different clothing. It's not a true fee in the proper sense, which I'll explain down the road. Instead of getting paid on each transaction, they get paid based on the total amount of money you've handed over for them to manage. Different structure, but still a form of compensation that creates its own set of conflicts.

A registered investment advisor can operate under a variety of different approaches. They take companies public. They manage money for individuals and institutions. In many ways, the duties and responsibilities are much more robust than what you find with a broker dealer. But they're two completely different things serving different purposes.

These regulations came about because back in the day, somebody had a bright idea. The very first mutual fund was a company called Massachusetts Investors Trust, which still exists today. The concept was simple but revolutionary. You pool money together from a bunch of smaller investors and invest in stocks collectively. This allowed the small investor to access the same benefits and diversification that big investors enjoyed. But combining people's money like that required rules. It required oversight. So they passed laws and regulations that eventually created what we now call registered investment advisors.

Here's the important part to remember. The RIA is the company. It's the firm. It's the business entity. When a person sits across from you and says they're an investment advisor or calls themselves a registered investment advisor, that's technically inappropriate. The individual is an investment advisor representative. The company is the registered investment advisor.

In my opinion, about seventy to eighty percent of the men and women in this business continue to make that mistake. I think they do it because they simply don't know any better. They should know. They're supposed to know. But they don't. So now you know more than most of the people out there selling you financial products, and that knowledge matters.

Investment Advisor Representative (Person)

This part goes pretty quickly because the concept is straightforward. An investment advisor representative is a person, just like a registered representative is a person who works for a broker dealer. The investment advisor representative works for the registered investment advisor firm.

The investment advisor representative is supposed to be a fiduciary. They're supposed to give you advice and manage your money with your best interests foremost in their mind. At least that's the way it's supposed to work.

The problem is that anyone who works as an investment advisor representative has conflicts of interest that you as the client need to fully understand. First off, the more money you have, the more they make. Even though you might have the exact same portfolio as somebody else, the same age, the same goals and objectives, if you have more money you're going to pay more. Which raises a fair question. Why should you pay more simply because you have more? And why should someone with less money receive less attention simply because their account is smaller?

Very few of these people charge for their time. Compensation is generally based on assets under management. The more you have, the more they collect. Sometimes they give you break points, meaning the fee percentage goes down once you hit five hundred thousand or one million or ten million dollars. But those first dollars are expensive dollars to have managed. That's just the reality of how the structure works.

One of the problems we have in this industry is the title financial planner. That term is not regulated in any meaningful way. Basically anyone in the world can step up tomorrow and call themselves a financial planner. There's nothing you can do about it. There are certifications and classes available, but no legal requirement to hold any of them.

In my opinion, the only person who should ever be able to call themselves a financial planner is someone properly licensed as an investment advisor representative. But you see men and women working in banks, credit counselors, insurance agents, all using that title freely. So is there any reason you're confused about who does what in this industry? Not one bit. I completely understand.

All I'm doing here is laying down a foundation. When we have a conversation together, we won't have to go over these basics repeatedly. It's efficient and effective to use this type of methodology to get everyone on the same page from the start.

And as you can probably tell by now, this is not off the shelf material. This isn't something we bought from a vendor or downloaded from some industry template. This is created in house by the Truesdell Companies specifically for the people we work with. That matters because it means the information serves you, not someone else's agenda.

Dual Registration Red Flag

Let's talk about dual registration being a red flag. What does that exactly mean?

When you work with a registered investment advisor, the vast overwhelming majority of those firms are directly tied to a broker dealer. Generally speaking, the broker dealer owns the registered investment advisor. Sometimes it's the other way around, but one of them is the parent company and one is the subsidiary.

When you have that relationship, the goal and objective of the people involved is to get as much business flowing to the parent company as possible. When a person is licensed both with a broker dealer and a registered investment advisor, you the client are often not fully aware of when the relationship changes and what relationship you actually have at any given moment.

I've got to tell you, over the years I've seen a whole lot of nonsense around this issue. It's getting better because technology and oversight are a whole lot better than they used to be. But the problem of dual registration needs to be fully understood before you hand your money over to anyone.

Here's how it typically works. Your friendly financial planner comes in and puts you in a brokerage account. You pay a commission every time you buy or sell a mutual fund. When you own that mutual fund, there's something called a 12B-1 fee buried inside, and they make a cut of that too. A lot of people aren't aware these 12B-1 fees exist. Let's say it's a quarter of a percent. Doesn't sound like much until you realize it's coming out of your account value year after year. That adds up to a whole lot of money over time. You do realize that, right?

Then one day, after they've sold you all these mutual funds and collected all those commissions, they come to you with a new idea. Let's move to something different. Let's go to a bunch of no-load mutual funds. They want to change your relationship from being a brokerage client to a registered investment advisor client. They tell you the accounts can stay with the same broker dealer, but this way it's more fair because now you're in a fiduciary relationship.

Here's the problem. You've already paid the commission on those original mutual funds. Instead of buying and holding and relocating within a mutual fund family where there may be no additional commissions charged, which is the norm, now you're moving to a fee-based account. They're telling you it's a fiduciary-based account, but in reality you're paying ongoing fees on money you've already paid commissions on. That's the red flag. That's the problem with dual registration.

When you work with somebody, you should ask them directly. Are you an independent registered investment advisor? Is your investment advisor a parent or subsidiary of a broker dealer? If they are tied together, I encourage you to think long and hard about what you're doing. I realize you may like this person and have a long-term relationship with them. But dual registration is a problem. The Securities and Exchange Commission and the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority have both written extensively about it.

Is dual registration illegal? No, it's not. But neither is cheating at cards in Vegas. They just throw you out of the casino. You understand where I'm going with this. Just be really careful when you work with someone who has a blatant conflict of interest by way of dual registration.

By the way, Truesdell Wealth Inc. is an independent registered investment advisor. We operate under true fiduciary standards. We do not charge any assets under management fees. Everything we do is based on a fixed cost investment approach. And the term Fixed Cost Investing is trademarked by me. I'm the one who created it because I got tired of watching people get squeezed by a compensation structure that rewards advisors for gathering assets rather than serving clients.

Entertainment Advisor (98%)

Now here's something that every single investment advisor representative, broker dealer, and financial planner absolutely hates when I say it. Most of the folks in our industry are nothing more than entertainment advisors. I call them EAs and I'm dead serious. I'm talking about ninety-eight percent of them, if not more. It's probably a whole lot more.

When you have someone selling mutual funds, are they really managing your portfolio? Because actual portfolio management is the buying and selling of individual securities, bonds, or real estate. These people are just another layer, another cost sitting between you and direct ownership of what you're invested in.

What happens with the vast overwhelming majority of investment advisor representatives is they use what's known as a third-party asset management platform. This is called a TAMP. The TAMP goes out and buys and sells the actual mutual funds. Sometimes they're handling individual stocks too. So your person, the one you're meeting with, is really not doing anything other than managing a relationship.

This is very important to understand. The vast majority of these people are relationship managers. Customer service agents if you want to call it exactly what it is. But they're charging a percentage of assets under management as if they're doing the actual managing. Technically they are, but that's like saying a camel, a horse, and a donkey are all the same thing because they all have four legs.

Now I'm not being mean about this because managing relationships is awfully important. Understanding the individual characteristics of a person, what's going on in their life, their concerns and goals, all of that is critical. I take a tremendous amount of time finding out exactly who you are and what makes you unique. We all do. Because just like financial products differ from one another, people differ too. There's no one size fits all when it comes to human beings.

But here's the thing. The management of your actual portfolio generally is one size fits all. The TAMP runs the same model portfolios for everybody in the same risk category regardless of individual circumstances.

If you just had an aha moment, don't be ashamed. Most people about this time do have that moment when things begin to click. You've heard about all the different types of people in this industry. You've heard about the conflicts. Assets under management. Dual registration. How anybody can call themselves a financial planner with no licensing required. Now you're beginning to see the picture clearly. These guys and gals really are just a bunch of entertainers collecting a fee for putting on a good show.

Frankly I do some of the same things. If you came to my casual cocktail conversation, I smiled and laughed and like telling jokes. But eventually you have to get down to business. We use individual securities. We use bundled financial products when we have to, and there are times when they're more efficient. I'll talk about that later.

But the overwhelming majority of these people are not really managing your money. The old joke is pat the client on the head, put a sucker in their mouth, pat them on the back, and send them on their way. Tell them everything's going to be fine. Does that sound familiar? If it does, there are better ways.

AUM (1.5% is Common for the First $500,000)

We've talked a little bit about assets under management fees already. Now I want to get into the weeds because if you came to our casual cocktail conversation where we sit down and dig into the numbers, this is exactly the kind of analysis we'd walk through together.

Let's use a very simple comparison. We'll look at someone with one million dollars and someone with two hundred fifty thousand dollars.

The person with two hundred fifty thousand dollars paying one and a half percent to their advisor is handing over three thousand seven hundred fifty dollars every year. If they spend a couple of hours face to face with that advisor twice a year, that's four hours total. That advisor is making nine hundred thirty-seven dollars and fifty cents per hour for their time. Think about that for a moment.

Now look at the person with one million dollars at the same one and a half percent. They're paying fifteen thousand dollars a year. If they're getting the exact same service, a couple of hours in the spring and a couple of hours in the fall, they're paying three thousand seven hundred fifty dollars an hour to be entertained. Because remember, a lot of these people are also using third-party asset management platforms to actually manage the money.

That TAMP is going to cost another half a percent on top of what you're paying your advisor. And if they're using bundled financial products like mutual funds, exchange traded funds, business development companies, or real estate investment trusts, every one of those has another layer of asset management cost baked in. Add another half a percent for that.

Now you're all in at two and a half percent. That means you're paying twenty-five thousand dollars a year on that million dollar account. Or six thousand two hundred fifty dollars on that two hundred fifty thousand dollar account. Every single year whether the market goes up or down.

Here's the big sales pitch they use. They say it all the time. They'll tell you something like this. This is the best way to go because we're on the same side of the table. The more you make, the more I make. That makes sense, doesn't it?

The problem with that logic is the client with two hundred fifty thousand dollars may have the exact identical portfolio and receive the exact same amount of time as the million dollar client. But that million dollar client is paying a whole lot more for the same service. Why?

I've been in this business a long time and I've always asked that question. If you can tell me why that's fair, I'll buy you a big steak dinner. But I've never had anybody come up with a reasonable, logical explanation for why you should pay more just because you have more.

Think about it like this. When you go to the grocery store, you're not required to disclose your income or net worth. But imagine if the world got to the point where everyone was so technologically integrated that you had to show an ID card. When you scan that card, it knows exactly how much money you make and what you're worth.

That can of pork and beans you want to take home because you're having hot dogs and potato chips for dinner tonight, good old-fashioned American meal, is going to cost you seven dollars. But the person behind you who makes quite a bit less is going to pay fifteen cents for the same can. You're subsidizing them.

That's exactly what happens with assets under management pricing. If someone is taking a lot of time from an advisor and they're actually losing money on that client, you're subsidizing their investment management with your higher fees.

But I guarantee you one thing. Nobody in this business is going to work for free. They're going to get rid of the deadbeats eventually. The small accounts that aren't profitable get pushed aside, ignored, or shown the door. Meanwhile you're paying premium prices for the same service those folks were getting.

That's a lousy way of doing business, isn't it? There are better approaches that charge fairly for the actual work being done regardless of how much money you have.

Haircuts (Regardless of Performance)

So what do I mean by haircuts? When you have someone charging assets under management, you are constantly getting a haircut. Every single day a little bit is being snipped off. Every single solitary day.

Some of these folks do it a little differently. Instead of charging every single day based on the value of the account at market close, they look at the value at the end of the month. They charge on the first trading day of the month or the last trading day. Either way, you get a haircut. A lot of you might remember going to the barbershop as kids back in the fifties, sixties, and seventies. Same principle. Your hair never gets too long because you're in the chair regularly.

Here's the key. Most of these people charge on a quarterly basis. Generally speaking it's in arrears, sometimes forward billing, but usually in arrears. What they're doing is taking a little haircut every single day, adding it all up, and then at the end of the quarter you get hit with the bill.

They call it a fee. It's a commission. Let's be honest about what it actually is. It's a slow bleed commission. Death by a thousand cuts. A barber snipping your ear every time those scissors come near your head.

On your brokerage statements it may not be quite that obvious, so you need to dig into those and take a close look. The number of times I've sat in front of people who told me they weren't paying anything is remarkable. I show them the numbers and a couple of things happen. Good people say holy cow, thank you for showing me that. Then we sit down and I look at the cost for all the mutual funds or ETFs or other bundled financial products. I ask them for their fee agreement. Most people don't have their fee agreement, so we go online and try to find it and calculate the full cost.

There's nothing wrong with transparency. I am so blatantly obvious about costs it's not funny. In fact when you see Truesdell Wealth and our tagline of traditional, transparent, and trustworthy, that word transparent is there for a reason. Transparency is critical in this business.

But a lot of these people obviously hate what they're doing because they keep everything jumbled, devious, and fuzzy. So you have to ask yourself a question. Do you really want a constant and regular haircut based on the value of your account? Do you want to pay more simply because the market went up and your balance grew?

I would hope by now you're saying there's got to be a better way. Of course there is. It's called Fixed Cost Investing. I am the father and trademark holder of Fixed Cost Investing because I got tired of watching good people get nickel and dimed into mediocrity.

BFP (Bundled Financial Products)

During a casual conversation, you'll probably hear me say the letters BFP which stands for bundled financial products. It's a simple way to get across the idea that there are advantages and disadvantages when you bundle anything.

There's a thing called safety in numbers, but when you get to a certain point you lose effectiveness. Let me give you an example from outside the financial world.

We have plenty of examples in our nation of fraud when it comes to Medicare, Medicaid, and health insurance of all types. Look at what's going on in places like California, Chicago, and New York. Look at the Covid fraud. Look at the childcare fraud that's taken place with the Somalis up in Minneapolis and all around Minnesota. When you have something really big, the individual gets lost in the shuffle. Oversight becomes impossible. Accountability disappears.

When you go to the doctor today, it's not the same as when you had a family doctor back in the sixties and seventies. You can say all you want about advancements in technology, but what we have now is checkbox medicine. Everybody knows it. Every doctor knows it. Every PA and every nurse knows it too. You're not a person anymore. You're a file number moving through a system designed for efficiency, not for you.

The same thing happens with bundled financial products. When you own a mutual fund with hundreds of stocks inside it, you have no idea what you actually own. You have no control. You're just along for the ride hoping the people running the show are doing right by you.

The key thing is this. There are advantages and disadvantages to bundled products. Knowing what, when, where, and how to use bundled financial products is important. Sometimes they make sense. Often they don't.

I like to unbundle things. I like full transparency. I like knowing exactly what I own and exactly what I'm paying. And now that you understand the concept of bundled versus unbundled a little better, I think you do too.

TAMP

Let's talk about what a TAMP actually is. TAMP stands for third-party asset management platform. In plain English, it's a company that does the actual investment management work for the person sitting across the table from you.

Here's how it works. Your financial advisor signs up with a TAMP and gains access to their model portfolios. These are pre-built investment strategies designed by the TAMP's investment committee. When you become a client, your advisor plugs your information into the system, selects an appropriate model based on your age and risk tolerance, and the TAMP takes it from there. They handle the buying, selling, and rebalancing. Your advisor monitors the relationship and meets with you a couple of times a year.

The TAMP charges a fee for this service, usually around half a percent of your assets. That fee comes on top of what your advisor charges. And it comes on top of whatever the underlying investments cost. Layer upon layer upon layer.

Now here's where the real eye-opener takes place. Most TAMPs do not buy individual securities for your account. They're buying mutual funds, exchange traded funds, real estate investment trusts, and they sprinkle a little bit of individual stocks in there to make it look customized. But the reality is the overwhelming majority of what they put you in is just another layer sitting on top of other layers. You're paying your advisor. You're paying the TAMP. You're paying the mutual fund managers inside the mutual funds. Everybody gets a cut before you see a dime of growth.

The big thing nobody in this industry wants to talk about is overlap. I talk about it because it matters. When you look inside these model portfolios, you'll often find the same stocks showing up in multiple funds. You might own Apple or Microsoft in five different funds inside your portfolio. That's not diversification. That's redundancy you're paying for multiple times.

Unfortunately, the overwhelming majority of a person's portfolio ends up being nothing more than a mimic of a common index like the S&P 500. The fancy model portfolio with the impressive sounding name performs almost identically to something you could buy yourself for almost nothing.

So you have to ask yourself a question. Why are you paying so much more for something that's common, not uncommon? It's like going to the grocery store and paying a premium price for generic brands. The box looks different. The marketing sounds better. But inside it's the same cereal everybody else is eating. You're just paying three times as much for the privilege of a fancier label.

Trade Costs

Let's talk about trade costs and how dramatically things have changed over the decades.

Back in the sixties, seventies, and eighties, buying and selling stocks was expensive. Commissions could run fifty, seventy-five, even a hundred dollars or more per trade. If you wanted to build a diversified portfolio of individual stocks, the transaction costs alone would eat you alive. That's one reason bundled products like mutual funds became so popular. It was the only practical way for regular folks to get diversification without spending a fortune on commissions.

Then the nineties came along and things started changing. Discount brokers emerged. Technology improved. Commissions dropped to twenty dollars, then ten, then five. Today most trades cost nothing. Zero commission trading has become the norm.

Along the way, something else happened that changed everything. Fractional shares. You used to have to buy whole shares. If a stock traded at five hundred dollars, you needed five hundred dollars to buy one share. Now you can buy ten dollars worth of that same stock. This development has been incredibly valuable for what are known as separately managed accounts.

A separately managed account is exactly what it sounds like. Instead of pooling your money with thousands of other investors in a mutual fund, your account holds individual securities that you actually own. Your name is on them. You control them. You can see exactly what you have and what you paid for it.

This is basically what we do at Truesdell Wealth. Not just for wealthy clients, but for all clients. That's very important to understand. Separately managed accounts used to be reserved for people with millions of dollars. Fractional shares and zero commission trading changed that completely. Now we can build truly customized portfolios for regular folks without the cost barriers that existed for decades.

So if trade costs have gone to zero, how is the industry making money? Great question.

They charge for extra services. They make money on the spread between what they pay you on cash sitting in your account and what they earn by lending it out. They bundle trades together and profit on the execution. Cash management has become a profit center, not a service.

A lot of these do-it-yourself organizations, broker dealers, and investment advisors have realized they can make more money by lending money. They've created affiliated subsidiaries that offer mortgages, car loans, and credit cards. That's where the real money is now. The brokerage account is just the front door. Once you're in, they want to be your bank too.

Then there's the bond market, which operates very differently than stocks. When you buy a stock, you can see the price clearly. When you buy a bond, there's a bid price and an ask price, and the spread between them is where dealers make their money. That spread is not transparent. You don't really know how much you're paying. The bond market is notorious for this.

When you have a low interest rate environment and a big spread between bid and ask, and then you're paying multiple layers of assets under management fees on top of that, nobody is going to make money except the people charging you. You're getting brokered. They're making money. The broker dealer is making money. The investment advisor is making money. The bond desk is making money. Everyone is doing just fine except you.

Understanding where the money flows in this industry is the first step toward keeping more of it in your own pocket where it belongs.

Bid/Ask

Let's make sure you understand bid and ask in the bond market because it's where a lot of money quietly changes hands.

The bid is what a dealer is willing to pay you if you want to sell a bond. The ask is what the dealer will charge you if you want to buy that same bond. The difference between those two numbers is called the spread, and that spread is the dealer's profit.

Here's the problem. Unlike stocks where you can see prices clearly on a screen, bond pricing is murky. There's no central exchange. Dealers set their own spreads. You might pay a two percent markup and never know it because nobody is required to show you what they paid for that bond before selling it to you.

In the bond market, what you don't see absolutely can hurt you.

Fixed / Flexible

Let's talk about fixed income versus flexible income because understanding the difference matters when you're planning for retirement.

Flexible income comes from dividends, interest, and capital gains. These can fluctuate based on market conditions, company performance, and economic cycles. When the market drops, your dividend income might get cut. When interest rates change, your bond values can swing dramatically. You might own a bond paying a fixed rate, but the value of that bond itself is anything but fixed. It can drop significantly if rates rise.

Fixed income in the truest sense comes from contractual obligations. Social Security is a contract with the federal government. Pensions are contracts with your employer backed by laws and regulations. Annuities are contracts with insurance companies that come with additional layers of oversight and state guaranty associations protecting you.

The distinction is important. Flexible income depends on markets cooperating. Contractual income shows up whether markets cooperate or not. When you're no longer collecting a paycheck, knowing the difference between what might arrive and what will arrive becomes critical to sleeping well at night.

Liquidity / Illiquidity Premium

Let's start by defining some terms because understanding liquidity and illiquidity can save you from making decisions you'll regret.

Liquid means easily converted to cash. A liquid investment is one you can sell today and have money in hand tomorrow with no hoops to jump through. Illiquid means the opposite. Your money is tied up and getting it back involves time, conditions, or penalties.

The word premium in investing means an extra benefit or cost associated with a particular characteristic. It's the price you pay or the reward you receive for accepting certain conditions.

Now let's talk about how these concepts work together.

The liquidity premium is what you give up for easy access. When you can get your money anytime you want, you generally receive a lower rate of return. Why? Because you're not committing to anything. The institution holding your money knows you could walk away tomorrow, so they don't have to pay you much to keep you around. You get convenience and access, but you sacrifice return. That's the cost of liquidity.

The illiquidity premium is what you gain for giving up easy access. When you agree to lock your money up for a period of time, you generally receive a higher rate of return. The institution knows they can count on having your money for a defined period. They can invest it more aggressively, plan more effectively, and they reward you for that commitment with better returns.

Think about it like this. A savings account paying almost nothing gives you total access. A five-year certificate of deposit pays more because you've agreed to leave it alone. The longer you commit, the more they pay. That's the illiquidity premium working in your favor.

Now here's where it gets interesting. Many illiquid investments come with clauses and conditions that provide exit ramps under certain circumstances. Death of the owner often triggers immediate access for beneficiaries. Disability may allow early withdrawal without penalty. Some contracts include provisions for activities of daily living, meaning if you can't perform basic functions like bathing or dressing yourself, you can access funds early. Many annuities include free withdrawal provisions allowing you to take ten percent annually without penalty.

The point is this. Illiquidity doesn't mean your money is locked in a vault with no key. It means there are rules and conditions governing access. Understanding those rules before you commit is essential.

The question isn't whether liquid or illiquid is better. The question is which is appropriate for which portion of your money given your specific circumstances and timeline.

Seven COWS

Now let's talk about the seven components of wealth and status. This is something I've been working on since 1968, which happens to be the year I actually began working. My mother and father bought me a couple of books that year. One was How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie. The other was Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill. Those two books started me on a course of trying to define things in life that probably very few ten-year-old boys would ever think about.

What I've come up with over all these decades, and what I've been teaching my clients and others on a regular basis, is that there are seven distinct components to wealth and status. I call them the Seven COWS. Each of these seven words should be followed by the word wealth, because wealth and status go hand in hand. But wealth is not strictly financial, as you'll see. Most people hear the word wealth and immediately think about money. That's only part of the picture, and frankly it's not even the most important part.

The most important component of wealth is mindset. Mindset wealth is everything. Let me give you the four components of mindset wealth very simply, without a lot of elaboration.

The first is minting millionaire mindsets. This is where you begin. You start by understanding that the mindset of a millionaire is different from the mindset of someone who is not a millionaire or who is poor. You want to emulate successful people. You want to study them. You want to understand what they did to become millionaires. There are a lot of different ways to get there. There's no single way. But you want to look for the commonality.

The next is modern minimalist methods. It may sound unusual, but modern minimalist methods simply means you cannot spend every dime you earn. You have to learn to have patience. You have to learn the time value of money. And you have to learn what Edward C. Banfield wrote about in his book The Unheavenly City Revisited, which is the concept of time horizon. Your ability to see into the future is one of the biggest indicators of success or failure in life.

The next is mastering money management. You'll notice each one of these begins with the letter M. That's intentional. Why? Because when you flip the letter M vertically, you get the letter W. A vertical flip, also known as mirroring across the horizontal axis, turns an image upside down while maintaining its left-right orientation. Thus, this is my way of reminding myself and my clients that it’s not a win, win situation that works best, it’s a win, win, win situation, where it’s a win for you, win for me, and a mutual win for us. That’s the ultimate key to mindset wealth.

And then finally, the fourth one is monumental mankind movements. What does that mean? It's pretty simple. You want to leave this earth a little better off than the way you found it.

Now the second component of wealth is physical wealth. For me, keeping it simple, physical wealth involves engaging on a daily basis in strength, endurance, and flexibility training with natural nutrition and hydration. And everything in moderation. That's the approach. If you do that, you will find that you feel better, live longer, and except for bad luck, you're going to have a much happier life.

The third component is emotional wealth.

The fourth is intellectual wealth.

The fifth is relationship wealth.

The sixth is income wealth.

And finally, the seventh is risk wealth.

Now each of these I can elaborate and go on in detail for a couple of minutes to a full thirty minutes, or even a workshop or seminar, or a prolonged conversation. But for today's purposes, those are the seven components of wealth and status in the order of importance.

For you and me, you should know that this is what I look at when I sit down. When any of us at our firms sit down, this is what we talk about. We go through this very methodically with our prospective clients, and then it's an ongoing discussion with our existing clients.

Again, it's a holistic approach. It's a family office approach. We're taking what people who are multi-millionaires many times over use, that exact process, and applying it to every single client, as long as those people are nice. When that happens, it's a win for everybody.

TINSTAAFL

Now, let’s talk about a funny sounding word, TINSTAAFL. That's T-I-N-S-T-A-A-F-L. It takes the first letter of each word from the phrase There Is No Such Thing As A Free Lunch. You'll also see it written as TANSTAAFL, which stands for There Ain't No Such Thing As A Free Lunch. Same concept, slightly different grammar.

This phrase became the title of a 1975 book by Milton Friedman called There's No Such Thing as a Free Lunch: Essays on Public Policy. Before we get into what the book teaches, let me tell you about the man who wrote it because understanding Friedman helps you understand why this concept matters.

Milton Friedman was born on July 31, 1912, in Brooklyn, New York, to Jewish immigrant parents from what is now Ukraine. His family moved to Rahway, New Jersey, when he was just a year old, and that's where he grew up. He won a scholarship to Rutgers University, where he studied mathematics and economics, earning his bachelor's degree in 1932. He went on to earn his master's degree from the University of Chicago in 1933 and his doctorate from Columbia University in 1946.

In 1946, Friedman accepted a position teaching economic theory at the University of Chicago, where he would remain for the next thirty years. There he became the leader of what became known as the Chicago School of Economics, which produced numerous Nobel Prize winners and fundamentally changed how economists think about money, markets, and government policy.

Friedman was awarded the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences in 1976 for his achievements in the fields of consumption analysis, monetary history and theory, and for demonstrating the complexity of stabilization policy. He also received the Presidential Medal of Freedom and the National Medal of Science in 1988 from President Ronald Reagan. He was widely regarded as one of the most influential economists of the twentieth century, advising presidents and prime ministers including Reagan and British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher.

Friedman passed away on November 16, 2006, in San Francisco at the age of ninety-four. His ideas continue to influence economic policy around the world.

Now let's talk about the book itself. There's No Such Thing as a Free Lunch is a collection of magazine columns Friedman wrote, primarily for Newsweek, where he explained economic realities underlying political and social issues in terms regular people could understand. The book also includes his famous Playboy interview from 1973.

The central idea is deceptively simple but profoundly important. Nothing is ever truly free. Even if something appears to have no cost, there is always a cost to someone somewhere. That cost might be hidden. It might be shifted to another party. It might show up later. But it exists.

This concept relates directly to what economists call opportunity cost. Every time you choose one thing, you give up something else. If you spend an hour doing one activity, you cannot spend that same hour doing another activity. The value of what you gave up is the opportunity cost of what you chose. Free lunches don't exist because even accepting something for nothing requires time, attention, and the sacrifice of alternatives.

Friedman used this principle to analyze government programs and policies. When the government offers something free to citizens, whether it's healthcare, education, housing assistance, or anything else, somebody is paying for it. Usually that somebody is taxpayers, either current taxpayers or future taxpayers through government debt. The lunch isn't free. The bill just arrives in a different form.

He also applied this thinking to things like minimum wage laws. Friedman argued that while minimum wage increases sound compassionate, they come with hidden costs. Employers respond by hiring fewer workers, especially young and unskilled workers who need entry-level jobs most. The teenagers who never get hired because employers can't afford to pay them the mandated wage bear the real cost of the policy. The lunch isn't free.

The book examines price controls, inflation, monetary policy, and the inefficiency of government monopolies. Friedman famously pointed out that the United States Postal Service performs exactly like a government monopoly because that's what it is. Meanwhile, private competitors like United Parcel Service provide better service at competitive prices because they operate in a market where performance matters.

His broader message was that free markets, with all their imperfections, generally allocate resources more efficiently than government intervention. When politicians promise free benefits, citizens should always ask who is really paying and what alternatives are being sacrificed.

Why does this matter to you? Because every day somebody is trying to sell you something using the word free. Free financial advice. Free seminars. Free consultations. Free lunches at workshops where they want to sell you products. Nothing is free. The cost is built in somewhere. Your job is to find it before you make decisions you might regret.

TINSTAAFL. There is no such thing as a free lunch. Remember that phrase every time someone offers you something for nothing.

3MY TEAM

Let's talk about Three MY TEAM. This is a very simple concept I've developed over the years, and it builds upon the original M concept from our discussion about the seven components of wealth. You'll recall that the first and most important component is mindset wealth, and everything in that discussion begins with the letter M. It began with minting millionaire mindsets.

So we're beginning with the letter M again, but this time the three M's refer to something different. The first M is minimize. The second M is maximize. We want to minimize and maximize appropriately. The third M is the word my. Then we use the letter Y for your.

We always want to minimize and maximize my and your TEAM. And you'll notice that TEAM is an acronym. It stands for Time, Effort, Aggravation, and Money.

This is where the win-win-win begins to pull together.

Think about what that means in practical terms. When I work with you, I want to minimize your time spent on things that don't matter and maximize your time spent on things that do. I want to minimize the effort you have to put into managing complexity and maximize the results you get from the effort you do invest. I want to minimize the aggravation that comes from dealing with confusing paperwork, conflicting advice, and systems designed to frustrate you. And I want to minimize unnecessary costs while maximizing what your money actually accomplishes for you.

The same applies to my side of the equation. When we both operate efficiently, when neither of us is wasting time or effort or creating unnecessary aggravation or spending money foolishly, everybody wins.

I want you to always remember, never forget, that for me it's about working with nice people who say this guy gets it, that's who I want to work with. It's not about being a big man on campus. It's not about having the most clients or the biggest office or the fanciest marketing materials.

It's about having spent decades pushing papers, walking, talking, thinking, writing, discussing, and refining things until you get to the point where you smile and say I got it. This works.

Three MY TEAM simply means we always want to do the best to minimize and maximize my and your time, effort, aggravation, and money. When we do that, you know what we have? We have a win-win-win situation. I win. You win. And the relationship wins because it's built on something that actually makes sense.

CAMELOT

Let me tell you about CAMELOT. It's an acronym that stands for Common sense, Advice, Management, Education, and Encouragement with Logic, Organization, and Technology. I've been using CAMELOT as our basis for providing investment and wealth advice and management going back to 1991.

Let me first explain how this came about, because the story matters.

I was in Zephyrhills, Florida, finishing an appointment with a client, and something clicked. I'm quite comfortable that it was based upon a conversation about our common background. We are both English, and we were talking about when our forefathers came over from England.

In my case, I know that genetically we are Vikings. I am part of the genetics of those who attacked and settled what is today known as Normandy in France. From there, my ancestors made it across the English Channel in 1066, joining William the Conqueror, who became the victor and King of England after the Battle of Hastings. Our family has long lived in England, and we have relatives in Boston. Not Massachusetts. We hadn't gotten there yet. Rather, Boston in Lancaster, England. You see, Boston is the city, Lancaster is the county, and England is the country. There are ruins of our castle near the Welsh border. The family did well for centuries, and people in England know how to properly pronounce our name.

The details of medieval ancestry are not important to this discussion. What matters is that a decision was made in 1630.

The Winthrop Fleet offered an opportunity. For those unfamiliar, the Winthrop Fleet was a group of eleven ships that sailed from England to the Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1630. It was led by John Winthrop, a wealthy English Puritan lawyer who would become the governor of the colony. This fleet carried approximately seven hundred passengers and marked one of the largest organized migrations to the New World at that time. Winthrop famously delivered his sermon describing the new settlement as a city upon a hill, a phrase that has echoed through American history ever since.

A great-grandfather, many generations removed, came over with that fleet and eventually settled in a place that is now called Boston, Massachusetts. He became the first vicar of Boston. A vicar, for those unfamiliar with the term, is a minister or clergyman in the Church of England who serves as the representative of a parish. The word comes from the Latin vicarius, meaning substitute or deputy. In the colonial context, a vicar was responsible for the spiritual leadership and guidance of the community.

I think it's important to always remember, never forget, that a lot of men and women came over from Europe as indentured servants. That's a polite way of saying they were temporarily enslaved to pay off the cost of their passage. My ancestor was an indentured servant. He paid off his debt to come over within a couple of years and became a free man in what we now call the United States of America. Back then it wasn't the colonies yet. It was the New World. The formal colonial structure came later. That distinction matters because it reminds us that everything we now take for granted was built by people who took enormous risks for the chance at something better.

Because of this heritage, I have always been interested in King Arthur, Sir Lancelot, Merlin, the Knights of the Round Table, and the traditions that I embrace willingly.

Let me explain what Camelot means in the broader sense before we return to the acronym.

Camelot was the legendary castle and court of King Arthur in medieval British literature. It represents the ideal kingdom, a place of justice, chivalry, honor, and noble purpose. In the stories, King Arthur gathered the finest knights in the land around a round table, symbolizing equality among those who served. There was no head of the table. Every seat was equal. The knights swore oaths to protect the innocent, uphold justice, and conduct themselves with honor.

Merlin was the wizard and advisor to Arthur, a figure of wisdom and foresight who guided the young king and helped him establish his reign. Sir Lancelot was considered the greatest of the knights, though his story also carries tragedy. The tales of Camelot include quests for the Holy Grail, battles against tyranny, and ultimately the fall of the kingdom through betrayal and human weakness.

But the enduring power of Camelot is not in its fall. It's in what it represented at its height. A place where things were done right. Where honor meant something. Where leaders served the people rather than themselves. Where wisdom guided action. Camelot became synonymous with an ideal, a brief shining moment when everything worked the way it was supposed to work.

This concept took on renewed meaning in American culture during the presidency of John F. Kennedy. After Kennedy's assassination in November 1963, his widow Jacqueline Kennedy gave an interview to journalist Theodore White in which she compared her husband's administration to Camelot. She referenced the popular Broadway musical of the same name and said that Jack loved that record. The line she quoted was about how for one brief shining moment there was Camelot.

The comparison stuck. Writers and historians began describing the Kennedy era as Camelot, a time of optimism, youth, and idealism in American politics. When Kennedy was killed, commentators wrote about the death of Camelot, the end of that hopeful moment.

I lived in Dallas when Kennedy was assassinated. My father had intimate knowledge of the assassination, which he transferred to me, and I'm always willing to share those details with people who are genuinely interested. So Camelot has special meaning and place to me. I hope my children feel the same way. Regardless of whether they do, I've written it down so that it's locked in for time.

Now let's bring this back to what CAMELOT means in our business.

Common sense is where it starts. You'd be surprised how uncommon common sense has become in the financial services industry. People are sold products they don't understand, strategies that don't fit their situation, and complexity that serves no purpose other than to confuse them. Common sense means stepping back and asking whether something actually makes sense for this particular person in this particular situation. If it doesn't pass that basic test, we don't do it.

Advice means genuine guidance based on your specific circumstances. Not a sales pitch dressed up as advice. Not a recommendation driven by what pays the highest commission. Real advice that considers your whole situation and points you in a direction that serves your interests.

Management means actually overseeing and handling the implementation of that advice. Advice without management is just talk. Management without advice is just activity. You need both working together.

Education means helping you understand what we're doing and why. I don't believe in keeping clients in the dark. The more you understand, the better decisions you make, and the better our relationship works. Education is not optional. It's fundamental to everything we do.

Encouragement means supporting you through the process. Financial decisions are emotional. Markets go up and down. Life throws surprises at you. Having someone in your corner who encourages you to stay the course when appropriate, or to make changes when necessary, matters more than most people realize.

Logic means our recommendations are based on sound reasoning, not emotion or speculation or whatever happens to be popular this month. We can explain why we're doing what we're doing, and the explanation makes sense.

Organization means keeping everything coordinated and in order. Your financial life shouldn't be a scattered mess of accounts, statements, and conflicting strategies. Organization brings clarity, and clarity brings peace of mind.

Technology means using the tools available today to serve you better. Technology allows us to do things more efficiently, more accurately, and more transparently than ever before. We embrace it where it helps and ignore it where it doesn't.

When you put all of these together, Common sense, Advice, Management, Education, and Encouragement with Logic, Organization, and Technology, it's pretty hard to argue that this is not a complete and holistic and proper way of thinking about investment and wealth advice and management.

CAMELOT represents our commitment to doing things right. It connects to a heritage that matters to me personally. It evokes an ideal that most people recognize and respect. And it provides a framework that actually works in practice, not just in theory.

That brief shining moment doesn't have to end. You can build something that lasts. That's what we're trying to do here.

Forecasting

Let me tell you how I approach forecasting, because it's fundamentally different from what most people in the financial services industry do. And understanding the difference matters.

Most people in this business make predictions. They tell you the market is going to go up or down. They tell you a particular stock is going to outperform. They speak with certainty about inherently uncertain futures because that's what clients want to hear. Confidence sells. Certainty closes deals.

I don't do that. I forecast. And there's a world of difference between predicting and forecasting.

When I say I forecast, I mean I assign numerical probabilities to possible outcomes. It's the difference between saying I predict it will rain today versus saying I forecast there's a seventy percent chance of rain today. The first statement pretends to know something unknowable. The second statement honestly acknowledges uncertainty while still providing useful guidance for making decisions.

This approach didn't come from a textbook. It came from decades of studying how human beings actually process information and make decisions, combined with real-world experience watching what works and what doesn't. I've assembled reference material from multiple disciplines that inform how I think about the future, and I want to share some of that with you.

The human mind is remarkably poorly equipped to deal with uncertainty. We're wired to seek patterns even where none exist. We remember our successes and forget our failures. We see what we expect to see and filter out contradictory information. We anchor on the first piece of data we encounter and insufficiently adjust when new information arrives. We're overconfident in our judgments and resistant to changing our minds even when the evidence demands it.

These aren't character flaws. They're features of human cognition that served us well when we were avoiding predators on the savannah. But they're terrible features for making complex decisions about uncertain futures involving money, markets, and retirement planning.

The intelligence community has spent decades studying how analysts make judgments under conditions of incomplete and ambiguous information. The findings are sobering. Even trained professionals with access to classified information routinely fall victim to cognitive biases that distort their analysis. Confirmation bias leads them to seek out information supporting their existing beliefs while dismissing contradictory evidence. Hindsight bias makes them believe past events were more predictable than they actually were. Anchoring causes them to stick too closely to initial assessments even as circumstances change.

The solution isn't more information. More data doesn't fix faulty processing. The solution is structured thinking that compensates for these built-in limitations. That means considering multiple competing hypotheses rather than settling on the first plausible explanation. It means deliberately seeking out information that contradicts your current view. It means keeping score on your forecasts so you can calibrate your confidence levels over time. It means remaining humble about what you actually know versus what you think you know.

In the world of professional forecasting, researchers discovered something remarkable. Ordinary people with no special credentials, no access to classified information, no advanced degrees in the relevant fields, consistently outperformed experts at predicting geopolitical events. These individuals earned the title of superforecasters because their accuracy was genuinely extraordinary.

What made them different wasn't intelligence, though they were smart. What made them different was how they thought. They were cautious. They were humble about the limits of their knowledge. They believed nothing was certain and reality was infinitely complex. They treated their own beliefs as hypotheses to be tested rather than treasures to be guarded. They were comfortable with numbers and used precise probabilities rather than vague language. They updated their forecasts when new information arrived. And they learned from their mistakes by keeping careful track of what they got right and wrong.

This mindset applies directly to investment and wealth management. Every decision you make about your financial future is a bet. You're wagering something you value, whether that's money, time, security, or peace of mind, on an uncertain outcome. The quality of your life depends not on any single bet but on the accumulated results of thousands of bets made over decades.

The critical insight is that you must separate the quality of a decision from the quality of its outcome. A good decision can produce a bad outcome because of bad luck. A bad decision can produce a good outcome because of good luck. If you judge decisions solely by their results, you'll learn the wrong lessons and repeat your mistakes indefinitely.

Think about it this way. Life is more like poker than chess. In chess, there's no hidden information and no luck. If you play perfectly, you win. But in poker, you can play your hand perfectly and still lose because of the cards that get dealt. The skill is in making better decisions on average over time, not in guaranteeing any particular outcome.

That's why I carry dice with me. Everything in life involves rolling the dice. You have to play the odds. You can't control outcomes, but you can control your process for making decisions. You can stack the probabilities in your favor through disciplined thinking.

History offers sobering lessons about what happens when people fail to think clearly about the future. Civilizations that flourished for centuries have been utterly destroyed, sometimes in a matter of days, because their leaders misread the situation. They underestimated threats. They overestimated their own capabilities. They relied on allies who never showed up. They fought with yesterday's methods against tomorrow's enemies. Naivete and hubris are recurring patterns throughout human history, and they're just as dangerous today as they were millennia ago.

This is why connecting dots matters so much. Forecasting isn't about predicting specific events. It's about understanding how different factors relate to each other and how changes in one area ripple through to affect others. It's about maintaining awareness of the broader context in which your specific decisions exist.

The same discipline applies to health and longevity. The biggest killers in modern society, heart disease, cancer, neurodegenerative disease, metabolic dysfunction, don't strike randomly. They develop over decades through processes that can often be detected and addressed long before symptoms appear. The conventional medical system waits until you're sick and then tries to treat you. A proactive approach identifies risks early and intervenes before disease takes hold. It's the difference between reactive medicine and preventive medicine.

Your healthspan, the years you live with full physical and cognitive function, matters as much as your lifespan. All the money in the world means nothing if you're too sick to enjoy it. Forecasting applied to health means understanding probabilities, taking action early, and continuously monitoring and adjusting based on new information.

The same framework applies to knowing when to quit. Most people think persistence is always a virtue. In reality, winners quit a lot. They quit the things that aren't working so they can focus on the things that are. Knowing when to walk away from a failing strategy, a bad investment, or an approach that's no longer serving you is just as important as knowing when to stay the course.

Creating genuinely new value requires thinking differently from everyone else. The most important question you can ask is what important truth do few people agree with you on. If your beliefs are identical to everyone else's beliefs, you're not thinking for yourself. You're just following the crowd. And crowds frequently end up exactly where they deserve, which is nowhere special.

So when I sit down with you, I'm not going to tell you I know exactly what the markets will do next year. Nobody knows that. Anyone who tells you otherwise is either lying or deluded.

What I will tell you is here's how I'm thinking about the probabilities. Here's what the evidence suggests. Here are the key factors I'm watching. Here's how my assessment might change if circumstances change. Here's the range of outcomes I consider plausible and the rough probability I assign to each. And here's how we should position your portfolio given that uncertainty.

Think about it. Connect the dots. That's what forecasting is. It's not crystal ball gazing. It's disciplined thinking applied to complex problems under conditions of uncertainty. It's acknowledging what we don't know while making the best possible decisions with what we do know. And it's continuously learning, updating, and improving our process over time.

That's what I bring to the table. Decades of studying these disciplines, combining quantitative analysis with qualitative judgment, and applying it all to the specific challenge of helping you navigate an uncertain future. The complexity is real. The uncertainty is permanent. But with the right framework for thinking, you can make better decisions. And better decisions, accumulated over time, lead to better outcomes.

Predictive Analysis – Quantitative / Qualitative

Predictive analysis is the process of examining current and historical data to make informed judgments about what might happen in the future. It's not fortune telling. It's the disciplined application of evidence and reason to reduce uncertainty and improve decision making. Every investment recommendation, every retirement strategy, every financial plan is ultimately built on some form of predictive analysis.

There are two fundamental types of predictive analysis, and understanding the difference matters.

Quantitative analysis deals with numbers. It's the hard data. Financial statements. Market trends. Interest rates. Inflation figures. Demographic statistics. Price histories. Cash flows. Balance sheets. If you can measure it and put it in a spreadsheet, that's quantitative analysis.

Artificial intelligence has dramatically improved quantitative analysis while simultaneously reducing its cost. Computers can now process enormous volumes of data faster and more accurately than any human ever could. They can identify patterns across thousands of variables that would take a person years to discover. They can run millions of scenarios in the time it takes you to pour a cup of coffee.

But here's the catch. AI is only as good as the instructions it receives and the verification applied to its outputs. Knowing what information is valuable, knowing how to specifically instruct the technology to find what you need, and knowing how to verify that the results are accurate requires human judgment. Garbage in, garbage out has never been more true than it is today.

That brings us to qualitative analysis. This is where the human brain remains irreplaceable. Qualitative analysis involves judgment, context, interpretation, and understanding. It's reading between the lines. It's recognizing when the numbers don't tell the whole story. It's understanding human behavior, institutional incentives, political dynamics, and the thousand intangible factors that influence outcomes.

There is simply nothing that replaces experience. No algorithm can replicate the pattern recognition that comes from decades of watching markets, working with clients, seeing what actually happens when theory meets reality. AI can assist. AI can accelerate. But the qualitative judgment that comes from lived experience remains the essential ingredient that separates useful analysis from sophisticated noise.

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