MM #251: Best Stocks on Sale NOW! Top Investment for Next 2 Years, Warren Buffett Exits Real Estate & Gold

Summary

Market Mondays Episode #251 Summary

Released on March 18, 2025 by EYL Network

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1. Market Overview and Current Trends

In the latest episode of Market Mondays, host Ian Dunlap and co-hosts Rashad Bilal and Troy Millings delve into the current state of the stock market amidst ongoing tariff discussions and economic uncertainty.

Key Highlights:

• Market Volatility: The Dow has experienced its third consecutive down week, while the NASDAQ has faced one of its worst performances since 2023. Despite recent tariff talks easing, economic indicators remain mixed.

  Rashad Bilal [01:11]: "We saw a nice rebound even though it was another down week... NASDAQ has had one of his worst weeks since 2023."

• Tariffs and Economic Impact: With April 2nd looming as the anticipated date for tariff effects, the hosts advise investors to remain vigilant and adaptable.

  Rashad Bilal [01:38]: "Until that day, let's keep our head up and our eyes open when it comes to the market."

2. Top Stock Recommendations

Dunlap and his co-hosts discuss the best stocks currently on sale and outline top investment opportunities for the next two years.

Recommended Stocks:

• Meta Platforms (Facebook): Recommended purchase price at $538.46, attributed to recent declines and potential for restructuring.

  Ian Dunlap [25:20]: "I like Meta at 538.46."

• Tesla: Suggested entry point at $190.29 amidst controversies surrounding Elon Musk and potential rebranding efforts.

  Ian Dunlap [25:41]: "At 190.29, I think there's some incredible value there."

• Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSM): Emphasized as a critical investment for the AI and quantum computing races, with suggested buy points at $158 and $162.

  Ian Dunlap [38:52]: "Taiwan Semiconductor is the one that I would go with for sure."

• PepsiCo: Highlighted as a solid investment following their acquisition of Poppy and strong market performance, with a favorable price point around $141-$135.

  Rashad Bilal [73:58]: "I like PepsiCo... if it gets to 141, 135, I like it for sure."

3. Analysis of Warren Buffett's Strategic Moves

The hosts analyze Warren Buffett's recent exit from Berkshire Hathaway's real estate and gold holdings, exploring potential implications for the market.

Insights:

• Real Estate Sector: Buffett's decision to divest from real estate may signal a strategic shift rather than an impending market crash. The discussion touches on the performance decline in Berkshire's real estate portfolio.

  Ian Dunlap [11:32]: "Berkshire halfway may sell its real estate business... it's going to keep the price of the stock up incredibly high."

• Gold Investments: While Buffett has historically been cautious about gold, the conversation speculates on whether this aligns with broader market trends or personal succession planning.

  Troy Millings [27:24]: "I think he has some incredibly favorable reasons."

4. Impact of AI on Investments and Industries

A significant portion of the episode is dedicated to the burgeoning field of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and its transformative impact on various sectors, especially technology and data centers.

Key Points:

• AI's Growth: The hosts emphasize the importance of companies like Nvidia and TSM in leading the AI revolution, highlighting their roles in advancing technology and maintaining competitive advantages.

  Rashad Bilal [25:06]: "AI is still a story. Definitely for the next two years, it's going to be."

• Automation and Labor Market: Discussions on how AI and robotics are reshaping industries by increasing efficiency and potentially displacing certain job roles.

  Rashad Bilal [56:42]: "We're building a town in Texas right now all on AI... it's going to infiltrate an industry and it can take over."

5. Government Spending and Economic Policies

The episode ventures into a critical analysis of U.S. government spending, focusing on Social Security, Medicare, and defense expenditures, and their long-term sustainability.

Highlights:

• Social Security Concerns: The hosts debate the future of Social Security, referencing Andrew Schultz's analysis on the growth and potential mismanagement of the Trust Fund.

  Andrew Schultz [91:08]: "If we had invested the Social Security Trust Fund in the S&P 500... it would be $15 trillion today."

• Defense Spending: The discussion critiques the high allocation towards defense and military expenses, questioning its impact compared to more pressing social programs.

  Troy Millings [82:35]: "Social Security, Medicare, and military spending are the real issues we have."

6. Special Announcements and Events

• Stock Club Live Sessions: Ian Dunlap announces that the Stock Club will be going live from an undisclosed location, offering real-time investment insights and trading updates.

  Ian Dunlap [03:04]: "Stock Club call this week we will be going live from undisclosed, undisclosed location."

• Invest Fest and Conferences: Rashad Bilal and Troy Millings share their upcoming attendance at the Nvidia GTC Conference and participation in panels discussing AI and quantum computing.

  Rashad Bilal [100:53]: "We'll be in Atlanta this weekend... at Nvidia GTC Conference."

7. Community and Personal Notes

The hosts take a moment to pay respects to Junior Bridgman, a significant figure in their community, highlighting his entrepreneurial legacy and impact.

Rashad Bilal [74:58]: "Rest in peace to Junior Bridgman... an incredible dude with an incredible legacy."

8. Conclusion and Final Thoughts

As the episode wraps up, the hosts reiterate their commitment to providing valuable investment strategies and maintaining community support amid economic uncertainties.

Ian Dunlap [100:51]: "Peace, Peace."

Rashad Bilal [101:16]: "Be good to each other... reach out."

Notable Quotes:

• Ian Dunlap [06:02]: "The Dow should go up."
• Troy Millings [25:20]: "At 538.46, I like Meta."
• Andrew Schultz [91:14]: "Social Security Trust Fund would be $15 trillion today if invested in the S&P 500."

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Conclusion

Episode #251 of Market Mondays offers a comprehensive analysis of the current stock market landscape, strategic investment recommendations, and deep dives into significant economic and technological trends. With insightful discussions on Warren Buffett's investment moves, the rise of AI, and critical evaluations of government spending, listeners gain valuable perspectives to navigate their investment decisions effectively.

For further insights and detailed stock recommendations, join the Stock Club live sessions and follow upcoming discussions at major industry conferences.

Transcript

[Ian Dunlap]

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[Rashad Bilal]

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[Ian Dunlap]

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[Dr. Cheyenne Bryant]

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[Rashad Bilal]

Happy Monday, ladies and gentlemen.

[Ian Dunlap]

Happy Monday. We're boys and girls.

[Rashad Bilal]

How's everybody feeling?

[Ian Dunlap]

No tariff talk. So the market is no yo easy.

[Rashad Bilal]

You never know. You never know. Anything can happen at any time. But Friday we didn't have as many tariff talks. We saw a, a nice rebound even though it was another down week, the third down week for the Dow. NASDAQ has had one of his worst weeks since 2023. So we can, there's a correlation here, but Everybody's still circling April 2nd is that day as the day that tariffs will go to effect. So we're just going to keep that in mind. But until that day, let's, let's, let's, let's keep our head up and our eyes open when it comes to the market.

[Troy Millings]

Yes, that's for sure. So welcome back, ladies and gentlemen. Yeah, a lot to talk about and big week. We got Blackout special guest. We got Dr. Cheyenne Bryant coming on Blackout.

[Rashad Bilal]

Very fitting legend. All your relationship gurus.

[Troy Millings]

She's been tearing up the game. You know, somebody that goes viral feel like every time she talks and has a lot to say about relationships. So check that out. 10:00 Eastern Standard time on Wednesday. Yeah. Got some other stuff I'll probably talk about throughout the course of the show. Ian, any announcements you want to say?

[Ian Dunlap]

No Stock club call this week we will be going live from undisclosed, undisclosed location. Gotcha. If you want to get rich from the market, go to Ian invest.com shout out to everybody who joined Red Panda Stock Club. I've been Putting like five or six updates a day in Telegram. The replay is in. Telegram. Stock Club prices are out. If I made you money, please PS in chat. Love y'all dearly and see y'all fellas this week at an undisclosed the Illuminati meeting.

[Troy Millings]

Yes, yes and yes. Shout out to everybody that took advantage of Stock Club. We have extended it for 24 hours because there were some people that wanted to do it on Friday and there was some technical difficulty. So we extended it for 24 hours today, but that's it. After that it will be done. So that's Ian invest.com and that's 50 off off stock club in three years of sniper. And yeah, anything else you want to talk about Stock Club as far as like the email or whatever?

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah. If you joined in the last 24, 48 hours, if you haven't been logged in, you. You should be logged in by now. So check your spam. We will start to go live twice a week. One day will be a random day, but we normally do the Stock Club on Monday nights but given travel we won't be doing it this week. But a lot of amazing updates and some insights on trading will be in there and some entries for trading will be posted next week. So if you want to know how to invest into the market and never have to guess about where to get in, join the Stock Club.

[Troy Millings]

There you have it. One day left. Ian invest.com disclaimer.

[Rashad Bilal]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Before we do that, I want to give a huge shout out to all of our earners inside of eylu. It was our national earners meetup. So shout out to all the earners throughout the country that put on and had a great meeting. I know we did one in Houston. Shout out to everybody in Michigan, New York, our EYU Investment Group was in there. Shout out to Dean and Austin. They were the special guests. Shout to everybody in the Carolinas, dmv, Tampa, Chicago and South Park. It was all over the place, man. So shout out to everybody inside of eylu. Keep going, keep going, keep going. We got some special stuff from an undisclosed location that we will be showing you a little bit later. But yeah, man, y'all know how this goes. This is the disclaimer. Do your own research. Our content is intended to be used and must be used for informational purposes only. It is very important to do your own analysis before making any investment based on your own personal circumstances. You should take independent financial advice from a professional in connection with or independently research or verify any information that you find on our show and wish to rely upon whether for the purpose of making an investment decision or otherwise. Y'all know how this works. Do the research, share the research, give credit when you find a research. Build community, spread love. Let's make some money next year.

[Ian Dunlap]

We're doing 2 and 20 though. Gonna let y'all live this year, but next year, 2020 for sure.

[Troy Millings]

So now we talk about the S P a lot, but for the Dow Jones, right? The Dow Jones peaked at around 45, 000 and it's hovering around like 416 now. So as far as like, prices, where people should start to look at entry points and as using the Dow Jones as an indicator to really, you know, look at the market, what is the price as far as the Dow Jones is concerned?

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah. And the first thing I want to say, I know we've had a drop. That was pretty damn scary. Even in our telegram, a couple people hit me like, damn, I didn't join for all this doom and gloom. It's not doom and gloom. I'm just making you aware of where we are in terms of the cycle because it's actually a great buying opportunity. So if you're looking at the Dow, 40,244 is the area I would be looking to buy. So $40,244 is the area I will be looking to buy the Dow. And for all of you who like spog, any of the cheaper SPY or Dow equivalents, that's fine as well. But the Dow should go up. And the biggest thing I want to stress over what's happened over the last maybe three or four weeks is that you have to focus on where to buy based on asymmetry. So meaning you don't want to buy the high. So if we're at the highest 45, 000, I don't want to buy 44, 950. I want to wait until it drops until a price point where everyone else is panicking. People are panicking also. Once again, you can use the Fear and Greed Index to gauge where we are. So when we are in extreme fear, that's the time you can look to buy. Or if the VIX gets above a certain level, you can look to buy them. But 40,002,44 is where I like to buy the Dow. And another important lesson in the United States stock market, whenever we've had a correction or crash, we have recovered 100 of the time. Now, whether it's through financial engineering or quantitative easing. Ah, that's another conversation for another Day. But America has one of the only markets that recovers 100 of the time. Japan, China, different instances. But our market for every crash or correction has recovered usually within eight months on in modern times, the longest time but 2020 it was a matter of weeks. We were back to record territory. So don't worry about the right time. You'll be a. Okay.

[Rashad Bilal]

Yeah. And if you're buying the Dow from the spider fund diagram, that sounds pretty consistent if you look at the support level first, second level support is around 410 and 409 average and then that resistance starts to hit around 417, 419. So that's not. If you correlate that to the actual Dow Jones 41,000 it's probably right in line with what you're saying as well.

[Troy Millings]

And I think it's important to highlight this because there are some probably new listeners for the first time. Maybe stocks always recover, but every single stock doesn't always recover. So great point.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yes.

[Troy Millings]

That's why it's important to. Once again the safest route is an index fund. That's why when he says two tech two index. Right. Like an index fund now you're invested in the entire stock market whether it's VO or S, P500. Now S&P500 is 500 companies but it's still kind of like a microcosm of the entire stock market or ETF which allows you to have broad range exposure in one area. Like QQQ gives you all of the technology companies. Right. So that's safer. Yeah, it's always safer because yeah, you. The stock market always goes up, but individual stocks do not always go up. Some stocks have been down for 10 years.

[Ian Dunlap]

Marijuana stocks. Tilray. Sorry.

[Troy Millings]

Yeah. So just because you think you're putting your money into a stock and you and your theory is that okay, it's down but I'm not gonna worry about it because stocks always go up. That doesn't mean that your particular stock is always going to go up.

[Rashad Bilal]

Yeah. And that's why we talk indexes. And then the next thing would be the ETFs because it might just be a sector that's moving. So for the past five years we've seen that technology and specifically semiconductors have led that charge inside of technology. So you get an ETF inside there. So whether it's an SMH or it's a socks which tracks those and they move according to how those are performing. Right. So Nvidia is going to be leading an smh. That makes sense. Because of where Nvidia is at. You can watch as those movements are being made inside of the etf that might be companies that you should be looking at because they're moving, right? They have actually shown growth. Whereas a sector, I don't know, Consumer Discretionary or XLY would be another ETF where it's like, wait, this hasn't moved the same way as an xlk because of the technology stocks that are inside there. So always good to and to look at it on a large scale than in a macro scale. Okay, the market is moving, right? The download SAP is moving. Well, what is moving it? And then you can fine tune it for sure.

[Ian Dunlap]

And I've been very critical of Google, but this weekend I was playing with some of the AI tools we appreciate. Gotta give you credit, Claude, that new update, Sam Altman, I don't know who like when Fat Joe found puns rhyme book. Sam Altman, you better go find that AI code and do some vibe coding. Google.

[Rashad Bilal]

Yeah.

[Troy Millings]

Yeah.

[Ian Dunlap]

Well played. Fight back. I'm proud of you.

[Rashad Bilal]

Good old Sam.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yes.

[Troy Millings]

So talking about Warren Buffett, Berkshire halfway. Berkshire halfway may sell its real estate business. So why would they sell their real estate business? And is this a sign that there's going to be a real estate crash?

[Ian Dunlap]

I don't want to say crash because I want all the real estate and mortgage professionals coming after me. And I know some people are saying it is succession planning for Berkshire in case Warren passes. He's at the later stages of life. But if you have a business that is incredibly profitable, wouldn't it behoove you to turn over a book of business in real estate to the new CEO to keep the price of the stock up incredibly high? I know there's a certain subgroup of investors who doesn't think Warren Buffett is the greatest of all time. For the record, he is. This is concerning. I'm going to come in calm and measured. I'm on my Rashad Bilal with the glasses vibe. Common, measured. But if this asset and a couple people shot to you all in Nebraska, there's some rumblings they're getting rid of some of those doors they own as well. So we will. I'm going to monitor the situation.

[Rashad Bilal]

You know the Berkshire over the past four weeks, I know the market is taking a hit. It's the only thing that's been positive. So he's doing something. They're doing something right over there.

[Ian Dunlap]

And his network has went up during this crash.

[Rashad Bilal]

Exactly. And he has a stockpile of 334 billion. We're yet to see where that's going. But the, the real estate part of the portfolio, it sounds like a sneeze. It's 4.4 billion of it. Not a sneeze. But in terms of, you know, the asset management, it is a sneeze. But I mean, CNBC wrote a great article about how in the early 80s, he bought newspapers because he thought that business was indestructible. We'd always needed. And in the early 2000s, he realized that, you know what, times have changed. And so my investment, my investment strategy needs to change. And so there was a comparison between that and his investment strategy. So the reasons why that they potentially may let it go a couple. I mean, and we know these, right. They're saying that the housing market has softened. Buyers face higher mortgage rates, elevated prices and limited, Limited number of listings. And then the pending home sales dropped in January to 4.6%, the lowest since January of 2001. Which doesn't sound as encouraging.

[Troy Millings]

Well, those numbers aren't very encouraging.

[Rashad Bilal]

They're not very encouraging.

[Troy Millings]

They are encouraging for. For landlords.

[Rashad Bilal]

For landlords. I'm talking.

[Troy Millings]

They're very encouraged for those.

[Rashad Bilal]

For that side of it. He's a landlord, but that's what I'm saying.

[Troy Millings]

No, so that they're encouraging.

[Rashad Bilal]

But for him, he's looking at it like, for his side. He's looking at it like if that business isn't growing, if home sales are slowing. Right. And we're not having new bills and we don't have control of interest rates and there's uncertainty inside of this present economy, is this now a good time to say, let's let go a little bit of this portfolio?

[Troy Millings]

You can never question Warren Buffett because he's.

[Rashad Bilal]

Yeah, I'm not. I'm just. I'm just throwing it out.

[Troy Millings]

He's the greatest of all time. True. And, you know, he might say, okay, I'm gonna make more money in gold than I'm making housing, real estate for the next 10 years. I don't know. But those numbers that you just described are encouraging for are incredibly favorable. If there's less homes being built.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yep.

[Troy Millings]

Less people are getting mortgages, interest rates are high. Well, what does that mean? That people got to live somewhere. So that means that people are not buying homes at the rate. And they're probably going to continue to buy less and less homes because it's going to become too affordable, it's going to be too unaffordable for them to buy homes. That means that they're going to have to rent. We talked about a rent to society to the point some people say almost 80% of the population at some point could be renters. Right. So the, the people that actually own the places that they're renting from, I mean now you have no, you have no option. So I got five different people that want to rent my apartment. Who's gonna pay the most? Who's the most qualified? Who got the highest credit score that is beneficial for landlords?

[Rashad Bilal]

Or what if you don't have a market that can actually afford to live in these places?

[Troy Millings]

Well, I mean if everybody has to rent, you gotta, there's gonna be some people that can afford it or that.

[Rashad Bilal]

Price, it could potentially drive down the prices. Right, because if you don't have occupancy and people can't buy and you have a large portfolio of homes that nobody is actually, actually going to live in or again purchase on a large scale. On, on a macro. Yes, on a macro scale. If it's an individual, this is like, I mean you're talking about a huge portfolio of potential vacancy.

[Troy Millings]

Rent prices in Manhattan reached all time highs last month. Rent prices across America have gone up, especially in all major cities. Miami, Los Angeles, I mean the indicating trend is that rent prices are going up. There's no indicator.

[Ian Dunlap]

They correct though?

[Troy Millings]

Oh, they're correct. At some point. It's like anything, it's like star. Everything has a, has a correction but the acceleration of it has been, has been tremendous as far as rent. Right. So I don't think the correction 2020, my God, like I just saw that yesterday. Manhattan real estate last month has reached the highest level that has ever reached as far as rent ever.

[Ian Dunlap]

What's that, 6,500?

[Troy Millings]

They said 4, 500 but that number's a little skewed because yeah, it gauges the whole island of Manhattan. So you got all the way uptown, but as far as probably midtown down to downtown. Yeah, it'd probably be like it probably 4, 500 for one bedroom by the way. So it'd probably be around 6, 6000, 6, 500 for one bedroom. If you take out Harlem and you take out all the way uptown, it'll probably be around 6, 500 for a one bedroom. That's a good business to be in.

[Ian Dunlap]

It's a lot of chopped cheese.

[Troy Millings]

Yo, what's McCall just sold his apart. Byron Allen just sold his apartment for $85 million. The largest sale of an apartment this year in New York City. 85 million for an apartment. That's not even the highest listing Apartment in the building.

[Ian Dunlap]

Great point. Buffett normally is a laggard when it comes to investing into a sector.

[Rashad Bilal]

Yeah.

[Ian Dunlap]

But he has incredible timing of when to exit a market.

[Rashad Bilal]

Right.

[Ian Dunlap]

So in fact. And if he heads off and broke off some of the business and kept 20 of it, 30. But to liquidate all of the real estate brokerage made my eyebrows raise a little bit as to why the portfolio.

[Rashad Bilal]

Grossed a net profit of 100 million in 2022. That went down to 13 million in 2023, and they suffered a net loss of 113 million in 2024.

[Ian Dunlap]

Gotta go.

[Troy Millings]

That's why it's also, it's also important to realize the real estate that he owns too. You know, he owns. He's one of the largest owners of trailer parks for sure. So. And he has a lot of real estate in Midwest, so. Yes. That's like the, like, like all things, it's a lot. The number one rule in real estate is location. So I think that his market, particularly the trailer part, like the lower income type situation like that, that might be hurting because it's not in prime locations. Those people are struggling even more than coastal communities. But most people live in coastal communities.

[Rashad Bilal]

Yeah, that's what, that's the point I was going to make what you were saying, like you're talking about the major cities, but the large ones. And you kind of nailed it. The large majority of the portfolio doesn't exist inside of a New York City or Miami or. Or in la.

[Troy Millings]

Yes, Omaha.

[Ian Dunlap]

That's like him missing out on Apple and early on and Microsoft early on, given his relationship with Gate. So I agree selection, client selection and city selection matters a hell of a lot. So the great point, Troy.

[Rashad Bilal]

Yeah. So that's what I'm saying is if your business isn't growing, what's it doing?

[Ian Dunlap]

That's why I asked him, hey, how many times it gets the fumble on stage?

[Rashad Bilal]

100 million to 13 to negative.

[Ian Dunlap]

You gotta go.

[Troy Millings]

Yeah.

[Ian Dunlap]

Losses quickly.

[Troy Millings]

But it is important just to say, like it's nuanced conversation because when people see Warren Buffett did something, it's like he sold stock. Stock market's gonna crash. He stole real estate. Real estate's gonna crash. It's nuanced. It's the location. It's trailer parks is. I think overall the people that's still enthusiastic about real estate, they have a reason to still be enthusiastic about real estate.

[Rashad Bilal]

Yeah, but that's what's the his, like you said, it's, it's timing with him.

[Troy Millings]

And there's a Shorting of houses in America.

[Rashad Bilal]

That's, that's what he's saying. Like it's, it's timing. We, we don't, we don't get privy to the information of his moves until a week, three weeks, six months after has happened. Right. So when you see a sell off in his Apple shares, when you see a sell off in some of his Coca Cola shares and you see acquisition inside accidental oil, it's like, all right. And then six months later, a year later, you see why he made that move. Right now you're holding 334 billion. Well, the market has pulled back. Is it now time that he started investing last week or they started moving that to other assets? It's all time with him. And he's proven time after time that he's a wizard when it comes to this.

[Troy Millings]

He also has made some very questionable decisions as far as.

[Ian Dunlap]

Such as.

[Troy Millings]

Well, he didn't buy, he didn't believe in it. In the technology companies which any of them in the dot com era, he didn't believe in. He didn't believe in technology companies. He was late to the party on that. And yeah, he got the right one years later though. But I'm saying he had opportunity early.

[Ian Dunlap]

He didn't believe he could have got Microsoft in 95.

[Troy Millings]

I think now he was right in the sense of a lot of those dot com companies ended up failing. Yeah, I'm just a lot of them became Microsoft, Apple, all of those companies. He was late. He's also said that he wouldn't take bitcoin for anything. That as of right now, that's been a wrong thing to say now.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yes, well, given the capital size, not the cape for him, but what if for the dollar amount he was going to put in, the issue would be the liquidation of it?

[Troy Millings]

Well, yeah, I mean his thing, he said I wouldn't buy all the bitcoin in the world for 25. So I think what he's saying is from a psychological standpoint, he doesn't. And he's a value investor. He doesn't see value in cryptocurrency. So he doesn't. He would not invest. No, he's like no matter how much it gets, even if it's worth $1 million technically is worth nothing. Because in his mind he doesn't see use case, he doesn't see the value in bitcoin. It has no value for him. It has no intrinsic value.

[Rashad Bilal]

Yes, that's always been his case. That's, that's his thing. He hasn't budged on that. And when his partner was alive, rest in peace, Charlie. He was even more of a bear on it.

[Andrew Schultz]

Right.

[Rashad Bilal]

So those two together, they. They've never switched on that to. To the day he died. Even now, Warren hasn't changed on it either.

[Troy Millings]

As of right now. He would be. That's not. You can theoretically say it has no intrinsic value. You can theoretically say gold has no intrinsic value. You could theoretically say the US Dollar has no intrinsic value. Variety of things. Have no real utrinsic.

[Ian Dunlap]

Value. Yes. Value. If the hedge funds and government was not buying it.

[Troy Millings]

Bitcoin. No. But gold wouldn't have the same value if everybody wasn't buying it either. I mean, I know that there's the. Some people in the world that's like, yeah, Pete, gold has elect. But I'm just. Most people are not using gold for transactions.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah, exactly. Subscription. Yeah.

[Troy Millings]

Like gold, like oil has intrinsic value. Right. Like we. You. It has. It has a use case that you actually use it for. And there's a variety of different elements that have use cases that. This is really, really important to the world. Go. Is not really important to the world. Most people hoard it. They don't use it for any level of functioning. They just have it stored or they have it on their necklace or a watch.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah.

[Troy Millings]

The value is what we put on it.

[Ian Dunlap]

True.

[Troy Millings]

Like one guy, he was saying, he was like, well, his argument was that Bitcoin is going to go to zero because it has no value. And they're like, what about gold? He was like, gold has value. Why does gold have value? He's like, because gold has been using currency since the beginning of time. Like for tens of thousands of years, gold has been used as currency. That's his argument. Oh, that's not really a great argument to me.

[Ian Dunlap]

It's a bad argument.

[Troy Millings]

Yeah. Because you just, you're just replacing one thing that has no value. But only just because this has thousands of a track record.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah.

[Troy Millings]

Now that makes it valuable.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah. The government agencies decide which currencies or instruments have value for the record. So yeah, in that case, it's a bad argument for sure.

[Troy Millings]

We'll see. We'll see. Warren Buffett, like I said, he's the greatest. So maybe bitcoin will go to zero at some point until then.

[Ian Dunlap]

No, not with Vanguard and BlackRock buying all of it up and not gonna.

[Troy Millings]

Happen until until then.

[Rashad Bilal]

Yeah.

[Troy Millings]

You can't argue with the greatest investment return of all time. That's, that's hard to argue with the.

[Rashad Bilal]

Greatest investor and the greatest investment. Oh, the opposite sides of this thing for sure. Yeah.

[Troy Millings]

With the Mag 7 being on sale, which two outside of Apple and Microsoft would you consider to invest in it and at what price?

[Ian Dunlap]

Number one, let's go with Meta shots. Zuckerberg and every brand. The onesie at the wife's party was crazy, but kudos. I like Meta at 5.38.46. Elon, you gotta go get you a little Black Lives Matter hoodie or something and do a rebrand like that.

[Troy Millings]

At what price?

[Ian Dunlap]

At 538.46. And then I like Tesla at 190 29. Tesla needs a whole rebrand and Elon needs to. I know he won't, but he needs to get off this Kanye train. So they've had the deepest fall of the Max seven. You know it's bad when Germany said they're done buying Teslas and part of that movement started in Germany. It's tough. Like you cannot offend a worldwide audience with your neo Nazi favoritism. So. But at 190 29, I think there's some incredible value there. I don't know how long the company will thrive given his liens over the last four or five months, but 19029 is the price that I like Tesla. For all of you who'll be like, yo, what happened? You all giving prices on market? Joint stock club. But.

[Troy Millings]

So what about Tesla? What makes Tesla something that you like?

[Ian Dunlap]

Yo, I'm just giving the two hours because they're gonna be like, well, you always do Apple or Microsoft. I'm not pro maga or pro racism. Clearly, I'm a black man in the United States of America. And they've had the deepest decline, I think from the high through this fall. I think they've fallen 51.

[Rashad Bilal]

Yeah.

[Ian Dunlap]

They have the highest probability of.

[Rashad Bilal]

But you said 120. You said 129, right?

[Ian Dunlap]

190 29.

[Rashad Bilal]

Oh, 190 29. All right. Yeah. Okay.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah. 129 would be crazy.

[Rashad Bilal]

Yeah. I'm like, damn, that's a hell of a full.

[Troy Millings]

So do you think that it's going to get hurt by the administration's anti EV policies?

[Ian Dunlap]

For sure.

[Troy Millings]

And tariffs. And tariffs.

[Rashad Bilal]

What? I mean, the, the guy didn't. They put the, the. The cyber truck and a model that's in front of the White House the other day.

[Ian Dunlap]

Richard Nixon would never. Mitt Romney would have never. George W. Bush wouldn't.

[Rashad Bilal]

What?

[Ian Dunlap]

We turned the White House into a damn car show.

[Rashad Bilal]

That was crazy.

[Ian Dunlap]

I've said this from the very Beginning, I give it 18 months. So what? We got 15 months left to that. Relationship is good. And I said it before a couple years ago, I think it was a mistake from them to leave that luxury brand to go to pricing for all profit margin. Word of the week matters a lot. And when people are underwater in those loans for the car, and now you have dealerships being vandalized because of racist sentiments by white people, which is fascinating to see as they won't do well for the stock market. So whenever you're running a publicly traded company, it helps a lot to not add weaknesses and threats to that SWAT analysis. And he's doing that, it seems like every month. Is there value there? Yes. Would they be as dominant as they used to be? I don't think so. I don't think the appeal is there anymore. But at 1-9029, I like it. I like it a lot.

[Rashad Bilal]

You got two. I had Meta, so I'll switch it up. I always throw an extra one just in case you say it. But I, I like Meta. I mean, you didn't say Nvidia, but I feel like that's kind of the obvious, right? Like, yeah, it actually got. It got to a point where I was like, I gotta grab it. It got down to 107 was my number. It got down to 105. So we grabbed some shares there. Obviously, we saw a shoot up. Big week for them with GTC happening this week. Big announcements. And then Thursday they got the big quantum days. So that, that should be one of those catalyst events. We'll see how the market moves. This isn't a Mag 7, but it should be, I think when they reclassify this thing. I know China has now dubbed their, their stocks the Fab Four with Alibaba 10cent.

[Ian Dunlap]

Sounds familiar. Yeah.

[Rashad Bilal]

Yeah, they're Fab Four. I'm gonna put Netflix in there. I'm gonna put Netflix. It actually got down to a price. I wanted to see it get down to like 853. It got down to 870, so we grabbed some shares there. I mean, upgrade after upgrade. We saw what it's doing in terms of live events. Shout out to the Netflix family.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah. I was like, hey, y'all invited us.

[Rashad Bilal]

To Monday Night Raw. We got to see live events in person. State of the art. Just a classy, classy service. I mean, it was incredible. And the Netflix team took care of us. I'm not just saying it, we actually witnessed it. But you saw what happened during the Super Bowl. You saw what happened with the NFL and deals with them. ESPN is now about to lose UFC because Netflix potentially could come in. I like Netflix long term. I like them short term, too. That pullback that they just have, you know, they ran up to over a thousand, got down to 870. I think it was a great grab at 870. I took some shares there, so those would be my 2.

[Ian Dunlap]

Wait, UFC is going to do the pay per view events through Netflix?

[Rashad Bilal]

There's some talks. There's some talks. There's some talks. Talks. Just talks.

[Ian Dunlap]

Oh, my God. Well, I'm a smart TKO group. AR Emmanuel to you.

[Rashad Bilal]

TKO has been going crazy. Like, if you watch that since I believe when, when Dwayne Johnson and the Rock is. One of these guys is just like a sleeper. If you look what he's done inside the spirits world now, what he's doing inside as an advisor for tko, that stock has been moving on up and up. Yeah, it's one of those sleepers. But yeah, man, we got to see it firsthand. It was like, all right, I get it, I get it. This is something. This is really something.

[Ian Dunlap]

NBA put their rights through Netflix.

[Rashad Bilal]

The NBA signed a deal with Amazon.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah.

[Rashad Bilal]

So they're Amazon and Peacock. Yeah, that's. And then they. They brought over some of the guys from, from tnt. I think they're going to be doing some of the shows. So they did like a kind of a merger deal for that, just for them, for inside the NBA.

[Troy Millings]

I don't know if they have an exclusive deal with Amazon. Peacock.

[Ian Dunlap]

Who?

[Rashad Bilal]

NBA?

[Troy Millings]

Yeah, yeah, it's exclusive.

[Rashad Bilal]

No, no, no. So they got partnerships. So ESPN still gets show games. Amazon gets games. They took it from TNT and tbs and. And what's the last one? I said Amazon, Peacock. Well, Peacocks, NBC Universal. So.

[Troy Millings]

Yeah, but I'm saying there's still some more games they could carve out, though.

[Rashad Bilal]

Yes. It's kind of like how the WWE did deals with Netflix, but they still get shown on Peacock as well. And they still. They still get distributed through other channels, but they're all streaming, so they could.

[Troy Millings]

They could potentially do a deal with Netflix.

[Rashad Bilal]

They could, yeah.

[Ian Dunlap]

Oh, my God.

[Rashad Bilal]

Yeah.

[Ian Dunlap]

Netflix is doing a great job, especially getting a niche. The niche audiences and running them into the fold. But if they get an NBA deal.

[Rashad Bilal]

Yeah, I know the, the NBA's largest deal is. Is with ESPN, ESPN, Disney, ABC Group. And then obviously they, when they renegotiated, Amazon got a couple games and Peacock joined the group as well, I think for like playoffs and things like that. Or Saturday night games. Yeah, playoffs. Playoffs. What the real Marsh Madness.

[Ian Dunlap]

That's for real.

[Troy Millings]

What are three recession proof stocks that people can invest in to protect themselves from the downturn?

[Ian Dunlap]

I know you everyone is so concerned about if the market continues to collapse. But I think there's a few companies that will do well regardless in the retail space. Costco I love dearly. Near and dear to my heart. Almost immovable. Regardless of what happens in the economy. Number two, Nvidia. Love you guys dearly. Thank you. We'll never switch up on you. From the bottom of my heart. And Troy, your baby. I gotta listen, I gotta give you credit. Tsm. I keep saying that if TSM was primarily in America, headquartered in America, divorced you.

[Rashad Bilal]

We're getting closer. It's getting closer to being America.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah.

[Rashad Bilal]

Every day.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yes. So those are my three.

[Rashad Bilal]

This is. It's an interesting question because if you look at the history. Have we been in a recession before? We saw a brief one. And so what were the companies that thrived there? I'm glad you brought up the retail space. You brought up Costco because a lot of people would think Walmart. But it makes me think that one of my other ones like TSM was, was my favorite. I think Amazon would probably be like 1B. Amazon would be one of those companies that I would definitely look in terms of can they still thrive in that environment. And for sure we're five years removed from COVID and we remember what our life was like when we just had to use Amazon.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah.

[Rashad Bilal]

And we were able to get everything right. And that's just from a retail space. But obviously what they can do inside the pharmaceutical space, they just again, I mean that the branches under that, under that tree of the, of Amazon is just so vast that I think, I think they thrive in any environment. PNG is another one we're always going to need. Home items is one of those ones that's not sexy. But it's a stable company that has shown growth throughout the years. And I would put Netflix in there too. I think that would be my thing.

[Ian Dunlap]

If it was cheaper I would have mentioned it. But. But sure. Netflix is probably. Is Netflix the best subscription run business consumer facing ever? Like their numbers are insane.

[Rashad Bilal]

Them and Apple. Them and Apple.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah.

[Rashad Bilal]

Yeah. But as a singular product. That's the singular product. Them.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah.

[Rashad Bilal]

Apple is kind of like the, the pro. The product is the phone and the subscription services just kind of get added on. But yeah. And the, the room for growth is there. Right. You talk about from a global capacity. There's still countries that they haven't reached for sure.

[Ian Dunlap]

It's a lot of addressable markets they have not tapped into yet. And you know if they get into allegedly podcasts and the streaming wars of content creators.

[Rashad Bilal]

Yeah. And, and the CEO said they're not. They're doubling down on the spending. I know they, that used to be. How are they going to generate revenue from a original content space? Original content space. Well, they've showed you they've moved into live events now they're going to double down on more original content. So yeah, scaling looks likely for them.

[Troy Millings]

How you feel about Oscar?

[Ian Dunlap]

I thought this is a great question and I wanted to take some stocks that we have not talked about before. I see what you may see in the potential of this company but I got to be very clear as of right now, I hate it all time high. 35 bucks in 2021 is currently at 13 bucks. If you can get it at 3 or 4 bucks I would not mind you swing trading it back up to 10 or 11. But as a long term hold this is a definite no. You can argue hims, hers, Lily of course are much better. And then companies that are tech health adjacent, Amazon, Apple Novo are way better. I don't think Oscar's in the top 25. So for a long term hold, no. If it's a trade, if you get it at three or four bucks and ride it up to 11, I'm good with that. But as a long term hold, this is a definite no.

[Rashad Bilal]

Yeah, it's, it's in a tough spot. It's for those who are not to know, it's a leading healthcare technology company and they operate individual health care insurance markets through the Affordable Care act, which was Obamacare, which Yeah. An administration that has now changed and one of the campaign promises was we're going to get rid of that. Even though there was no plan really laid out to how get how to get rid of it. What we've seen is in the first, we haven't hit 100 days yet but the things that he said he was going to do, he's doing them.

[Ian Dunlap]

Oh he's shipping at anything that he's going to do.

[Rashad Bilal]

He's. Yeah, he's doing it. In fact his approval rating is at its all time high. They just NBC just put that out last night that his approval rating. Donnie.

[Ian Dunlap]

Really?

[Rashad Bilal]

Yeah. I was like huh.

[Ian Dunlap]

But yeah, imagine if you actually get some done. Wow. Okay.

[Rashad Bilal]

Yeah.

[Troy Millings]

Yeah.

[Rashad Bilal]

So I don't think Oscar is in a good spot.

[Ian Dunlap]

No. And they only reported 25 million dollar net income like soldier boy should not have as much money as your investment in your portfolio. I'm good shots, big soldier. But no, I'm gonna ask him. Lily Novo, there's a bunch of others you can invest in a hell of a lot better.

[Troy Millings]

Okay, so let's talk about this. If you had $30,000 to invest in the stock, two stocks for the next two years or one stock. Yeah. One stock to invest in the next two years, what would it be?

[Ian Dunlap]

I hate to take your pick, but say it.

[Rashad Bilal]

Sorry.

[Ian Dunlap]

Taiwan Semiconductor. Taiwan Semiconductor. I think they are the most important company on planet Earth right now. Next to Nvidia. Next. Nvidia. But Taiwan Semiconductor, I think, is incredibly important in us winning that AI race, quantum race and all things AI. And it's had a deep enough discount where I like it. If I can get it at 1:58, I would love it. Even at 162, I will buy in and I will hold for long term. Intel's done. TSM is better than intel by far. Please stop asking. I've been on this tirade for two years. So Taiwan Semiconductor is the one that I would go with for sure.

[Rashad Bilal]

Yeah.

[Ian Dunlap]

No, it doesn't mean sell Apple. No, it does not mean to sell Nvidia or Microsoft. Please. No, it doesn't mean sell V all. But if I have to start from scratch right now, TSM for sure.

[Rashad Bilal]

I'm not gonna argue with you on this one, man. I'm. I'm actually. Those are the two. Those are the two. If it was 30k, if it was 50k set, whatever the k was, those would be my two especially. And I covered this on the last class. I said AI is still a story. Don't. Don't get fooled. AI is still a story. I know we went back and forth last week about the AI trade, but it's still a story. And definitely for the next two years, it's going to be. When we talk about the expansion of artificial intelligence, when we talk about inferencing, and that was something we spoke about. It's here. You know, we got Carnegie hall and we saw it firsthand. And every time we go to a new space, it's is you're starting to see the remnants of it. But yeah, I mean, Blackwell for sure. And we're talking about Nvidia's case. We're going to see what that does. It's sold out now. There's a back Blackwell Ultra, so you could. Yeah, right. Ultra. We're going ultra black on these. On these folks. You still got Reuben sitting in the Waiting to. To be deployed to the people. Hopper is still moving, right? There would be no deep seat story if there wasn't a Hopper chip. So that's still the story. And none of that happens if they can't be manufactured by the company that you. We just named tsm. So those are for the next two years for sure. If you ask me five, I might have gave you a two, maybe a different slight alteration. But the next two, when talking about data centers, when we're talking about prompt engineering, when we're talking about personal agents, those two are going to be the story for sure.

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah.

[Ian Dunlap]

Rashad, what about you? Or is there one that you love that if you, if you were. People love this question. If you're down to your last dollar, last 30, 000, which one would you invest into?

[Troy Millings]

Well, the first before that, because the pushback for tsunami people are going to say is what about the geopolitical risk of China? And they already have tremendous aggression towards Taiwan. So for the people that are saying the risk of China invading Taiwan or China trying to cyber hack or bully or whatever, what is the threat to TSM with China having such aggression towards Taiwan?

[Ian Dunlap]

I think I was one of the ones who probably brought up the threat first, but I think it's pretty clear under Biden this may not have happened. But if China chooses to invade Taiwan to take back what they believe is theirs, Big T gonna hit that button. Drake should have hit on Kendrick.

[Rashad Bilal]

That's the red button.

[Ian Dunlap]

This is like SGA is like a free agent and LA is like, come on. This piece is the piece on a chessboard that matters for the race that batters because the, the war won't be boots on ground like you talked about before.

[Troy Millings]

But what, what, what. Oh what button are you referring to?

[Ian Dunlap]

Every drone we have in sight and Captain America and black in America, Thor, Autumn, little weapons we have.

[Troy Millings]

Well, we can't. We can't go to war with China.

[Ian Dunlap]

Oh, we're gonna he gonna hit.

[Troy Millings]

No, that's, that's. That's not sustainable.

[Ian Dunlap]

Suicide. Suicide.

[Troy Millings]

No, that's not sustainable. That the whole world's gonna. First of all, that'll ruin the entire world. Second of all, that's what it has to the war.

[Rashad Bilal]

What I think the, the invasion of Taiwan semiconductor would. Would.

[Ian Dunlap]

Cause World War 3.

[Troy Millings]

It affects the world, but it doesn't. And just China's gonna be. China's gonna be in control now. No, I think that China's gonna be in control now. Which they are already creeping into control now anyway. That's Just that would be like cherry on top. Like.

[Rashad Bilal]

Okay, but that's what I'm saying.

[Troy Millings]

As soon as you got that, you got the throne. Like you have the throne.

[Rashad Bilal]

They won't let them get it.

[Troy Millings]

They have it.

[Rashad Bilal]

No, no, I'm talking about TSM in terms of, that's why it's like open door. And Gigi Ping was saying like these guys, America has now allowed them to build whatever they want, give them tax incentives to now bring their foundries to the U.S. so it originally started as 28 billion, now it went up to 60 billion. Last month was another $100 billion project. So they've built as nearly as much infrastructure or will have as much infrastructure as they had in Taiwan up and running in the next five years and on the domestic land of the United States. So in the event that there's an invasion, business. Business still gonna run.

[Troy Millings]

No, it's still gonna have a major impact though. If China invades Taiwan.

[Rashad Bilal]

Yeah, for sure.

[Troy Millings]

Because if China invades Taiwan, they're taking Taiwan. There's no, this is like if the United invades Aruba, like if China, if China really decides that they're going to deal with the consequences later and today is the day that they fully just take Taiwan under their control. There's nothing that, there's nothing that, there's nothing that anybody can do about it now you got to start playing the diplomatic game. You got to sanction China and you got to try to get them and you got to try to do it that way. But they can literally just take Taiwan any, at any point in time that they want. There's consequences that they do that. That's why they haven't done that. But there's no fight. It's not going to be a Ukraine war. It's going to be a two day.

[Rashad Bilal]

Would it be beneficial to who?

[Ian Dunlap]

For China?

[Rashad Bilal]

Yeah. In terms of, let's say they shut down a TSM until they have full control over it. Right. Does that, what does that do to their, their semi economy?

[Ian Dunlap]

I don't think they care about their economy. Like the most dangerous person to fight is a person who doesn't care if they die. That's China. So like if they don't care about being defeated, because if that's the case, they wouldn't have had their market so constricted the last three or four years. They could have take, taken pole position from Amazon with Alipapa and they chose to shut it down.

[Rashad Bilal]

So it's very interesting until recently, until recently and that, that, that was, I think was a CEO. It was the. The owner of the Brooklyn Nets. I forget his name. His name. But he said Gigi Payne called everybody in, all the CEOs of the major companies and called them in. He said, look, this is the time. Like, right now is the time. Like, AI is the story, and we have to figure out how we're going to lead and how we're going to build infrastructure to make sure that we stay in this race. Called them all in. Since that meeting, we've. We've seen now this fantastic four have a nice run with 10 cent and Badu and Alibaba. So they. They understand what's at stake here, right? Like, we're not.

[Troy Millings]

What's at stable. What.

[Rashad Bilal]

Number one, they can't. This is a race that they. They definitely want to win. Now, this does. This administration said there's no way that anyone will ever defeat us in this AI race because of the infrastructure and the companies that we have. But they all decide to figure out, like, yeah, we're going to work together. I don't know if that's what I'm saying. Invasion. At this point, does a war or the threat of war, is that good for business?

[Troy Millings]

When you say. When you say work together, what do you mean?

[Rashad Bilal]

The CEOs of the. The Chinese companies. CEOs of Chinese companies.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah. They tell America, y'all better get down and lay down.

[Troy Millings]

Yeah. China doesn't want to be in competition with America. They want to be over America. That's their goal. Their goal is not to be friendly competition with America. Their goal is to be the number one superpower in the world. And they're. I mean, they have the largest military in the world right now. They're going to have the largest economy in the world in at least five years. They're already ahead as far as technology. If they're not ahead of America now, they'll be far ahead in the next five to 10 years. It won't even be close. As far as the technology gap, they've already strategically placed themselves on all over the world and are controlling economies from Africa to the Caribbean to South America. They're all over the world. They have a plan to be America 2.0. They don't.

[Rashad Bilal]

I'm still thinking in, Tim, in terms of the greatest companies in the world are still where?

[Ian Dunlap]

Here. But if they get that piece on the chessboard, which I've been.

[Rashad Bilal]

Which one? Which one of them is the piece?

[Ian Dunlap]

You talking about that piece.

[Rashad Bilal]

Oh, tsm. That piece.

[Ian Dunlap]

What?

[Rashad Bilal]

Because if you think about the last.

[Ian Dunlap]

Infinity Stone, Feel like culturally, Taiwan is theirs. It was stripped away.

[Rashad Bilal]

The superpowers will control the technology, technological advances. Right? You agree?

[Ian Dunlap]

Say that again.

[Rashad Bilal]

I said the superpowers, the. I guess the Max 7, we can call it. They will control the technological advances over the next five, ten years, or they're. Or they're going to purchase the company that does via OpenAI. Microsoft.

[Troy Millings]

Yeah, but you can have great companies on your soil and still not be the number one country in the world. Like America still has great companies, but they still got. They still got an answer to China. And if China is the most dominant in technology, the most dominant army, the most influential on a global scale, I mean, it's just like Japan. Japan has a lot of great companies, but they have no real power.

[Rashad Bilal]

No, I said the greatest companies, though. It's like we're talking about.

[Ian Dunlap]

We're always going to have the greatest companies, but to Rashad's point, okay, we have the greatest companies on earth with the worst spending habits of any large nation ever. I don't like that stuff. Elon doing the Doge conversation, though. The debt to GDP ratio being what it is. Oh, it's. It needs to be some cuts happening. They just want to cut everything black first. I don't like that part. But there has to be. Credit card debt is at an all time high. Government spending at an all time high. How housing, like there. There's no more affordable anything. Damn near like if I was 19 to 20 living in this world right now. Oh my God. Tough, tough. And while India, we built that middle class, we built up China, sold off some important parts of tech. And for you, bitcoin, Maxis, China owns almost as much bitcoin as us as. Well, you know, Michael said he gonna take his ass right to Shanghai if things get hot here.

[Rashad Bilal]

It's gonna be like the Dark Knight.

[Ian Dunlap]

Right out of here. So we have some issues that we need to fix for sure.

[Rashad Bilal]

So who you two.

[Troy Millings]

Is it two or one?

[Rashad Bilal]

Two.

[Troy Millings]

So who's your two?

[Rashad Bilal]

Well, he said my. He said my two. He said Nvidia and tsm.

[Troy Millings]

Well, bitcoin for sure. Because when we talk about all these, all of, all of these things, they're all dependent on a country and they're dependent on a variety of different global political geopolitical moves. And that's really the, the, the brilliance behind bitcoin is that whoever designed it, whether it was the CIA or whether it was Satoshi or whether it was the Communist Party of China, whoever designed this thing is actually a genius who.

[Ian Dunlap]

Owns a Trademark of Satoshi Nakamoto not to cut you off.

[Troy Millings]

Who owns it?

[Ian Dunlap]

I don't know. Dennis, Robin, Scotty, Pippenos. Go ahead with your point. You cooking? Go ahead.

[Troy Millings]

Whoever. They've designed it to outlast everything. Right. And it's going to be issues here and there. But you can't say, okay, we're going to crack down. Like they could say they're going to crack down on Taiwan. That's going to cause. Cause problems. How can you crack down on something that doesn't even exist? Crack down on air. They've tried it before. China's tried it. Russia's tried it. Hasn't worked because it's not like one particular. You can't have sanctions on it. You can't have tariffs on it. You can't strike down leadership. Only thing that, only thing I can compromise it is if, if the, if it gets compromised, as far as the technology gets compromised. Yeah. If there's a massive data breach and everybody's wallet is now open and that's where the quantum computer comes into play.

[Rashad Bilal]

Or mass seizures, which the U. S did.

[Troy Millings]

Well, they do. They've been doing that from the beginning.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah, we're doing that for a minute.

[Troy Millings]

Yeah, they've been doing. That's how they got all their bitcoin. But they still. It still hasn't affected it. So I just feel like when you think about the future, I don't know, two years, you know, anything can happen. It could be a negative two years. But just in general.

[Rashad Bilal]

Damn, man. I was going. So I was going to go there. If we're talking about the next two years and the cycle of it, this year should be good, but the next year probably will be negative.

[Troy Millings]

Yeah, but even like.

[Rashad Bilal]

Right. That's the other part.

[Troy Millings]

Every. At some point we're not going to have the same cycle. It's not going to work the same way. So even the sample size that we have is a relatively short period of time. It's only 15 years. So that's traditionally what has happened. But that doesn't necessarily mean that's going to happen. Every single four years is going to be the same exact four years going forward. There's going to be some outlier at some point in time.

[Ian Dunlap]

Are you saying that because the hedge fund buying influence and the governmental influence.

[Troy Millings]

Now, that's one of the reasons for. Sure. Because it's, it's, it's, it's. The scales have changed. Right. When you got blackrock that owns that much, even microstrategy that owns that much Right. Like now it's, it's. It's going to take what BlackRock wants to happen, is going to happen for sure.

[Ian Dunlap]

Worldwide.

[Troy Millings]

Yeah, the man with the gold makes the rules.

[Ian Dunlap]

So for sure they got digital or physical.

[Troy Millings]

That's a fact. They got bank right now. But yeah, you gotta. You gotta look to them for sure. And then Nvidia has continued to lead the race when it comes to. And they're still number one. They've had some challenges. And you know, it might not be as great as it was for the last five years, but for all intents and purposes, artificial intelligence seems like it's only going to get bigger. And that's one thing that Jensen was talking about as far as now the next. The next stage is rational AI where you can actually have a conversation. I'll talk to my contractor the other day, and I was telling him, at what point are these laborers going to be replaced by AI machines? And he was like, never. That's never gonna happen. And I'm like, why you think that? He was like, because they can't. It's. It's on the job decisions, split decisions that person has to make that AI can't make. And I'm like, well, on a certain level right now, that's kind of true. Cause even in chat gbt, you ask your questions. Some questions it doesn't answer, but at some point in time, every question that you ask it is going to be able to answer the reason why it doesn't answer the questions now because some questions can't be answered. So you have to take an opinion. You have to take an opinion. Right. But at some point in time, it's gonna. It's gonna be opinion. And that's. That's dangerous.

[Ian Dunlap]

You can upload a data. A big enough data set.

[Troy Millings]

Yeah. It's gonna have the issue.

[Ian Dunlap]

The robots may not have the skill set to hang drywall and prime and tape, mud, sand, but if they get there and you can upload enough data and computational set it.

[Troy Millings]

Yeah, but I think the functionality is the flexibility aspect of it. Right. Like if you start to have robots. How we think of robots is a metal machine that's difficult to kind of screw in. But what if a robot becomes a person with three and it's. And it's operating. It's operating like me.

[Rashad Bilal]

They're doing it now like this was literally on one America two weeks ago or last week. They're building a town in Texas right now all on AI. Right. The machine is actually layering the foundation is. Is layering there's no drywall anymore. So it's all cement homes and they're built. People are living in these, in these towns right now. And so the idea of having contractors be there for six months to a year, this is the test for it. Right now they're building a hotel and it's going to be solar. I know we talked about solar last week, but it's going to be solar and those houses are being built in two months. A town like it's incredible. But this is, this is technology. This is how it infiltrates an industry and it can take over.

[Troy Millings]

Yeah.

[Rashad Bilal]

And do it more efficiently.

[Ian Dunlap]

And for those who think that your skill set or job will not be affected by AI just go play with Claude or chat GBT03 and just see like Ty was showing me some stuff yesterday and building stuff in 45 minutes. That would take a small team maybe two or three years ago, two or three months to build. It was going to have an effect on every. And you have to just learn how to use it to, to make yourself better as well. But you can't act like it's not going to have an impact on our lives. It's already doing it.

[Troy Millings]

Yeah. And nothing. No. No job is 100% safe.

[Ian Dunlap]

No.

[Troy Millings]

So no. Yeah.

[Rashad Bilal]

Yeah. Now I did just the last point on the, on the bitcoin every four year thing. Yes. The cycle will at some point it could break but the reason it's doing it is because of it's based on its having. Right. So every four years it halves and that's why they counted as a four year cycle because every time that it halves there's less bitcoin supply in the, in the chain. So there's a method to it which is why they calculate every four years.

[Troy Millings]

I also think that bitcoin now is, is it is related to the global economy as well where some level it might have been insulated when it was a smaller. Now it's. It's directly related. So if the global, if there's a global recession, bitcoin is going fall as well. It's not. It's not. It doesn't move.

[Ian Dunlap]

It used to be. Right.

[Troy Millings]

Exactly. Exactly. Well, we'll see. Okay.

[Ian Dunlap]

What about the stock maybe due for a little correction. And that's the one thing I can't say for the Trump administration for the few Republicans that we have. I wonder if they'll report the data correctly now that he's in office. Supposed when Biden was in office. I don't think they're gonna let him move that 2/4 of negative GDP. Why, why he's there allegedly he pacing.

[Rashad Bilal]

For it right now. Quarter number one.

[Troy Millings]

Well, what has been a hedge is gold reached all time highs of 3,000. And that's something that even Mike Novograss was talking to us about before the election. He said that one. He said a variety of different things. He said that he thought that the stock market was going to go up real quickly when Trump got elected, if Trump won and then it's going to go down, which essentially that's what's happened so far. He said he thought it was gonna be the inverse if, if Harris won. And then he also said that if stocks go down he thinks gold is going to go up. He said gold and bitcoin. Well, he said he thinks gold is going to go up. And I asked him, I asked him exactly like what do you think how high? He said he could see gold getting a 10,000 in 10.

[Ian Dunlap]

Bless you.

[Troy Millings]

Nice.

[Ian Dunlap]

That's, that's how and how long?

[Troy Millings]

10 years. 10 years, that's like triple. I mean that's like the ultimate. That's a very, very foolish. He didn't like guarantee that but he said like there was a case in the world where gold can get to 10,000 and in 10 years. So what about gold?

[Ian Dunlap]

I did an interesting exercise in Telegram and Stock Club. If you look at gold as very comparable with The S&P 500, of course it's outpacing it. So you can argue that gold is a safer investment than NASDAQ or the Dow or S and P because there's a group that uses gold as a hedge and because there's real value there, it doesn't drop as much. Now of course you had some periods in 2014, 2013, what was down a lot. But gold has done incredibly well and I think opposed to looking at it as solely a hedge, maybe we have to have the conversation about using it as a primary investment vehicle and being at 3,000. It just so hi. Okay. For everyone who doesn't know Novograss is a billionaire, I know there's some people like, well he was wrong about one thing. So all advice doesn't matter. He savvy investor. So if he's saying it can get to 10,000 and he's saying that publicly, the real number may be 12,000 which would mean if we slide for two quarters we're definitely going to slide into 27. So we may have a three year route where things are bad, which would be incredibly fascinating. So the gold is definitely a good investment. If you look at the long term stock going back to 2000, 2005, 2008 return has been amazing. In 2008 it was at 716. We're currently at 3000. It's performed better than NAS, well the S P 500 in the Dow. So you definitely got to put it on your watch list for sure. And shout out to everyone who's been holding gold. I know keys been been big on gold. He was the first person I thought of when we broke 3,000. So it's a good asset but all assets tend to trend the same way.

[Troy Millings]

All right, stock club sale. There's one day left. 50 off stock club go to Ian invest.com Ian invest.com where to get the prices.

[Ian Dunlap]

You're there to get the stocks and the prices. Not to be my best friend. It doesn't entitle to you to a date or to be my lover. I just want to be real clear for when you join. So be like, yo, I got a question. Do you think me you can hang out on the Brooklyn Bridge? No, we're not going to get a chopped cheese because you paid the half off price. I'm sorry. I love you dealing. We'll do a meet up in the future but the, the solo hangout Brooklyn Bridge play.

[Rashad Bilal]

Sorry.

[Ian Dunlap]

Nope, nope.

[Troy Millings]

Back out of play. Okay. What about stock? Okay. Hello.

[Ian Dunlap]

Unlike the other stock that we talked about earlier, I like it a little bit more. But when you hit homework assignment for everyone, go to your chart and look since inception. So it had a nice run up starting in 2024. It got to a high of 55, is currently at 28. So the trajectory is better. But I don't like when a stock has a sharp increase and sharp decline. I don't hate this one as much as the other. I would not invest in it. But maybe if I was looking to buy it back in at 15 or 18, I wouldn't mind holding it. But I, I hate when the Stock goes from 12 to 50, then it goes from 50 back down to 15. I don't like that kind of erratic nature in my portfolio. So a swing trade maybe like a day trade on it or bounce off of a key level. Yes. But to hold it long term, I wouldn't touch it because you have to look from 2021 through 24 it was damn near flat for three years.

[Rashad Bilal]

So yeah, no, this, this is, we spoke about this. This stock maybe a couple months ago, six months ago. It's crazy because six months ago is risen 343.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah.

[Rashad Bilal]

Even though it's falling back down here. This is one of those energy plays when we talk about, especially in AI and we talk about data centers and how they're going to be powered. This is a nuclear, recycled nuclear fuel company. And so this really speaks about efficiency. Who's, who's going to do it? How's it going to be powered? Is it going to be nuclear? Which they, which they think from all talks and all analysis saying that's the most efficient way to do it. And so you can see that that run up is okay, hey, if we're going to create data centers and somebody's going to do them and we could talk about the expansion of them and we talked about Metado and 27 of them and Tesla's building them. Well, somebody has to power them. And so this is a company that may be a beneficiary. If we're talking about next generation in terms of efficiency and waste, they could be one of those companies that is a beneficiary of that. Because right now they're kind of in a leader position in terms of recycled nuclear fuel. And if that's going to be the way of future data center powering, this makes sense. Which is why it had sat still since 2021, right?

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah.

[Rashad Bilal]

When would we use it? When would we use it? We're still using gas, we're still using. Now there's a new wave of how we need to do this and there's a new system of power that's going to be on the grid. People be talking about the, the grid, American energy grid. It's pretty alarming, man. And all signs are pointing that it's only going to increase with all the type of infrastructure that they're talking about building for future technology. So yeah, keep your eye on this company. Understandably why it's, it's moving kind of like in this, this mountain that's on a decline. But I'm not invested in it. But I would definitely watch it over the next couple, next couple of months. Definitely into 2026, but definitely in 2026, 2027, as we start to see more things come online, more settings come online. Look for this to be the one of the ways that we power them.

[Ian Dunlap]

And back to your point, Rashad, about China, our power grid is old as hell, like infrastructure wise, way behind. Like, man, we had the hurricane in Houston last year. They still have not swapped out. We still got cables above streets in Houston. Like, oh my God, man.

[Rashad Bilal]

So most places, most places is cables.

[Ian Dunlap]

Above and a power grid. When's the Last time for those of you in the field that in most major cities that the power infrastructure has been upgraded. Not good, not good. Prayers to everyone that lost family or lost property or had property damage with all those tornadoes. Ohio, Pennsylvania, Alabama.

[Rashad Bilal]

Yeah, it's just.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah, but we built up India's middle class in 15 years. Crazy.

[Troy Millings]

That is a fact. Okay, speaking of data centers, given the importance of data centers, current trajectory, what's your thoughts on Equinix?

[Ian Dunlap]

This is a sleeper that we have not talked about. I'm gonna be very clear that this current price is too hot about so $848 and 96 cent. Hell of a run. I will put it on the watch list and it's a great lesson. And as a sector becomes important they're going to be companies that are not talked about that are really important that may not be as popular as a Tesla, but this company, even though it has some ups and downs, if you look over the last few years they're, they're more stable than Tesla is and is given a better return. So the ticker is EQIX. In 2019 it was at 371. It's currently at 848 ticket EQIX put on the watch list. I like it a lot. I'm sorry we haven't talked about it more. We should have. But when it comes down to a favorable price, I'll be sure to mention it again. I don't want to always talk about Apple and Microsoft.

[Rashad Bilal]

Yeah, this is, this is that, this is that play. This is the same thing that when we talk about connectivity, when we talked about infrastructure, when we talk about data, these are those companies like the ones that nobody speaks of are going to be beneficial beneficiaries of AI development. So yeah, pretty high.

[Ian Dunlap]

Right now though Equinix is solid.

[Troy Millings]

Do you believe the market bottomed out on or. I mean we're still sliding so you can't have a bottom. But do you think like this is like relatively the bottom, we might go a little lower or do you think that there's still a lot more room.

[Ian Dunlap]

As an investor Only the paranoid survive. And I know when whatever we say that it gets clipped up, people like no, there are other people who say you can't be paranoid but the people who get damaged the most are the ones who think that the end is over until you have a clear sign. Given the erratic nature of leadership in Washington.

[Troy Millings]

Every major hedge fund has raised the, the chance of us getting into a recession. Warren Buffett still hasn't put his money into the market yet. The global, the global uncertainty has just begun. So it's growing.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yep.

[Troy Millings]

I would say that there's a, there's a probably very good chance that this is not the bottom.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yep. And even in the prices that I put and that's why it took me so long to finish stock club prices because I want to be sure and accurate. I have some stocks even like Tesla. I have Tesla going 18 lower from where it is today. Like so unless the erratic nature changes really fast. Even though that was at 417, I can see us getting to 385 on the Dell on DI 385. Hypothetically. What do I know? I just make up numbers out of thin air. I have no clue what I'm talking about. But if the tariff situation gets worse, this first quarter is not good and we get a couple other markets that are negative, the job numbers remain negative, interest rates continue to go up. It won't be a great combination.

[Rashad Bilal]

It doesn't look promising. If you look at all the major indexes and if you use that ema, that'd be interesting. Right? Like we can't predict the bottom, but we can kind of get a gauge of. Yeah. Are they all under their 200? Like these are questions you should ask yourself. And I'm sure if you look at charts, you know the answer. Where's their rsi? Are they oversold? Because these can be oversold. Right? Like, yeah. Is it under 30, is it under 20? Those are some of the things in factors that you should look at if you're looking at a relative bottom. So we're getting there, we're getting there, we're getting there. The NASDAQ is in Correction territory over 10. The s p touched that. That level crawled back from it. The Dow, same thing. So based on percentage wise from its highs, yeah, there's a pullback. But again that floor, those are. I would look at the, the moving averages. I know you talk about the 72, 200. Some people you might even want to go out to the 400. If you're looking at a large index like that, the 400 might be an option as well to see where we're at from the 200 to the 400. Maybe take some percentages from there and say all right, well this is, this is my floor.

[Ian Dunlap]

And also when we have more hyper concentration amongst funds, it's a sign. Like even Michael Saylor his bitcoin strategies focus on one. You have the big four in China. Q. Q. Q. Is now launching a Q. Q. 15 index well, you got to trim the fat from the ones that are not going to perform well if we go through a downturn. So hyper concentration is a soft indicator 2 of a potential pullback. Not to scare you guys in the market. So.

[Troy Millings]

What about PepsiCo?

[Ian Dunlap]

Love it. A billion dollars on a healthy soda brand.

[Rashad Bilal]

Yo, this is, yeah, mergers and acquisitions, man. PepsiCo recently purchased Poppy. If you're not familiar with Poppy, it is a, it's a health, it's a carbonated health drink. Right. I would, I would call it, I guess they call it a healthy soda. I know like my kids and a lot of schools have it in their cafeterias. They sell it as an alternative to Pepsi and Coke. Kids seem to enjoy it. They have a bunch of flavors. They were a competitor. They were in a space where PepsiCo was getting kicked in the face. And so rather than compete, they said, let's offer them a Ch. 1.5 billion dollar acquisition that should be closing here shortly. This is a company that started on Shark tank, bro, in 2018. I know, I know, 2018, a shark tank company. Now nearly a 2 billion dollar valuation or 2, 2, 2 billion dollar sale is pretty incredible to a brand. I mean when you talk about the top two brands in, in that space, them and Coke obviously sit at the, at the leaderboard. And it's not just those two beverages. Right. They have a portfolio of items that, that they also sell. But I think this is a good acquisition for them for sure.

[Ian Dunlap]

We need to make a Bitcoin Cola 2 Billy on a healthy soda. Kudos to you. Shout out to all my entrepreneurs and shout out to shark tank. But PepsiCo, very good company if it gets to 141, 135, I like it for sure. But incredibly run company, great market share, great profit margin for their sector. I definitely like PepsiCo in this environment, in this market. I know for all my health gurus, not the healthiest options, but if we're talking return on investment, Pepsi is a solid investment for sure.

[Troy Millings]

And we gotta say rest in peace to Junior Bridgman, a billionaire and somebody that we met a few years ago, Adam at Invest Fest. He spoke on a panel with Rich Paul and he passed away last week. Yeah, from I believe cardiac arrest. So send our condolences. Sure.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah, yeah. A legend of my hometown. You guys actually broke the news to me and then word started to spread from everyone back home. But rest in peace to him, condolences to his family. Hell of an inspiration given him being from my hometown and all the lives he impacted and Affected, So rest in peace. And, man, that's. That was a rough little moment for my hometown. So prayers to his family.

[Rashad Bilal]

Yeah. Condolences to him and his entire family. A beautiful gentleman. We got the pleasure of sitting down with him at Invest Fest. Prior to going on the stage, we had the. The privilege of sitting down with him for a few hours, and he was just picking our brains and, and, and enjoying, you know, some of the things that he was seeing at Invest Fest, but then got the chance to go to the Kentucky Derby and actually visited one of his estates with his family. This incredible dude. Incredible family, and more importantly, an incredible legacy that we should definitely pay attention to, emulate. I'm glad that there's more stories coming about. It's unfortunate that it happened after his death, but, yeah, people are going to be aware of his story from, from here on, and they should be, because it's an important American story of entrepreneurship, of a family and a legacy. Like his kids all work and all have companies inside of the portfolio. So, yeah, definitely, definitely. We're gonna be missed for sure.

[Troy Millings]

Rest in peace. Yeah.

[Ian Dunlap]

Okay.

[Troy Millings]

And speaking of Invest Fest, we got one. So we got something that's going that's big for the street. We got some. One thing that's gonna be big for the streets. Cultural. A cultural moment. A popcorn cultural moment.

[Rashad Bilal]

Stay tuned.

[Troy Millings]

You care, though.

[Rashad Bilal]

Stay tuned.

[Troy Millings]

It's gonna be. It's gonna be a viral. Let's just say this. We'll tell you. It's very viral. Very viral.

[Rashad Bilal]

Stay tuned.

[Ian Dunlap]

Very viral.

[Troy Millings]

Very viral. Cultural. Cultural for the. For the streets.

[Ian Dunlap]

Okay, y'all have a good Monday. Love you.

[Troy Millings]

All right, so Scott Besman. Besden.

[Ian Dunlap]

Mm.

[Troy Millings]

On cnbc. Well, actually, let's. Let's play this clip if we can.

[Rashad Bilal]

Top 10% of Americans are 40 or 50% of consumption. And that is an unstable equilibrium. The bottom 50% of working Americans have gotten killed. We are trying to address that. We're trying to get rates down. And, you know, could we be seeing that the. This economy that we inherited starting to roll a bit? Sure. And look, there's going to be a natural adjustment as we move away from public spending to private spending. The market and the economy have just become hooked and we become addicted to this government spending and there's going to be a detox period.

[Troy Millings]

Okay, so what do we think about this clip that he says the market and economy have become hooked and addicted to access government spending?

[Ian Dunlap]

I agree. Why? I don't agree with every principle or tenant that Elon and Trump may be discussing. I Think government spending has not could be streamlined. I'll say that. And I think we lack some efficiency and some area kudos to everyone who works in the government or maybe employed by the government. This is no slight to you, but I think as a system there is a systemic problem about how capital is deployed. And I wish that some of these departments will run a lot tighter and cleaner and hopefully over the next four years we'll get the change to make the debt to GDP ratio come down and cities won't have as many issues in terms of funding. But what do you guys think about it?

[Rashad Bilal]

Yeah, I think a decent detox is needed. The, the, the problem with that I have with DOGE is how they're going about it. I understand that things need to be more efficient and even some of the claims that Elon has said and the President has said, I've actually gone and researched it and all of it is not false. Like some of the things that they're saying about what is being spended. Like I know at the State of the Union he was naming all of the ways that the government was spending money and I'm like, let me just go check on it. And I was like, oh wait, I was almost surprised. Like, you know these, this is. Okay, he's not too far off base here. How they're going about it leaves it a mess where you have, okay, don't show up, do show up. Federal mandates, I know Department of Education, they, they're reducing 30 of the, the staff. Then it's 50 of staff and then federal judge say you can't do it and there's a federal judge who overrules that and it just gets messy. So how it's going to, I mean people's lives are being affected on a day to day basis when it comes to that. So the process of how it's being done, I don't agree with, I, I do agree with being more efficient on spending. I mean anybody in business should be focused on becoming more efficient and spending and the government obviously when we talk about the amount of debt we have, the only way to eradicate that is to become more efficient and find other ways to increase income and reduce spending. So the deet, I feel like the detox, it's gonna happen, right. How and when, and how, how efficiently it happens will be the issue.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah.

[Troy Millings]

Do you clean the house from the top or from the bottom?

[Rashad Bilal]

Whose house? It's a trick.

[Ian Dunlap]

You about to cook. Go ahead.

[Troy Millings]

Because I mean there's ways you, you need to, we need to cut Back on. On spending for sure. But everybody in chat. Homework assignment. What is the two biggest items that the government spends money on? Okay.

[Ian Dunlap]

It's above our pay grade. Yep.

[Troy Millings]

But the biggest item that the government spends money on in Social Security, Medicare, and other mandatory medical spending. And then the second item is defense and military spending. So Social Security and Medicare have been off limits for years. They'll cut Medicaid because that's for poor people. But Medicare and Social Security is a trap that we've been in for years. Social Security statement, if you read your Social Security statement, it said it's going to be insolvent in a few years. It's been saying that for years. That's an issue that nobody wants to tackle politically.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah, politically.

[Troy Millings]

They haven't been able to figure that out yet and kind of put it in perspective. I mean, that's 61 of the budget. 61. $4.1 trillion. And then defense and military. Defense and military, 61.

[Rashad Bilal]

Which categories?

[Troy Millings]

Social Security, Medicare, National Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah. Okay.

[Troy Millings]

And. And Nash. And Defense spending is $842 billion a year. 12%. And the defense spending aspect, nobody ever thinks about cutting that. Nobody ever talks about cutting defense spending.

[Rashad Bilal]

Nope.

[Troy Millings]

So it's like, okay, China, once again, going back to China, they have the largest military in the world. America has the most military bases in the world. Hundreds of bases all over the world. China has less than 5. They're efficient. That's an efficient military. That idea of having bases all over the world now with technology. Right. Like, is it really beneficial? Hey, you're creating bad will. The differential. Getting kicked out of Africa. Now you got all these bases everywhere. That's that. You look like a colonizer. Nobody wants to have American bases in their country. We got bases in almost every country in the world. Including countries. Including countries we don't even have diplomatic ties with, like Cuba, Guantanamo Bay. We own a part of Cuba. How much money is that costing to run all these bases? You have. You got to run the base, then you got to have security for the base. So China has really relatively no basis. They have no basis. They didn't build. You're not going to see a Chinese military base pretty much anywhere in the world. Well, they're gonna have the whole entire Taiwan.

[Rashad Bilal]

Easy.

[Troy Millings]

Artificial intelligence. You can't tell me that you can't replace some of the spending that we're doing on military and all this foreign aid. Military that we're providing the countries. But it's easier to cut DEI band programs for $600,000 and 5. You know, stuff does add up, but that's an easier target than the real issue. The real issue that we have is Medicaid, Medicare and Social Security and the military. Those are the, that's the real issue that we have. Until, until those get cut drastically or until those get revamped totally. It's not going to work. We're going to keep people going, to keep living longer. We're going to keep putting ourselves in more and more global conflicts and wars. And so it's, it's not going to work. We're getting sicker as a society. Every year. We're getting sicker and sick as a society. So until we start addressing real problems, this government spending thing is not going to work. It's just taking a little bit, but it's not, it's not making a real impact.

[Rashad Bilal]

Yeah, right now. And so the military part is important, but the next line Item on the spending 169 billion is Department of Veterans affairs, which you can't be a veteran unless you're in the military.

[Troy Millings]

So that's like part of the military too, technically.

[Rashad Bilal]

Right. The other reversal is that further down on the item line, 71 billion goes to education.

[Troy Millings]

That's getting cut. That's, that's, that's cuttable.

[Rashad Bilal]

Right? Our education. What, what do we rank, like 19th or 20th in math and 24th or something like that?

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah.

[Rashad Bilal]

And that's getting cut. Yeah. This is, this is an alarming time.

[Troy Millings]

Yeah.

[Rashad Bilal]

This is the. And these aren't just made up fictional numbers. This is literally from the fiscal data, treasury department.gov like, this is an official website. Like, it shows you how much we spent this year. The number's at just over $3 trillion in 2025.

[Troy Millings]

That's Social Security this year. That Social Security thing is going to keep. It's, that's. I don't know how they gonna figure that because. No, it's not an entitlement. It's not an entitlement. If you pay money into a system, how is that entitlement?

[Ian Dunlap]

But if you audit that, it may reveal mismanagement. Is that. Never mind.

[Troy Millings]

Where's the money going?

[Ian Dunlap]

I tried to stop, but you.

[Troy Millings]

Where's the money going? Where's the money actually going? That's the part that nobody really ever figured out because, like, when we used to do what I used to do, pensions for people, rollovers. You know, if you work a pension plan, most of the time you take a pension. So you take like $2,000 a month. Like, let's Say you're a cop, right? They give you a couple different options. They'll give you, like, okay, you could take a pension for the rest of your life. That's $3,000, or you could take a pension for 15 years, and that might be 2,000 they give. You know, they. They, like, they make. Once you. It's irrevocable. Once you make a decision about your pension, you can't change it. Most people just take the monthly because that's what you think of. That's what you're trained to think. But sometimes you can actually take the lump sum and roll into an ira. So then they'd be like, all right, well, what's the lump sum? A lump sum's a million dollars. How do you think that they were going to be able to pay you $3,000 a month? There's a higher number. So as you've worked, your money has gone into a pension. The pension is invested, and then it's giving you $2,000 off of that million dollars. Right. Which is currently. Which is going to be invested in, you know, bonds or whatever they're investing the money in. But nobody ever really thinks that. Nobody looks at their pension like their pension is worth a million dollars. They look at their pension like, I'm gonna get $2,000 when I retire.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah.

[Troy Millings]

That's how. That's the language that. That's the language that union workers use, like, I'm gonna get 60 of my. Of my income or I'm gonna get $3,000 a month for the rest of my life when I retire. They never say I'm gonna get $2 million because they don't look at it like that.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah.

[Troy Millings]

So the Social Security numbers coming from a higher number that's actually currently invested that you. We've paid. Who's managing that portfolio?

[Ian Dunlap]

You are cooking with hot fish grease right now, yo.

[Troy Millings]

I don't know.

[Ian Dunlap]

It's hypothetically the world's biggest index fund, and it's running and solvent.

[Troy Millings]

Or. Or it's the world's biggest index fund. Bernie Madoff did a lot of time. Allegedly, allegedly beneficial. You guys start to think about this stuff.

[Ian Dunlap]

We can talk about Reptilians before we talk about that Social Security.

[Rashad Bilal]

Can you put that as. Can a beneficiary receive Social Security?

[Troy Millings]

Can they receive your Social Security?

[Rashad Bilal]

No, no, no, no. So instead of saying, like, you're saying.

[Troy Millings]

Like, Right, if your parents have.

[Rashad Bilal]

Right, exactly, exactly.

[Troy Millings]

I don't think so. Yeah, I don't think it's transferable.

[Rashad Bilal]

So, like, that's what I'm saying when you think if it's a million dollars in the term, if somebody doesn't live, say you retire at 65, but you live to 75, that's not. Obviously you're not getting a million. You're getting that $3,000 a month for the 10 years, which is nowhere near the million. But what happens to the.

[Troy Millings]

And most people don't even know how Social Security works. They're taking their Social Security early. So they get in only 60 of it. It's a whole education. Social Security within itself is a whole education.

[Rashad Bilal]

That 68 now, right?

[Troy Millings]

Yeah, they keep moving it, but so I mean, it's kind of complicated. Like, you know, the vast majority of people, especially you just, you know, work a regular 9 to 5 job. You're not. You don't really have resources to go to a Social Security. You actually do. You can't go to Social Security office. So people don't know that. So you can actually go to a Social Security. And they. They're supposed to actually educate you on Social Security.

[Ian Dunlap]

Don't tell them we sent you, though, for the record.

[Troy Millings]

So allegedly.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah, we could talk about the SO and, and the reptilians. They have Alphas, insectoids, what else they have? They got the 12 foot thing with wings. We talk about anything else. But then you, you are cooking, though. 52 and a half. But nope.

[Troy Millings]

All right, before we leave, allegedly. Before we leave, one last clip. Andrew Schultz, he's pretty controversial. You know him?

[Ian Dunlap]

That's my guy.

[Troy Millings]

Okay. He's got a lot of negative attention.

[Ian Dunlap]

Oh, for sure. Earned too. Earned. Hate.

[Troy Millings]

Earned. Not given. But he has an interesting clip. Let's. Let's play this clip.

[Andrew Schultz]

Every American born gets a thousand bucks.

[Ian Dunlap]

Put into a van.

[Andrew Schultz]

It's a friend of ours, Brad Gerstner, with this. Invest American is the concept.

[Rashad Bilal]

And regardless if the concept is good or not, the emotional connectivity to the.

[Andrew Schultz]

Success of American industry is really important. When you know at 22 that you.

[Rashad Bilal]

Could get this thing that's been compounding for 22 years. You, you could pay off some college loans, you could put something down on a house, you could pay for trade.

[Andrew Schultz]

School, whatever it is.

[Ian Dunlap]

I think you have a different energy.

[Rashad Bilal]

Towards America and its success.

[Andrew Schultz]

And then you have a lot less.

[Rashad Bilal]

Of these kids who are just like, America's this horrible place.

[Andrew Schultz]

And capitalism is bad.

[Rashad Bilal]

Yeah, capitalism is bad when you're left behind.

[Andrew Schultz]

When you're invested in capitalism, it's baby.

[Ian Dunlap]

Absolutely.

[Andrew Schultz]

I did an analysis. I wasn't sure if I should put it out, but I'll tell you guys the numbers. The U.S. social Security program is meant to be kind of of the retirement program for folks that don't have access to private retirement accounts. And there's a trust fund every year we all put money in with our Social Security. Taxes out of our paychecks goes in there. It gets invested in one thing, U.S. treasuries, which have averaged about 4.8% return since the beginning of the program per year. Meanwhile, what if you put it into the market? Meanwhile, the S and P has been averaging 11%. So here's the math. If in 1971, which was the year that we went off the ground gold standard in the United States, if we invested the Social Security Trust Fund in the S and P, the balance of the Social Security Trust Fund today would be $15 trillion. That would be roughly one third of the value of the total s and P500, which would be jointly owned by all Americans. Now, here's what's up. The middle class people who had access to private retirement accounts benefited by buying the s and P500. And the wealthy were able to access it. So all of the equity value that accrued from American enterprise and the prosperity of the American system accrued to the people that had access to the private accounts. Meanwhile, the people that only had access to the public accounts got stuck owning Treasuries. Today, the Social Security trust fund has $2.7 trillion balance. And based on the outflows and inflows, it's going to go bankrupt in 2032. That means Social Security is either going to get cut or the Fed's going to print a ton of money to keep Social Security benefits. Retirement age goes up a little bit.

[Rashad Bilal]

Yeah.

[Andrew Schultz]

It's a lot of levers.

[Troy Millings]

Yeah.

[Rashad Bilal]

Wow.

[Andrew Schultz]

So I did the math. If you assume that the s and P500 continues to grow at 10 and a half percent a year, we could put about $500 billion in the trust fund today. And it will not go bankrupt again. And it will continue to grow every year. And then all Americans have participation in American enterprise. And importantly, this becomes the world's largest sovereign wealth fund ever. You don't need a separate sovereign wealth fund. We already have one.

[Rashad Bilal]

We have it. It's called.

[Andrew Schultz]

It's called the Social Security Trust Fund. And what we've done is we've totally mismanaged it. Basically, we've created through the Social Security system the deep inequity we see in this country. If instead we had allowed the Social Security system to invest in the S&P 500 to buy American Enterprises to fund American businesses. Then every American would be wealthy. And that middle class that uniquely participated by basically arbitraging the market where they forced the treasury bond yields on the poor and they got to take access to the equity yields would have not.

[Troy Millings]

Okay, Baby bond, something that we've talked about before. This is actually something that we talked about earlier. I think our second episode and I think it might have been RFK Jr. He might have championed Baby.

[Rashad Bilal]

No, that was Corey Booker.

[Troy Millings]

Yeah, Cory Booker.

[Rashad Bilal]

Yeah, out in Jersey. He announced it. This is. Yeah. 2019. He had this idea. I think he was trying to. Was he trying to run for president at that time?

[Ian Dunlap]

I think so.

[Troy Millings]

I think so, yeah.

[Ian Dunlap]

Well, he was in consideration.

[Rashad Bilal]

Yeah.

[Troy Millings]

So baby bonds, pretty much you give everybody when they're born a thousand dollars. And they said that that's actually one way to kind of help the racial wealth gap because even though everybody gets the same amount of money, it'll help people that traditionally have less. Like a thousand dollars to you is. Is not going to change your life. Right. But a thousand dollars to somebody like in poverty, over the course of time that grows to what? $20,000. That's life. That's life changing. That could be life changing. $20,000 at. And they turn 18. So what is your thoughts on that?

[Ian Dunlap]

I know Andrew gets a lot of controversy. Shout to him and Calico, this is actually Brad Gerstner's idea. But I think it would be a great way to get people to not only have. Because after the financial literacy part, we need financial systems for the people. As things are eroding, the job market is eroding inequalities and those wealth gaps are getting wider. I think it's a great idea. I also think too we should have a hedge fund manager for the people that will allow them to get a higher gains. Because like you said, a thousand dollars into VO may not change your life from 1 to 30. Let's say if you're allowed to liquidate at that time. Going to your point earlier, the point that we have to figure out those who would manage it and when it's time to draw the money, will all of it be there? But I think as an initial step, I always thought it was a mistake for everyone not to have access to the markets and have money invested for them upon graduation of high school or of college. But what do you guys think?

[Rashad Bilal]

I think that that makes. It makes a lot of sense. How do we do it? We. We just came from. It's crazy like when I think about five years ago when we were trying to figure out people are not going to be able to get jobs, there was a stimulus check, right? Every American pretty much if you made a certain amount, you got a stimulus check. Well, that same process, obviously that has to come from somewhere, which if it doesn't, it leads to. To the amount of spending. But if that process was put in for every kid that was born, right? Even if talking about compounded interest over 18 years, substantial amount of money that a. A kid who's born with little to nothing, right. Or below, I guess, poverty lines in terms of, of household income, that changes everything for you. That could be you starting a business. That could lower you going to college and what that's going to cost. It could change decisions for you. Why we haven't done it.

[Ian Dunlap]

That's another conversation.

[Rashad Bilal]

That's another conversation. But when, when it was first introduced, we kind of sat and I remember we were just like, yeah, this sounds like a great idea. It's probably not going to happen. And it didn't happen. But I like it. I like it. Can it be implemented? I'm sure it can. Will it be implemented? Another episode?

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah.

[Troy Millings]

Yeah. I think it's mandatory that they take financial literacy class before they can get money, though, because if that's the case, you're just gonna end up blowing it anyway. So.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah.

[Troy Millings]

Okay. Been real, Rashad.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yep. Nope. Timeout.

[Rashad Bilal]

It's been real.

[Ian Dunlap]

You. I've been cooking. Listen. Broadcast of the year. But no, no, no.

[Troy Millings]

Yeah, for sure.

[Rashad Bilal]

We'll be.

[Troy Millings]

We'll be on the road this week. Want to say where we're going to be.

[Rashad Bilal]

Ladies and gentlemen, the market Monday is hitting the road. We are going to San Jose tomorrow. We have been invited to the Nvidia GTC Conference. Jensen will be giving his keynote. We will be in attendance as VIP attendees. And we also have the privilege of speaking on a panel this week at GTC will be on Thursday. So we'll put the links in bios on Instagram so y'all can check us out and. Yeah, we might. We might go live to report what. What's happening. We said that this is the most important company and definitely the most important CEO or not One of the most important CEOs of this decade and definitely of this year, especially when in terms of AI and so everything Blackwell, everything ultra back. Well and on Thursday, big day is they are labeling it Quantum Day.

[Ian Dunlap]

Quantum Day.

[Rashad Bilal]

Yeah.

[Ian Dunlap]

Figure out something else to go to.

[Rashad Bilal]

We. I know we've been critical and we've had our thoughts about Quantum and Jensen actually expedited that by saying that it's 30 years away. But here we are two months later, he's having a Quantum day. And so I think it's important to understand the companies that'll be there and the CEOs that are going to be on the stage with them. So D Wave, Quantum will be in attendance with the SEO will be there, Regetti will be on with on part of the panel as well, and IONQ their CEO will be there. All eight CEOs that have a major role in the quantum computing and quantum computing sector will be in attendance with Jensen. So I'm sure there will be plenty of announcements and we'll be there bringing it to you first. So shout out to the good folks at Nvidia, my guy Lewis. Shout out to Amman for putting us together. I know he was here on market Mondays and introduced us to the people there. So, yeah, we'll be there, man. We appreciate it and we look forward to it. I'm excited.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah, I am as well. Like you say, keep your head down, avoid the.

[Rashad Bilal]

The.

[Ian Dunlap]

Well, don't pay attention to the noise and keep working.

[Rashad Bilal]

Yep, they watching. They watching this one. You think they. They watching.

[Ian Dunlap]

That's why I told Rashad, hey, that conversation.

[Rashad Bilal]

You watching?

[Ian Dunlap]

No, that's a private conversation.

[Troy Millings]

There you have it, ladies and gentlemen. Go to ianinvest.com 24hours left. Check us out on Blackout on Wednesday, 10:00 Eastern Standard Time. Dr. Bryant. It's gonna be dope conversation about relationships and. Yeah, let's get it.

[Rashad Bilal]

Yeah. Yeah. Shout out to all my Pisces. I know Pisces season is coming to an end. Winter is coming to an end this week. Shout out to all the pipe. I know Jatali had a birthday. Shout out to Black sand, man. Yo, man, this did another marathon. This dude ran the marathon in sweats.

[Ian Dunlap]

Happy birthday to my brother Drew. His birthday is on Philly, 20th. Yeah. Love you.

[Rashad Bilal]

My birthday. Drew, we gotta come check the restaurant out. My brother.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah, that's a fact.

[Rashad Bilal]

That's a fact, man. Be good to each other. Reach out.

[Troy Millings]

We're gonna be in Atlanta this weekend.

[Rashad Bilal]

Oh, yeah.

[Andrew Schultz]

Yeah.

[Rashad Bilal]

Okay.

[Troy Millings]

We gotta meet up. Eyo University. Meet up in Atlanta this weekend. So we'll be in Atlanta. Out to Atlanta.

[Rashad Bilal]

Yeah, Atlanta. We are on the way. Be good. Reach out. One text, one phone call could change the trajectory of somebody's day and definitely somebody's life, man. So be good to each other. We see y'all next week. Blackout. On Wednesday. Make sure y'all tap in. It's gonna be a good one. And love is love.

[Ian Dunlap]

Peace, Peace.

[Dr. Cheyenne Bryant]

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[Ian Dunlap]

This season on Compiler, we're diving deep.

[Rashad Bilal]

Into how AI is reshaping the world world we live in.

[Ian Dunlap]

Join us for a new season of Compiler, an original podcast from Red Hat.

[Rashad Bilal]

Subscribe now wherever you get your podcasts.