MM #264: Trump Calls Peace with Iran: Is Big Tech the New Military?, Will Oil Surge? & Tesla’s Comeback

Summary

Market Mondays Episode #264: Trump Calls Peace with Iran: Is Big Tech the New Military?, Will Oil Surge? & Tesla’s Comeback

Release Date: June 24, 2025

Host/Author: EYL Network

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1. Introduction

In Episode #264 of Market Mondays, hosts Rashad Bilal, Troy Millings, and stock market expert Ian Dunlap delve into a myriad of pressing topics affecting the financial and geopolitical landscape. The episode navigates through the recent military actions involving former President Trump and Iran, examines the evolving role of Big Tech in defense, discusses potential oil price surges, and analyzes Tesla’s remarkable resurgence in the market. Additionally, the hosts explore investment strategies amidst these developments and spotlight inspiring stories from small business entrepreneurs.

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2. Trump’s Military Action and Its Implications

The episode opens with a discussion on the United States' recent military strikes against Iranian sites. Ian Dunlap expresses concern over the spate of Achilles injuries in the sports world, drawing a parallel to unforeseen consequences in military operations.

Notable Quote:

"With the stock market is actually not phased as of yet as predicted." — Ian Dunlap [03:17]

Rashad Bilal highlights the complexity of the situation, noting Trump's declaration of full control over Iranian airspace three days prior to the bombings. This preemptive statement has sparked debates on whether it was a strategic diplomatic maneuver or an impulsive move.

Notable Quote:

"If you were a criminal casing somebody's house, would you put on Twitter that you have full control over their ring system?" — Rashad Bilal [12:46]

The hosts debate the possible motivations behind Trump’s announcement, with Troy Millings suggesting it might have been an attempt to balance diplomatic relations while demonstrating strength to allies like Israel.

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3. Big Tech's Foray into Defense and Its Investment Impact

A significant portion of the discussion centers on the transformation of Big Tech companies into key players in the defense sector. The conversation touches upon companies like Meta, Palantir, and OpenAI, examining their strategic moves and the implications for investors.

Notable Quote:

"Palantir stock is going to skyrocket based off of... potential wars that could potentially happen in the future." — Rashad Bilal [20:12]

Ian Dunlap raises ethical considerations, questioning the morality of investing in companies that contribute to military advancements. The hosts explore the symbiotic relationship between technological innovation and defense, pondering the long-term effects on the market.

Notable Quote:

"Morally investing... do you invest in something because you know there's growth, but you know that destruction could come from it." — Ian Dunlap [23:44]

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4. Potential Surge in Oil Prices Amid Geopolitical Tensions

Rashad Bilal and Troy Millings analyze the potential repercussions of the recent Iran-related military actions on global oil prices. They discuss the strategic importance of shipping routes through the Middle East and the possibility of rerouting shipments if tensions escalate.

Notable Quote:

"Trump had to negotiate a deal... Israel wasn't happy about that." — Rashad Bilal [70:38]

The hosts assess the likelihood of oil prices reaching unprecedented heights, with Troy expressing skepticism about oil surging to $300 a barrel, citing historical data and market safeguards.

Notable Quote:

"The probability of that is very low." — Troy Millings [72:12]

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5. Tesla’s Comeback: Navigating Challenges and Opportunities

Tesla’s resurgence in the market is scrutinized, with discussions focusing on Elon Musk’s strategic pivots and the company’s ventures into autonomous driving and robotics.

Notable Quote:

"The robotaxi has always been on the vision board. This is a game changer in terms of profitability for him." — Ian Dunlap [63:40]

The hosts debate the sustainability of Tesla’s growth, especially amid regulatory challenges and competition from other tech giants venturing into similar technologies.

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6. Investment Strategies in Turbulent Times

Amidst geopolitical uncertainties and market fluctuations, the hosts provide investment insights tailored for both retail and institutional investors. They emphasize the importance of long-term strategies, diversification, and staying informed amidst sector rotations.

Notable Quote:

"If you have exposure to the market every month regardless of what happens, because if not we can be very honest... but these stocks are going to go up, it seems like endlessly." — Troy Millings [34:11]

Ian Dunlap advises against attempting to time the market, advocating for consistent investment and leveraging corrections as entry points.

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7. Cryptocurrency: Current Landscape and Future Prospects

The conversation shifts to the state of cryptocurrencies, with a particular focus on Bitcoin and XRP. The hosts discuss recent market movements, regulatory developments, and the potential for future growth.

Notable Quote:

"Jack Dorsey is the new Bitcoin Jesus. Michael Saylor, the flashy renegade." — Rashad Bilal [35:32]

They also address the polarized opinions within the crypto community, highlighting the passion and volatility that characterize this asset class.

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8. Spotlight on Small Business: Live With Nature

In a heartwarming segment, the hosts welcome Liv McCray of Live With Nature, a small business specializing in organic, vegan-friendly topical products. Liv shares her entrepreneurial journey, the challenges faced during economic downturns, and the pivotal role of Invest Fest in her business growth.

Notable Quote:

"Invest Fest has really, really, really helped me. I have repeat customers... I continue to have orders and... genuinely grateful." — Liv McCray [88:12]

Liv emphasizes the significance of maintaining low overheads, leveraging social media for marketing, and fostering community engagement to sustain and grow her business.

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9. Conclusion and Upcoming Events

The episode concludes with announcements about upcoming events, including the next Invest Fest, blackout sessions, and special guests. The hosts encourage listeners to participate in pitch competitions and support community-driven businesses.

Notable Quote:

"Everyone should enter that pitch competition. If you have a business and if you don't have a tech component to your business, add one." — Rashad Bilal [99:34]

They also highlight the importance of continuous learning, networking, and investing both in the stock market and within the local community to build generational wealth.

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Key Takeaways

• Geopolitical Actions Influence Markets: Trump's military action against Iran has complex implications for global markets, particularly oil prices and defense sector stocks.

• Big Tech’s Defense Integration: Companies like Meta, Palantir, and OpenAI are increasingly involved in defense, presenting both investment opportunities and ethical dilemmas.

• Oil Price Stability: Despite tensions, a surge to extreme levels like $300/barrel remains unlikely due to historical trends and market safeguards.

• Tesla’s Strategic Moves: Tesla’s investments in autonomous driving and robotics signal potential for long-term profitability despite short-term challenges.

• Investment Best Practices: Emphasize long-term strategies, diversification, and consistent market exposure over market timing.

• Cryptocurrency Dynamics: Bitcoin and XRP continue to dominate discussions, with their future growth tied to regulatory developments and market sentiment.

• Support for Small Businesses: Platforms like Invest Fest play a crucial role in empowering small entrepreneurs, highlighting the importance of community support in business success.

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Stay Connected:

• Invest Fest: Upcoming event with opportunities to win trips and engage with top entrepreneurs. Visit investfest.com for more details.

• Live With Nature:

  • Website: www.livewithnature.com
  • Instagram: @livewithnature

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Transcript

[Rashad Bilal]

The world needs ingenuity. Ingenuity needs accelerators.

[Troy Millings]

That's where you come in.

[Rashad Bilal]

Be the tipping point from impossible to impact. At mit, Sloan School of Management. What is daddication?

[Troy Millings]

The thing that drives me every day as a dad is Darion, and we call him Day Date for short. Every day he's hungry for something, whether it's attention, affection, knowledge. And there's this huge responsibility in making sure that when he's no longer under my wing that he's a good person.

[Ian Dunlap]

I want him to be able to.

[Troy Millings]

Sit back one day and go, we worked together. We did a good job.

[Rashad Bilal]

That's dedication. Find out [e-mail] brought to you by the U.S. department of Health and Human Services and the Ad Council here.

[Troy Millings]

Yeah, we are live.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah, man.

[Rashad Bilal]

Back at it.

[Ian Dunlap]

Happy Monday.

[Rashad Bilal]

Yes, sir.

[Ian Dunlap]

Love is love. How's everybody doing? Shout out to everybody in Oklahoma City. Prayers up to Tyrese Halliburton. You hate to see that happen. Achilles is not anything that we play with. So speedy recovery to him and everybody around him.

[Troy Millings]

Why are there so many Achilles injuries?

[Ian Dunlap]

That's something that they're looking into, man.

[Rashad Bilal]

Cameron was talking about that.

[Ian Dunlap]

J.J. reddick had an interesting take a couple years ago about the wear and tear of today's athlete. And I think this year they had eight Achilles tears. This season, the Pacers had three players. Achilles, obviously. We saw Jason Tatum in the playoffs. Damian Lillard. Toy is in Tyrese last night. So that's horrible. It's tough, man. It's tough to watch. And then everybody remembers, you know, Kevin Durant in the finals when he's on Golden State, the cap string and he.

[Rashad Bilal]

He tore it. Kobe started the low. The low top. But when I was playing, when I was playing, boy, you wouldn't think about win.

[Troy Millings]

Never in life.

[Rashad Bilal]

That was.

[Ian Dunlap]

You think it's a tribute to the shoe. I mean, everything plays a part, right?

[Rashad Bilal]

Think about, like I said, I mean, we've never thought of. I mean, I would think more for sprained ankles. That's why I was always scared to wait to wear low tops because I'm like, yo, like I rolled my ankle like too much to be wearing low tops. So. Yeah, but it wasn't even a thought. That wasn't even a thought. It was only high top. Then they came out with mids and that was. That became a thing. And then Kobe started wearing low top sneakers and.

[Ian Dunlap]

Oh, no, that's the stand. I mean, Aaron Rodgers saw his as well, right? And that was just activity, maybe the way that the turf doesn't give that might pay a factor, but it's definitely something that. And then we lost the dude who created Sports Science. That would have been a perfect timing to try to understand what's happening. Rest in peace to him.

[Troy Millings]

Rest in peace to him.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah. But yeah, congrats to them, though. And shout out to the city of Houston. Ian, however you look at it, Rockets called me. Tickets will be on sale shortly, I'm sure.

[Troy Millings]

Yes.

[Rashad Bilal]

Shout out to Katie. All right, man. We got a lot to talk about, a lot to cover. Of course, we're going to talk about the latest happenings over the weekend with Iran and how that potentially impact the market going forward. Price of oil, different things in that nature. But before we start, big week for Eyo this Wednesday, blackout. We got two special guests. Same time. I got my boy Punch. We got my boy Ray Daniels coming on.

[Troy Millings]

Both of my guys. Yeah. Controversial comments.

[Rashad Bilal]

And we're going to talk. We're going to have a hip hop conversation.

[Ian Dunlap]

Punch on fire right now.

[Rashad Bilal]

There's a lot of. It's a lot of. It's a lot going on right now. First and foremost, salute to my brother Jim Jones.

[Troy Millings]

Yeah, Jimmy.

[Rashad Bilal]

But we gonna talk about it.

[Troy Millings]

Jomo.

[Ian Dunlap]

Salute to our brother Nas.

[Rashad Bilal]

We're gonna talk about it. It's getting out of hand.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah.

[Troy Millings]

Great rollout, though.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah.

[Rashad Bilal]

It's getting out of here.

[Ian Dunlap]

I saw Shannon was talking to him. That was a little. That's pretty aggressive, huh?

[Rashad Bilal]

Shay shay. Six, eight. Like six, six.

[Ian Dunlap]

Said the workout challenge.

[Rashad Bilal]

50. Like, you know, it's one of these things. Like, you see Shay Shay, we had Shishay at Invest Fest last year. Like, he looked like he could play right now. He could get drafted. He could sign up. He could at least the Jets. He could make the jets roster for sure.

[Ian Dunlap]

He can't make. He can't play.

[Rashad Bilal]

Right.

[Ian Dunlap]

At least.

[Rashad Bilal]

You could at least make.

[Ian Dunlap]

You saw him in the ring with Patriots.

[Troy Millings]

At least somebody.

[Ian Dunlap]

He's tied in two minutes.

[Rashad Bilal]

The Browns. One of these teams. One of these teams. Special packages.

[Ian Dunlap]

He could pause.

[Rashad Bilal]

Special packages. That's. That's actually a tournament. Football. That's a term. You don't know that.

[Ian Dunlap]

It's not called special teams. They already have special special teams.

[Rashad Bilal]

No, special teams is a whole different thing. That's a whole different part of the. Of.

[Ian Dunlap]

I know.

[Rashad Bilal]

What are you talking about? So when they bring a quarterback in for. For one. For one play. That's got nothing to do with special team. That's a special package that they're running. It is a special package. Not nothing to do with special teams. Special teams is kickoff, kick return and hunting pto.

[Ian Dunlap]

We don't know. We don't know.

[Rashad Bilal]

Special package. That's a special package is part of a football term. It has nothing to do with special teams. They're two different things. Okay, but check it out. 10:00 Eastern Standard Time. And then Thursday at 6:00 we got a legend or earn your leisure. Kirk Franklin.

[Ian Dunlap]

Praise him.

[Troy Millings]

What?

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah.

[Troy Millings]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah, man. Yeah.

[Rashad Bilal]

And his business partner.

[Ian Dunlap]

Shout out to Norm.

[Rashad Bilal]

It's yeah. Salute to Norm. So they, they gotta, they gotta run too. Yeah.

[Ian Dunlap]

So they, they're on the cusp of something very special in terms of business a lot of times and even we. I felt like it was an educational experience for us that during that interview, just learning. Because when we think music business, we kind of leave gospel out of it. And you don't think about it in, in terms of how they structure business deals or how they're being taken or taken advantage of or how they're being characterized. But they are on to something very revolutionary. So it was. It's one of them.

[Troy Millings]

They've carved out a, an amazing niche. So please tune in to watch that.

[Ian Dunlap]

Signia Assets.

[Rashad Bilal]

So six o' clock and then the last thing I'll say. We'll talk about investments a little later. But I got to give a big shout out to Jalen Brown.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yep.

[Rashad Bilal]

300 million dollar contract a few years ago. Revolutionary independent shoe deal turned down Nike.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah.

[Rashad Bilal]

Got snubbed from the Olympic team. NBA champion, NBA Finals mvp, icon, Atlanta legend will be in the building. He will be at Invest Fest for the pitch competition. He's added to the pitch competition. Guys, you need to sign up for this pitch competition. We got two chains. We got Jaylen Brown, we got Paul Judge.

[Troy Millings]

I met just show with a suitcase of money.

[Rashad Bilal]

It's gonna be a lot.

[Ian Dunlap]

I, I was just telling him we just got a. I just got a phone call from an exec at a major company that was like, yo, what's up with this pitch competition? How can I bring capital to it?

[Rashad Bilal]

Right?

[Ian Dunlap]

Are, are there any ways I can infuse capital into this? Because yeah, the grand prize winner gets the money. But like there's plenty of other businesses like I saw last year. I was just so. He said, I was just so inspired by seeing all those people in the hallway with their dreams on the line and willing to go for it. I want to bring a check. So make sure, yeah, y' all show up. Make sure y' all enter, but be on the lookout. Because people are watching you at every step of this process.

[Rashad Bilal]

So, yeah, all you got to do is have an Invest Fest ticket and then just go and sign. You got till June 30. Go to the website, click the link and apply any tech company, any company that has tech inside of it, any stage. It could be from startup. Just the idea. That's what Paul said. You could have just the idea. I highly suggest every entrepreneur. And like he said, there's opportunities that other people might get money as well. Not. They might not. There might be more than just one winner or there might be potentially more money than that. Because like I said, Taylor Brown obviously has a lot of money. Obviously two chains has a lot of money. So like Ian Dunlap has a lot of money.

[Ian Dunlap]

And don't forget Paul, Paul said, yeah, yeah, $125,000 check. But that don't mean that we don't bring a couple of those $125,000.

[Rashad Bilal]

No, I'm saying. But like, say, like, they might want to put more money in.

[Ian Dunlap]

True.

[Troy Millings]

So I mean, I will be in the building ab.

[Rashad Bilal]

So you never know. And the last thing. No magic. Shout out to. No magic with a K at the end. This is the Invest Fest hat. They just sent me the sample they made. They made the merge for Dipset. Actually, they made the Diplomat hat. So shout out to him. Stay tuned. Exclusive merch drop. But shout out to. They reached out and DM said they would like to collab and say, yo, Energy.

[Troy Millings]

I love it, brother.

[Rashad Bilal]

No, you gotta, you gotta. You gotta be thankful at all times, man.

[Troy Millings]

Absolutely.

[Rashad Bilal]

Ian, any announcements?

[Troy Millings]

Nope. Mid roll. Let's have an amazing show.

[Rashad Bilal]

Troy.

[Troy Millings]

Yeah, man.

[Ian Dunlap]

First and foremost, I want to wish my daughter a happy birthday this week. Friday will be her birthday.

[Rashad Bilal]

Happy birthday.

[Ian Dunlap]

Daddy loves you. 14.

[Rashad Bilal]

Happy birthday.

[Ian Dunlap]

That was quick. That was quick. And shout out to everybody that's celebrating their birthday.

[Troy Millings]

14.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah, man.

[Troy Millings]

Wow.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah, yeah, I know.

[Troy Millings]

Time is flying.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah. Really quick. Really quick. You know how this works, man. Yeah, yeah. Y' all do your own research, but continue to share the research. Right? Our content is intended to be used and must be used for informational purposes only. It's very important to do your own analysis before making any investment based on your own personal circumstances. You should take independent financial advice from professional connection with or independently research and verify any information that you find in our show and wish to rely upon whether for the purpose of making an investment decision or otherwise continue to do research. Share the research. When it's great. Give credit to the people you found it from. Let's share the knowledge to share the wealth. Let's build community. Big shout out. We got to give a shout out to everybody that was participating in EYLU this weekend. There's a couple Juneteenth things happening. So shout out to the South Florida regional group. They had a Juneteenth celebration. New York City. New York City. We got something to announce today they held a dip, a deep dive into crypto with Austin. Shout out to Austin.

[Troy Millings]

That's fire.

[Ian Dunlap]

If you've been in the chat, you've been seeing what he's been posting and we'll get into some of the bills that were passed last week that are going to change the way crypto looks. Dmv, Houston, the Carolina, Chicago, Detroit, Ohio held their first meetup. So shout out to everybody. Eylu. Let's build community. This is what it talks about in all rose D2 Atlanta, Georgia August 22nd invest fest weekend. So make sure y' all pull up.

[Rashad Bilal]

Okay, so let's talk about Iran. Obviously if you're not under Iraq, you know that military action was taken from the United States over the weekend. They bombed three sites and Trump put it on Truth Social and it was crazy because Van Jones actually, I mean Van Langton. Yeah, yeah, called it was on a blackout last year. That's why you should always watch blackout. And he actually predicted it perfectly. He said either Friday or Saturday, it happened on Saturday. He said that there was some military, Iranian military bases that actually was enriching nuclear enhancements that couldn't be touched by Israel because they didn't have the technology to blow up the mountains. So he kind of laid it all out. The 30, 30000 pound bomb that needed to be dropped and only America had that. So the beat. Yeah B2 Flyers said that that was done. Okay, now this is interesting. We're going to talk about how this affected the stock market because the stock market is actually not phased as of yet as predicted. But there's a lot of different thoughts on this from a standpoint of Trump. You know he's, he announced three days prior to that that we now totally have full control over the Iranian airspace. So some and Iran came out with a statement saying that they moved all of the nuclear stuff out of the the bases.

[Troy Millings]

Absolutely.

[Rashad Bilal]

So now you got two One, America is going with the narrative that they completely destroyed Iranian, the Iranians nuclear facilities and it's over. Iran is saying that they moved everything. Now what's interesting is that he said that we have full control over the Iranian skies three days before he actually bombed. Okay, now if you were, if you were a criminal, let's just say, right, and you were casing somebody's house and you was about to rob their house, would you put on Twitter that you have full control over their ring system?

[Troy Millings]

Probably not.

[Rashad Bilal]

Because if you did do that, like if you knew you're in danger, right, what do you do? You move, you move your valuables out of your house. Right? So some people have, there's some conspiracies that maybe this was a back channel diplomacy with Iran to kind of give them the heads up so it's forward facing that. Okay, okay, we looked, we did this, we know Israel, you got what you want, but we're still in diplomatic talks with Iran and this is kind of their way out. And some people just saying like, no, Trump is just, wow, he just announced it because he's just impulsive and, and then three days later just, just dropped the bomb. But it's interesting that he would say that because I don't think that that would make a lot of sense to declare something like that and then strike three days later because it would, it is essentially giving them the heads up that you're going to do something if you got folk full control of their, of their skies. So before we go into the, the, the, the stock part of it, what, what do we make of this?

[Troy Millings]

I think if I was trying to please my allies and then in turn not cause a World War III scenario, maybe I'll give you a little heads up to move some, some of the assets that you have. Because we're not prepared to go to World War iii. I don't think we have to be conspiratorial around this. I think we know if he wants to go into attack, he will fully. I think this is one of the cases where he had to do what he had to do to please Israel and at the same time show a strong front. But I don't think given this term and all the turmoil that's happening in the country and everything that's happening with bricks that he wants to have this will work nighted with Iran. But what do you think? I think I just know if I was going to go bomb an enemy at the location, I wouldn't text their cousin. Three days before. Hey, I'm on the way to 223 Main Street.

[Rashad Bilal]

We got, we got the drop on you.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah, it's interesting. Even like post the actual bombs being dropped, it was, all right, now is the time for peace. It's like, how do you decide that now you've bombed a side and they're like, we're not at war. We just want to get rid of the nuclear threat. And the, the fact that you're saying, all right, hey, let's talk about peace now after you've now destroyed obviously or allegedly destroyed. Talk about, yeah, let's figure this, let's talk about it now.

[Rashad Bilal]

I mean, that's street rules though. That's like you knock somebody out because you don't want to kill them and then just say like, yo, I did that out of love. It could have been worse. I didn't want to shoot you. I didn't want to stab you. I'm gonna put you down, hold your hands, I'm gonna hold your hands. I'm restrain you and let's like, let's talk it out. Let's, let's figure it out.

[Ian Dunlap]

Now there's Debo rules.

[Troy Millings]

And after Van said that on blackout too, I got three or four text from some people in the military who may have alluded to this won't be our last time in Iran. And this wasn't the final strike. So like if Van knew last Wednesday, right.

[Ian Dunlap]

The all signs pointed to it that there is no turning back from a retaliatory standpoint. Now what right do. Obviously Iran has now continued to file fire missiles at Israel. Now what, what do we walk ourselves into?

[Rashad Bilal]

A sleeper cell attack? And this is why they have high alerts on New York City and, and you know, major New York cities. But I mean this is, this is technically how terrorism starts, right? So this actually comes from Art of War. If you read the book, Guerrilla warfare is pretty much terrorism, right? When you're fighting an opponent that you can't actually beat with army, then you, you have to resort to other tactics. So you know, you, you do things like blow up a train station, right? Like that's, so that's, that's the alert. That's why they, so if you're wondering why like, okay, New York City is at, at high alert right now, because they're saying, okay, even, even if it doesn't come directly from the government of Iran, it could be somebody that sympathizes with them, right? Like, but you, you, you can't, there's nothing that they can do to fight Israel or fight America, but they can do other things to kind of disrupt day to day life, which makes things uncomfortable for civilians, which push pressure on the government. Even like, we'll talk about the, the seas shutting down. Sea. Sea roots hijacking. Ships. These are things that it's just like it's annoyance but you do enough of it that that causes a major disruption. Right. It's not like you're not going to be able to you know, have a full fledged military attack but you do pop up type attacks. That's what that, that's, that's what comes next potentially because that's the only way, that's the only way to actually respond. Like hack, you know, computer hacks and different things of that nature.

[Ian Dunlap]

Those are the signs in Netflix did a documentary on, on the history of bin Laden and Taliban. Literally like what you just laid out is exactly what happened until it was obviously we saw what happened in 9 11. It was attacks on embassies, it was taxed on the water. Right. U.S. naval ships being attacked. Right. And until a major event happened and you think about it from the standpoint of the US government how does that look internally? Right. Because this is a different age when we couldn't see everything that was happening obviously with social media. You talked about sympathizing and empathizing with people of Iran. A lot of people here looking at like why did this happen? What did we get ourselves into? The Vice President he was even on record saying like I didn't know this was about to happen. Right. AOC is calling for impeachment. What do you think it stands from the internal view of what's happening in this I guess quote unquote early conflict.

[Rashad Bilal]

I mean they knew, they knew. There's no way that that J.D. vance doesn't know what's going to happen.

[Troy Millings]

Which brings me to my point. Where is the checks and balances on the defense tech regime? On June 13 four senior executives and Palantir Meta Open AI have been appointed as lieutenant colonels in the U S Army after the creation of a special unit. So if Peter Till back JD Vance owns Palantir Zuckerberg breaks his war with Palmer Anderil now met us in the defense tech business. It seems like a lot of the tech bros bro billionaires have pushed him into wars and even going back to the Saudi meeting the it was interesting seeing who was there and who was not there. Where is the checks and balances on who is advising him to go into these wars and if there is being done solely for profit.

[Rashad Bilal]

And talk about. Okay so meta you said meta you said open AI Open AI Palantir and there's one more company, right? Is it or just those three?

[Troy Millings]

It's one more. Let me find the last one. Let me see. I Can't find the last one, but let's focus on those three right now.

[Rashad Bilal]

All right, so Meta Palantir and open AI companies that we've talked about a lot. So if you want to tie it in from an investing standpoint, open AI obviously isn't a public traded company yet. But if you, yet, if you look at paler, I mean, people have already said that Palantir stock is going to skyrocket based off of, you know, not just this war, but a series of potential wars that could potentially happen in the future. Meta Somebody, you know, Mark Zuckerberg, obviously he's, he's been, he's been so dedicated to, to, to the presidency that he actually was considering buying a home in D.C. to moving to move to D.C. good investment to be closer to, to Trump and his administration. And then you look at their, their stock and it's up and it's, and it's, and it's, has gone up. Right. So yeah. Is it a coincidence?

[Troy Millings]

No. And I don't think most of Silicon Valley rushing into defense tech when that was looked at as an antiquated business perception wise in Silicon Valley. I just think it's ironic to see the push into some of these wars given the investment that they have into defense tech now. Meanwhile, Raytheon is not moving how it normally would or Lockheed Martin isn't moving. We are having like a change of the guard amongst defense tech. But I wonder at what cost and.

[Rashad Bilal]

And even, you know, Andrell, you talked about them before 60 Minutes does a expose on the CEO and it's like you said, they're pushing defense tech like it's electric cars.

[Troy Millings]

Yes. They got a different sector.

[Rashad Bilal]

They got these. The CEOs have become celebrities.

[Troy Millings]

Yeah.

[Rashad Bilal]

Whether you're talking about Andrea, whether you're talking About Palantir, the CEOs of Defense Tech companies have become celebrities. And before this was a, this defense period was a underworld. Like arms dealers, they made movies about arms dealers and like Nicholas Cage and stuff like that. Like they would, that you didn't even want to know you, those people didn't even want you to know who they were and you didn't know who they were. Now it's like they're friends talking to town like, and it's like they acting like this is like the new toys that people are playing with as far as drones that can destroy a whole entire city. That says a lot about the times that we're in as far as investment opportunities, but it also says a lot about the times that we're in as far as how war has become so mainstream that it has no problem being traded publicly and celebrated publicly as well.

[Ian Dunlap]

I mean, tech has always been the thing. When people talk about growth and value, they find that intact. And so if AI was a story and people have led the head headlines with that, well, what's the next sector inside of a. And it, it. I mean, we've seen what happens with Palantir. Ian, I'll, I'll add to what you said because Raytheon traditionally is not a stock, but if you look at the history of the company over the past three years, RTX is a company that spawned from that. So if you look at RTX's chart in terms of what's happened with conflict, I mean, it's out of this world. Right. And so you have to throw that inside there. When you talk about, I know Andrew was one of the companies you talked about, obviously not publicly traded. It looks all signs of pointing and that's where it's headed. And we've seen some of the successful IPOs that happened this year. That market is starting to open up.

[Troy Millings]

Yeah, starting to heat up.

[Ian Dunlap]

You're starting to heat up again. You've seen with Zuckerberg. You know where this is headed. I, I thought what Van said on, on, on Wednesday about Palantir was just like super powerful. Like this is the most dangerous company in the world. And so now from an investing standpoint, especially from a retail standpoint, we always talk about morally investing. If you know these things, you know that, do you invest in something because you know there's growth, but you know that destruction could come from it. It's, it's one of these dilemmas that you, we all have to face at some point. I feel like, yeah, it's.

[Troy Millings]

And even some people have been like, well, why do you like Anderil but not Palantir? I just said I personally would not invest in Palantir. Like I. As as far as the Silicon Valley space, I think Peter Thiel, that book Zero to One changed my life. I just personally would not invest into it. But I like Anderil because of the war that he went through with Meta. It's the classic revenge story. For those of you who don't know, the Oculus design, which Apple then copied came from Palmer and they tried to bury him.

[Rashad Bilal]

And the great, the great thing about that is that allegedly what he says is that he got fired from Meta because he was supporting Donald Trump. That's interesting because he's obviously a pro Trump supporter. He was very, he was very vocal about his support for Trump years ago and at that time I guess it wasn't fashionable to support Donald Trump so in Silicon Valley. So he was fired. That's what he says. Meta. Meta said that he was fired for other reasons. But now Mark Zuckerberg is one of the biggest supporters of Donald Trump allegedly.

[Troy Millings]

Financially, but not morally. I won't speak for Zuck though but.

[Rashad Bilal]

I mean as far as forward facing, right, he's. He donated a million dollars to his to.

[Troy Millings]

He's gotta kiss the ring and I get the contracts. That's the part of the game that we're in. Halfway through the decade, you gotta kiss the ring. So it isn't doing it and they're paying the cost.

[Rashad Bilal]

What would be who. What's the war index? If we could. So Ander Rail public and not a great question. Public and non public.

[Troy Millings]

Palantir and a real open AI which Microsoft.

[Rashad Bilal]

You gotta say open AI is Microsoft.

[Troy Millings]

But they're starting to have their issues and yeah, they're trying to break away but yeah, throw Microsoft in there and Meta. Who would think that like your love for Instagram, DMing would turn into a war product? That's why it keeps. Data is the new oil.

[Rashad Bilal]

How did Medic get involved in the war industry?

[Troy Millings]

Because they cross Palmer and Anderil and you see that he's about to come an icon. Much easier before you become publicly traded to say hey buddy, shouldn't have fired you. Let's be friends. And in the friendship and the reconciliation, okay, well let's find a way to make some money together.

[Rashad Bilal]

And they have the data.

[Ian Dunlap]

I was gonna say that. That's it.

[Rashad Bilal]

And. And they control the algorithm because volunteers.

[Troy Millings]

On fire and their data is phenomenal. And their data sets and how they've stacked that AI Meta may be the only place that you can go to to get psychographic and demographic profiling the way that you can at Palantir.

[Rashad Bilal]

Never forget that propaganda is just as important as military arsenal is first in war. And study, any study, any general that was extremely successful, whether they, whether they were successful for good reasons or bad reasons, they used and they understood propaganda. They wasn't just military fighting, blowing up stuff. Every successful general or head of state that was a military man understood the need for propaganda.

[Troy Millings]

Yeah, we can't leave our Raytheon out of the index. That was a great question.

[Ian Dunlap]

I, I think RTX is, is adding it. It's up 25 this year. In, in these times of conflict, you'll see those things rise. I think you nailed it in terms of meta, how do they become. They have 3.4 billion users across all platforms. That's nearly half the planet. So if you need the data for the world, it's at their disposal. Right. And people.

[Rashad Bilal]

Yeah.

[Ian Dunlap]

Their audience is, is still. Was it 100 million users a month? Like you're still growing and you still.

[Troy Millings]

Have average time of like 34 minutes a day. That's why you need them platforms. That's.

[Rashad Bilal]

Yeah a lot. It's a lot going on. Ladies and gentlemen, hit the like button and share high level conversation. Shout out to 19 keys. He got a dope episode with Tabitha Brown.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah.

[Rashad Bilal]

They'll both be at Invest Fest. Speaking of Invest Festival, I know you guys are waiting to see the winner of the raffle. We added an extra week because we got a call from the bros in Ghana. They're gonna throw something in as well. So that free trip to Ghana is still running. We got another week added so.

[Troy Millings]

Oh.

[Rashad Bilal]

If you're interested, you got seven more days. We'll announce it next Monday we'll announce the winner. So anybody that buys a ticket for the next seven days you're entered to win, you get the mg, the mortgage guys course you get opportunity to get VIP tickets upgraded so. But yeah, there'll be a lucky winner of that that will get all expense paid trip to Ghana. The good thing about this is that when we announce these things other people want to add in. Chime in.

[Troy Millings]

I gotta get a list together as soon as my ear get better, boy.

[Rashad Bilal]

So, so you got seven more days ladies and gentlemen to get your tickets to Invest Fest ticket to enter that raffle for that free trip to Ghana. And that's any, anybody that buys a general admission ticket. Okay, so switching topics before we switch.

[Troy Millings]

What do you think is going to be the end resolution of this conflict with Iran?

[Rashad Bilal]

Man? I mean you, you saw Yemen saying that they, they, they have officially entered the war and that they, they said don't put up, don't put your ships in our water. You've been warned.

[Troy Millings]

So that's a strong statement.

[Ian Dunlap]

The waterways. Yeah, you, you starting to hear the, the straight Hamas come up in conversations. We got to close that down. Help us out.

[Rashad Bilal]

It's very interesting situation. I mean, you know, I guess what Israel definitely would want and now they say in America because at first America said that they wasn't going to push this line. But some of the stuff that Trump is saying recently is a regime change and I think that that's something that you really got to be careful with because as I said on blackout, this is how this whole situation started 40 years ago.

[Troy Millings]

Yeah.

[Rashad Bilal]

When, when they implemented the show of Iran, who was western back leadership and the country hated them and they had a revolt. And then the, the Islamic regime that we have right now in Iran, the state, the, the, the cleric regime that runs the country, that was a result of. So you got to be careful when you just try to take out regimes because it, it actually could be potentially worse for you. So I think that that's, that's what they want to happen.

[Troy Millings]

Destabilization.

[Rashad Bilal]

Destabilization. And a, a new, a total, a total regime change that's way more moderate, that is friendly with United States, friendly with Europe and friendly with Israel. That's what they want to happen. That's what you see happens. I mean, if you look at the countries in the Middle east that have good relationships with America, that's what they, that's what they are. Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Egypt. Right. Like this is why even Syria, like the new regime in Syria is a friendly regime to America. It's interesting. The president, he was on the ICE terrorist list three years ago.

[Troy Millings]

That's fascinating.

[Rashad Bilal]

Now he's speaking in front of the United nations in September.

[Troy Millings]

Will it be an invest fest?

[Rashad Bilal]

Oh, no, you never know. Potentially, Potentially.

[Ian Dunlap]

Waiting for the coded email.

[Rashad Bilal]

So, so where do I think this thing ends? I think that China will come into play.

[Troy Millings]

Absolutely.

[Rashad Bilal]

And I think to a lesser degree, Russia. I think that they will be able to calm things down. I think Israel will continue to try to get a regime change, but I don't know if that's actually realistic. And I think that they will definitely delay the nuclear program and have, you know, that kind of stomped out, at least for the next four years, as long as Trump is in office. And there will not, I don't think that they will, that there will be a full fledged war because I don't think that that's beneficial. I know Americans don't want that to happen. So I don't think that Trump, I think Trump's thing was like, okay, let's just bomb it. Let's show a good face to Israel. And then let's just say, okay, now we can just get on with our life. And you know, let's, let's not take this too, let's not take this too far.

[Troy Millings]

Too far.

[Ian Dunlap]

That, that's been the messaging that's been going out for the past two days now. It's like, we're not at war with Iran, we're at war with their nuclear program. We're at war with their nuclear program.

[Troy Millings]

Smart, smart message.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah. The messaging is continuous to be that from the White House and J.D. vance to that as well. Today it's not a war against Iran and now that the nuclear program has dismantled pretty much we said we can get back to business. We can figure out how to create.

[Rashad Bilal]

Peace or has it been dismantled According.

[Ian Dunlap]

To them there's been videos that is coming out of Iran as like it has been dismantled. In fact you've started a war and we're going to end the war. Like that was literally the clips that have been going I'm sure people have seen on social media. We'll see.

[Troy Millings]

Awesome prayers man. Crazy.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah man.

[Troy Millings]

Yeah.

[Rashad Bilal]

Okay. Okay.

[Ian Dunlap]

And the market opens positive.

[Troy Millings]

They front ran the investment and told you what was going to happen in Saudi Arabia.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah that's.

[Troy Millings]

Yeah.

[Ian Dunlap]

Oh man.

[Rashad Bilal]

Yeah.

[Troy Millings]

That's the great thing about the market though. Regardless of war, feast, famine, regime changes, presidential changes like the market is literally rigged to stay up through engineering and how they align those indexes. So for everyone watching long term I wouldn't change my portfolio structure. If you want to add Palantir, fine. If you're already in Meta I would probably add more. I never thought I'd see the day when Meta would have a lieutenant colonel in the U.S. army. Talk about a moat. It's a hell of a one to have too so. But I wouldn't change my portfolio too much.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah. And it's. I'm say this because you didn't at these levels. Right. Like look at the levels that Palantir is at. If you're going to invest in investing long term but make sure you get it at a price. It's running at a. Yeah. I mean pass all time. I feel like every week is a new all time. Huh. Just be mindful of that please.

[Rashad Bilal]

Bitcoin Maxis your leader will be adding best festival Jack Dorsey second leader Michael.

[Troy Millings]

Saylor the first one. That's the new Bitcoin Jesus. Michael Saylor we need you please pull up.

[Rashad Bilal]

Bitcoin Jesus coin. Jesus.

[Troy Millings]

I feel so bad for Kathy Arc started to make a little run but that's really honestly the bitcoin exposure or institutional play was Jack's idea though in square.

[Rashad Bilal]

Yeah yeah. Jack is the hey yes. Michael Saylor is the flashy like kind of renegade.

[Troy Millings]

Yeah.

[Rashad Bilal]

Jack is the more the institutional standard.

[Troy Millings]

Absolutely been that way.

[Rashad Bilal]

Yeah yeah.

[Ian Dunlap]

But we'll ask him shout out to Kathy Wilson we'll Axel former former Invest Fest for sure attendee your.

[Rashad Bilal]

Panelists oh XRP army for sure.

[Troy Millings]

What XRP do to you.

[Rashad Bilal]

One day. One day.

[Troy Millings]

It's not a conversation now. Go ahead.

[Rashad Bilal]

Well, you know the XRP enthusiasts, they're very passionate and you know, they for some reason decided to just, you know, go crazy on me a few months ago.

[Troy Millings]

Because you antagonize them every month.

[Rashad Bilal]

That's why XRP is under $2 right now. All I'm saying is that when. Okay. The court case is going. Okay. The CEO. Okay, Trump's in. Okay, bro. When. When are we going to have XRP reached? $10,000?

[Troy Millings]

Oh no. But I, I can see 10.

[Ian Dunlap]

10 years.

[Troy Millings]

Yeah.

[Ian Dunlap]

Even that is like still far fresh at this one.

[Rashad Bilal]

When, when is it gonna happen? That's all I'm saying.

[Troy Millings]

Well, the same way XRP got derailed is similar to how Jack Dorsey and Square got derailed. Hopefully he'll tell the story at Invest Fest. But there was some collusion by some banks to thor the greatness of Square.

[Ian Dunlap]

And maybe some financial tech companies as well. Not just the banks.

[Troy Millings]

Yep. So. But Rashad, I hear you. Can't everyone that love assets just all get along? I'm feeling more like emotional because my ear is hurting, you know. But Bitcoin, XRP Vanguard. Can everybody just get along and love each other before we go to war? No. Okay.

[Rashad Bilal]

Okay. XRP Army. All right. Okay. Well, we'll revisit this conversation. Can we talk about credit cards? Can you give an update on what you think about the performance of all credit card companies?

[Troy Millings]

Visa, American Express, I think they all recalibrate into the levels they should be. Yeah, I think Visa coming down to 316.91. I want to re enter.

[Ian Dunlap]

What's the catalyst that drives them down.

[Troy Millings]

Sector rotation into Bitcoin. The other war that's being fought is traditional and Visa does have exposure to crypto, but I think a lot of premium that were in the credit card space is being eaten up by exposure to bitcoin. Defense tech or. Or tech. My stance on Visa has not changed. I just think when they hit that high, I mean you have to look they went from 256 to 357 in less than a year. Yeah, like so for put this in chat GPT perplexity. What is the average range that a stock should run up in a year before it enters a place where it automatically has to retrace back to its me? Like once you see something go up 60 or in tech120 like we saw in Covid or 2021, you're automatically going to retrace I like when stocks are steady and they're hitting 20 or 30 growth year over year. But once you get into that 40 to 80 range, you're going to eventually have a pullback. But I, I still love Visa. I love American Express. There's been some consolidation there. Of course. Discover and Capital One merge. Discover is doing well. They'll probably retrace here soon, but I will still hold them long term.

[Ian Dunlap]

Okay, I'm with you. Interesting that you, you gave that, that Visa breakdown. Just full disclosure. Invested in Visa have option closing. Visa been part of that run. The stability there obviously is incredible. When you, when you travel, you understand the importance of Visa in terms of payment processing. You'll see that everywhere. Some of these companies you will not see everywhere. American Express is not accepted everywhere. You know, I love American Express. Both American Express and MasterCard kind of been flat for the year, year to date. I think 1% that they're both sitting on about that much, which is with Visa is their, I guess, kind of their merger or their dive into the crypto space. They were a bit ahead of the curve. Other, other payment card processing companies, they were kind of the first to try to figure out how to work with Circle. We Circle saw Circle as a stable coin IPO last week, but I tied their recent pullback Visa, I'm speaking of, into what's happened with this genius act, right when stable coins are now being discussed from the federal government standpoint, when you had a lead in that space and now there's regulation to make that more of a open market and you see Amazon and you hear about Walmart trying to figure out how to actively explore a stablecoin payment system that's naturally going to start to cave into some of the business that Visa was doing. So I still like the long term. But that pullback. That's why I asked you what's. What are you seeing from a standpoint of why the recent pullback, having that open market now for payment process from big. I mean, E Commerce leaders having more than just the option of Visa will, will it will. It will affect them short term, but long term, I love Visa. I think it'll be the leader in the space for sure.

[Troy Millings]

And one of the greatest things that's not talked about in business is investing in your competition. Zuckerberg did a great job of patching up the issue that he had with Palmer. I, I don't know what position they have, but I think for the stripes they should have invested in because Visa's market share has went from 50% in 2021 down to 41.7 this year. And like you said, they just have a lot more competition that is popping up. Do I think it would be the erosion of their business? No. But anytime I start to see any market share or market sentiment adjustments to the negative, I automatically get terrified. So.

[Rashad Bilal]

Yeah, okay, okay, let's talk about this. You know, it's the consumer sentiment these days is extremely low. A lot of people are already feeling economic pressure, pullback, the recession, whatever you want to call it. We see it in, in everything, even rumors that, you know, Beyonce's tickets was reselling for lower prices. Right. The Beyonce is an indicator of the.

[Troy Millings]

Economy dynamic pricing and you know, we're.

[Rashad Bilal]

Going to talk about it on Wednesday, but shout out to, to the homie B Simone, you know, even she was saying that she had to, you know, make some economic choices when it comes to the retail space. But with that happening and then the S P hitting an all time high, is this, is there a disconnect in the stock market or is this a recipe for a fall off the cliff moment when the market catches up with the reality of what's happening on the street?

[Troy Millings]

No, there's a disconnect between the stock market and the economy and there always will be a disconnect there. I, I look at them as two different economic engines. Even though they may look similar, the stock market is its own beast prime. I know retail has gotten popular over the last five years but we, we have to be very clear institutions and the higher powers above institutions run S P, Vanguard, the Treasury bond market, stable coins and now crypto. So while the sentiment may be negative as it should be, I was even thinking this weekend like the erasure of retail as a sector like pre covet. I remember when Walmart would be open 24 hours. There are not many places that are open to 2am so there's just been like a decline overall in a retail space and the cost of everything has gotten so high. But the S P and the stock market is its own engine. Like we said, we're on the midst of a war and one of the greatest technology companies in the history of America now is in the arms business. I never had to them but it's, that's the other sector rotation that isn't talked about as the involvement into other sectors that you normally would not be a part of to make sure that you survive and keep that top billing spot amongst those indexes. So.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah, so the whales will be wells, right? Institutions move the market. Retail investors consume the Companies on the market.

[Troy Millings]

Yep.

[Rashad Bilal]

So what about people that are looking to get into the stock market but waiting for a drop? Is this something they could say, okay, it's all time high, don't buy at the highs. Recession is here or recession is coming or economic downturn has affected. I'll just wait it out because I know that the stock market is going to fall based off of variety of different factors.

[Troy Millings]

I don't think it's gonna fall anytime soon. The thing I will say, there is a correction in the market every month and if you know how to use indicators properly, there's an entry every day. Like hypothetically for VO, if we got down to 546.89, I would like to get in at that price if I was starting over today. But anytime Drew sent me this, like anytime CNBC has one of those market and turmoil specials. After one year your average return would be 40 with a 100 success rate. So the indicate in the market Mondays we've told you endlessly, probably 300 companies of where to invest. I think you can have a personal recession while the market is doing well and that's a very shitty feeling. Like so you have to have exposure to the market every month regardless of what happens. Because if not we can be very honest. The job market is never going to recover. But these stocks are going to go up, it seems like endlessly and into perpetuity. I remember even in 2012 some people was calling the death of Apple and began to short apple. And they continue to have a run through now. So you have to invest for the long term in order to make sure you stay out of your own personal recession.

[Ian Dunlap]

And there was moments this year, if you look at January 27th when we had deep sea, it was a market all of April.

[Troy Millings]

Yep.

[Ian Dunlap]

If you look at whatever hap. Whatever he labeled it on April 4th. Right. Or April 7th, there was a market correction and it pulled back. I don't know me by definition, recession won't. We won't hit a recession based on the definition of two negative quarters.

[Troy Millings]

I don't know if we'll ever have a traditional recession again because we felt.

[Ian Dunlap]

From all the looks of it when we looked into April, like hey, the way this is looking, this if this bleeds into May, this will lead to a negative second quarter. The second quarter is going to be over next week and from the looks of it as of today, it's a positive quarter. And so yes, the first one was rough, the second one start out rough, but we've recovered actually past the lows and now are going to some of the highs in S P. And so by definition it don't. It won't fit that. But like you said, I think one of those indicators we should be watching is the job market because that will determine whether they're going to raise or. Or lower interest rates. But even that now they're saying that it's going to be pushed up to September. That was a report today that interest rates are going to be dropped, which, you know, helps retail investors. So yeah, it. Invest, invest, but you know, you don't want to time it. You want to have opportunities. When you see, okay, you got, you got to take advantage of opportunities. And there's been at least two to three this year where if it wasn't the entire sector, definitely companies that we've spoken about have hit barriers. It was like, all right, this is, this is a barrier for entry.

[Troy Millings]

It's gonna be one of the times while in my huper show, April, I told you the market will recover in 62 days. Recover quicker than that. If you didn't take advantage of it. I'm sorry. Lo siento. Get your tickets to Invest us. But if you do want to know where to get into the market and never want to have to guess, go to ianvest.com come on. Maninvest.com join the red panda Stock Club. Stock Club call would be Wednesday at 7pm Central, then blackout at 9pm Central with two amazing guests. I love y' all. You should, you should have listened though. Should have listened. I'm sorry. There would be another opportunity probably right before Invest Fest. I can, I can guarantee it.

[Ian Dunlap]

Summer months upon us.

[Troy Millings]

Yes. That week of August 17th through 24th.

[Ian Dunlap]

Oh, it's always been rough.

[Troy Millings]

Usually. Oh my God, it's been rough.

[Rashad Bilal]

Which makes it even more important.

[Ian Dunlap]

I got. I take pictures. I take pictures of, of that week just to see what the portfolio is going to be. Reminder.

[Rashad Bilal]

Speaking of, you know how to track and know and different things in each year. What's one economic indicator that retail investors ignore but should track weekly for better entries into the market?

[Troy Millings]

Market Mondays, y' all can look for all these fancy ass. Put the call ratio. Just tune in every week. Like hypothetically, if we just turn this into a hedge fund, I would, I would push for 3 and 30 minimum. Ideally 4 and 40. If. If the only investment is 2 hours and you get to keep all the profits. What are you missing out on? So that's my weekly indicator. I was gonna give another one when I first came in, but no, nothing bigger than program.

[Ian Dunlap]

That's fair, that's fair. On a weekly basis. Yeah, for sure, for sure.

[Troy Millings]

This past weekend my mom was like, you realize that like your sustainability has been greater than Kramer's. And I'm, I'm still a fan of gym despite his last 10 year run. The first five the gym had. Oh my God. What? But I think it's just important to take out the fear when it comes to investing personally regardless of what you do for a living because the erasure of a bunch of economies is only going to continue to increase. Like I never would thought I would see the day where Pfizer is in a free fall and Hymns is performing like Pfizer of 2000, like economies of scale of just being destroyed and there are new companies that are emerging as a result. And if you're not putting your money to work and having the best entrepreneurs work for you on your behalf, what are you doing?

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah, Noble's taking a beating too. But I think I, I agree and obviously, I mean we might be biased here, but even if we told you things like GDP or we said, you know, look at CPI or hey, you should look at the job market, you would still need someone to explain to you what that actually.

[Troy Millings]

What the data means.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah, what that data means, how to interpret it, what it means to, for you as a retail investor, how you can use that to your advantage. And so yeah, I'm biased. I think we're the perfect place for that because we're going to tell you exactly like just in the last minute. That's what the job market is looking at. Yo, how many people have applied apply for unemployment this week? Yeah, that tells us something, right? That tells the Fed something that tells whether they're going to raise or, or lower rates that can affect you. We could say that the, the acronyms but they won't mean anything without context.

[Troy Millings]

And so yeah, and experience like it's one thing to put some something in chat GPT but not having lived it like even go to April when we had the drought and if you're on trading view put on order flow and then see the put and call ratio and how I think when things shifted like little tips like that, knowing when to get into the market, when to get out, when to then apply the features, when to apply the options, like that's life changing what percentages you're looking at. Absolutely right.

[Ian Dunlap]

Having a long term outlook. I mean all these, all these little nuggets that you just pick up all the way. Obviously we've been Doing it for six years now, so. And people take it for granted, but this is a valuable resource that a lot of people are taking advantage of. Shout out to everybody that's in here right now.

[Troy Millings]

Yeah, Rashad, your FU number is a hundred.

[Rashad Bilal]

100 milli. I mean, you know, we could settle for a little bit lower than that, but I just feel like that's bulletproof. Like, you know. Yeah, that's the bulletproof.

[Troy Millings]

I'm trying to curse before then, but it's good.

[Ian Dunlap]

I told him to call 50. I'm out of here. Shout out to her. She's dope. Good night. It's been real.

[Troy Millings]

I think you do the internal media play market Mondays for the Vatican ggs.

[Rashad Bilal]

Oh, also talking about Invest Fest. You know, read an article in the New York Post about Michael Rubin's Fanatic festival. I'm sure you've probably seen it with. He had LeBron James and Tom Brady and Jay Z was there and stuff like that. So, you know, it's interesting because when you look at entrepreneurship, there's. There's different levels that I think a lot of people are not fully aware of and privy to. Right. Where it's like, okay, that's a big event. He brings a lot of celebrities through.

[Troy Millings]

Got it.

[Rashad Bilal]

But, you know, it's interesting what he said at least is that last year that his event lost $14 million.

[Troy Millings]

Wow.

[Ian Dunlap]

Don't cheat them.

[Rashad Bilal]

So, okay.

[Troy Millings]

Wow.

[Rashad Bilal]

So what that means to me is that you got to have even more of appreciation for an Invest Fest. Not to beat the dead horse here, but yeah, for real, as a black entrepreneur, a lot of times you don't have the luxury. This is what that.

[Troy Millings]

One loss will cripple most businesses.

[Ian Dunlap]

It's over.

[Rashad Bilal]

But that happens a lot across the board. Right. Whereas it'll be a lost leader attacks, write off just to boost your brand. But, you know, you're looking at profitability in five years. Jeff Bezos was. Was on the Tonight show. His legendary clip. And Jay Leno was, you know, joking with him, like, when is your company ever going to be profitable? This was like, you know, 20 years ago.

[Troy Millings]

Yeah.

[Rashad Bilal]

And he was saying, like, you know, it's going to take time to get profitable. We got to be profitable from day one.

[Troy Millings]

Yeah.

[Rashad Bilal]

Or there is no day two.

[Ian Dunlap]

That's the difference.

[Rashad Bilal]

That's the part of business that I think a lot of people don't fully understand. We don't have the luxury to not be profitable, because if we're not profitable, then there's no show.

[Troy Millings]

He lost 15 last year.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah, last year. And he said it probably won't be profitable this year. When you talk about the. Because people forget the, the cost of activations. You got to get people there. All these things add up. Now obviously it's a billion dollar company at this point, but yeah, they're taking a loss every year. He's. He doesn't know when it's going to be profitable.

[Rashad Bilal]

So when you, when you put together these events and you get the top level celebrities and like this is top level celebrities that we're talking about as far as that we've been able to curate. Right. And top level business people and top level billionaires and high level activations. Just don't take that for granted because it's difficult.

[Troy Millings]

Incredibly.

[Rashad Bilal]

Like, you know, I mean, like this is somebody that literally lost $15 million on an event and that's what.

[Troy Millings]

And to have a lit event and not make money on it is. Could you. At Casa Knot and Cash and LeBron. What.

[Ian Dunlap]

Who else can you. I mean Jordan, that's probably the only person that. That's not there that he could have had in that space.

[Rashad Bilal]

But that just highlights one particular area. Like I said, this can go be. This could be a tech company. This could be an engineering firm. This can. This can be a lumber company. A lot of times what we lack in our community, we talk about access to capital, but we have, we lack. We lack access to Runway.

[Troy Millings]

That's a great point.

[Rashad Bilal]

Like, it takes, it takes a Runway to be able to fly a plane. Right. Like sometimes the Runway is the size of a couple football fields. We. We're flying planes off a 50 foot driveway. Exactly. There's no, there's no room for error. And you almost got to be. It's almost a miracle to. To land. To take a plane off on a 50 foot driveway is. That's actually a miracle. You got to be an extremely skilled pilot and it's one in a million. That's what. When you see, when you see certain level of success, you got to understand that it's impossible.

[Troy Millings]

Yeah.

[Rashad Bilal]

Like sometimes in the, in the math. In math, in mathematics, when something has such a low probability of happening, they just deem it as this is just impossible. Right. Like if it's like 0, 0.1. Like the, the number is so low that it's a possibility, but technically it's impossible. That's. That's what, that's what we are Fact.

[Troy Millings]

Humbling?

[Ian Dunlap]

No.

[Rashad Bilal]

Respectful?

[Ian Dunlap]

No. Respectfully, not humbly, no.

[Rashad Bilal]

But it's a learning. But it's not even to brag yeah, it's a learning. I just wanted to. Just because it's business. It's a business. When you start your business, just understand the type of obstacles that you're up against. Right. And then on top of that, you're going to have to deal with some level of criticism, jealousy and envy from people that look just like you. That's. That's the part that's hurtful the most. That's. That's. That's the most hurtful part of this situation. Because it's like if you do something that's impossible, you're not only providing inspiration and motivation for somebody else, but you're also providing a pathway and a blooper for somebody else to potentially do what you did. But when you have some level of hate, jealousy and criticism from people that you're actually leading on a certain level to the same promised land that you're trying to get to yourself, that's hurtful.

[Troy Millings]

Well, I want to commend you because even, like, I mean, how long did it take for the Jack Dorsey thing to come together?

[Ian Dunlap]

No comment.

[Troy Millings]

If these things take.

[Ian Dunlap]

It takes time, man. We keep saying it over and over. That's why, like, I had this conversation.

[Troy Millings]

Through four years of nose to get a maybe last year that they go fly to Miami and hang out for 14 hours.

[Rashad Bilal]

That's a fact. That is a fact.

[Ian Dunlap]

That goes for anyone, anybody that you see up there. It takes time. It takes nurturing, it takes networking. It takes building relationships with people who are around the person. It takes conversations, it takes text messages that don't get responded to for three months.

[Troy Millings]

Yeah.

[Ian Dunlap]

You just got to be patient.

[Troy Millings]

Yeah.

[Ian Dunlap]

And don't take it personal and work through it. Yeah. That's it.

[Troy Millings]

But for the clothes that I see out there, what's.

[Ian Dunlap]

What's happening here? Right. Like, people don't fully understand what's happening. What happened in here is, is something that is revolutionary. Right. And it has to work. We don't have the advantage of it not working. It has to work because it's not just us. Right. If it don't work for us, imagine how hard it's going to be for the next person that's trying to kick this down. We got to kick this door down. We got to get it right, and we got to do it at a high level of excellence. And that's what we're doing every single year, over and over. So shout out to all the partners who have been with us, Shout out to the new partners that are here with us this year. It takes that right. Because if we don't get it done, it's not going to happen. So you got to support us, you got to protect us. You got to make sure that you champion it because this is important.

[Troy Millings]

Speaking of other great African Americans. Got to give credit to Elon Musk. Yeah, man, I was wrong.

[Ian Dunlap]

If we gotta, if we're gonna give credit and we use Dan Ives all the time when we talk about technology from all reports of everything he said is that he had an expectation for it and it far exceeded.

[Troy Millings]

Yeah. Not a scale yet, but they are. I do know some people in Austin who actually saw them out.

[Ian Dunlap]

It wasn't success. So it's starting, it's starting in Texas. It's going to be very small fleets right now. And I think they had drivers in the cars. So obviously because it's brand new technology and they're rolling this thing out. There were some, there were drivers in the vehicles for this one. But the, obviously the, the purpose of it is to not have anyone in the car.

[Troy Millings]

Yeah.

[Rashad Bilal]

Well, also talking about having leeway to run. No greater leeway than what Elon Musk has been given. But that aside, has he turned to ship with this Tesla situation? He's, he's been off the radar a little bit last couple of weeks. He hasn't been as forward facing as he was. He stepped away from the political scene a little bit. Even kind of said on Twitter that he. He's the biggest troll of all time. Which I guess is trying to downplay.

[Troy Millings]

Yeah.

[Rashad Bilal]

Some of the comments that he made. He's more focused on the business. He said so it. Has the Tesla ship been turned around?

[Troy Millings]

Not turned around all the way, but they're heading in the right direction. I said when he first, him and Trump first broke up when he said he's going to be sleeping in the office. I'm like a focus. Elon is dangerous. I think they'll eventually get to maybe like 4, 15, 30, maybe by October. I think he just needs to assemble some stronger executives who can. He needs like his Tim Cook. Even though they have a great operator when he's away on academy sabbatical or he just goes off and whatever political arena he wants to go into, he needs an operator there that is going to run the ship properly. But I do think he has turned things around in terms of being focused and a lot of times when relationships don't go right, it will make you focused again on the projects that you should be focused on. And not to pat him on the back, but he kind of Got used in that political. Like he was supposed to be Tony Stark. Right. But then Peter comes in quietly gives the same kind of support to Trump and Palatia now is the biggest defense tech company in the world. Like, I think he's going to find a way to eventually get his revenge and it's going to be through Tesla and Starlink eventually.

[Ian Dunlap]

This. This is. I don't know if they've righted the ship. I feel like the. We just obviously people were tying him to a political campaign and the overall sentiment around him was negative. The robo taxi has always been on. On the vision board. It has always been at the front of it. This is the technology here. That. This is a game changer. This is a game changer in terms of profitability for him. Right. When you talk about selling cars and the margins that he makes from the sales of cars and obviously taking some of those government initiatives away, that hurts those margins. The margins on the Robotax here are so high that it changes the company forever, which obviously gives them more. I mean, like that. Not that he needs more cash or cash flow, but to create even more innovative things. Obviously Starlink, but who knows what's next?

[Troy Millings]

I would not want him as a. A competitor or enemy. And if I help rig the election for you, let my kid wipe a booger on your desk and let me.

[Ian Dunlap]

Put the Teslas in front of the. In front of the white ones. But this is a good start. This is a good start. And we said this a couple weeks ago when we saw Tesla pull back. They get this right. This little blimp in the road will be an asterisk, Right?

[Troy Millings]

Absolutely.

[Ian Dunlap]

They. And to what? From all reports of what people have seen, they're off to a good start. They're off to a good start.

[Troy Millings]

And those robots they had were supposed to be used for national security purposes. I'm not sure if that contract will be fulfilled, but like if he makes one or two. Right. Partnerships and he's focused for three or four years.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah.

[Troy Millings]

Off to the moon.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah.

[Troy Millings]

Yeah.

[Ian Dunlap]

And even the cop. That, that the autonomous driving thing is. We talked about Waymo. Waymo, just actually they announced that they're starting in New York City over the summer. Yeah. So that should be interesting.

[Rashad Bilal]

Really?

[Ian Dunlap]

Driverless cars in New York City.

[Rashad Bilal]

Allegedly.

[Troy Millings]

That's a vibe.

[Rashad Bilal]

New York City can't even agree upon congestion price. And I doubt very seriously that the liberal LE government of New York City will ever agree upon autonomous driving vehicle.

[Troy Millings]

Maybe if Adam got to start partying and. And get in office and do some work.

[Rashad Bilal]

We'll see.

[Troy Millings]

Adams, can we get taxis, please?

[Rashad Bilal]

Andrew Cuomo, man. This guy got kicked out of office as governor and came back running for mayor. Only in America.

[Ian Dunlap]

Vote tomorrow. New York City. Get outside.

[Rashad Bilal]

Be mindful.

[Troy Millings]

You think I'm gonna take it?

[Rashad Bilal]

Who are you and who are you endorsing?

[Ian Dunlap]

I don't live in New York City.

[Troy Millings]

Oh, my God. Political.

[Ian Dunlap]

What?

[Troy Millings]

Who you voting for?

[Ian Dunlap]

I can't. We don't live in New York City. We don't have a vote.

[Rashad Bilal]

Who are you endorsing? You don't have to live in New York City to endorse somebody.

[Troy Millings]

Who are the two candidates?

[Ian Dunlap]

He's in the league. Cuomo's in the lead right now.

[Rashad Bilal]

Saran Mandani, he's.

[Ian Dunlap]

He's in second.

[Rashad Bilal]

And. Well, allegedly, we don't.

[Ian Dunlap]

Based on the polls. Paused.

[Rashad Bilal]

Depending on who we're pulling, Paul and I led by that Andrew Cuomo. Those are the two front runners.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah.

[Troy Millings]

Andrew, Send that email, my boy.

[Rashad Bilal]

You don't. You don't have a voice in this.

[Ian Dunlap]

No.

[Rashad Bilal]

I am endorsing Zaran Mandani. Right. It's the right thing to do. Sometimes in life, you gotta stay on the right side of his.

[Troy Millings]

Why is it the right thing to do?

[Rashad Bilal]

Because he seems to be focused on the people and not the institutions. If you watch the debate. I watched that debate, and then it was pretty alarming, some of the. Some of the things that was said. And he was the. He was the odd man out. Odd man out, stood alone.

[Troy Millings]

So you like the Bernie Sanders of New York City?

[Rashad Bilal]

He's the Bernie Sanders of New York City. They said if he wins, all the hedge fund managers will be leaving immediately.

[Troy Millings]

They ready to go to Miami. Anyway.

[Rashad Bilal]

Anyway.

[Troy Millings]

What? Ken Griffin sells some of them. Lots he got down there.

[Rashad Bilal]

So for what it's worth, that is my endorsement for New York City mayor. I believe in his campaign.

[Ian Dunlap]

Okay.

[Troy Millings]

Promo on 5.

[Ian Dunlap]

Promo. I. I think he'll win. I don't. I'm not gonna. I think he'll win.

[Troy Millings]

Yeah. I think.

[Ian Dunlap]

Shout out to New York City. All the children in New York City. It's the last week of school for them. Shout out to all the teachers. Everybody graduating. Yeah, I forgot to say that. Shout out to everybody that's graduating as well. We got two graduations in the household this week.

[Troy Millings]

That's amazing.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah. Education at the forefront.

[Troy Millings]

That's.

[Ian Dunlap]

That's my most important thing. What are we doing for education?

[Rashad Bilal]

Nothing.

[Troy Millings]

That's another conversation.

[Ian Dunlap]

No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. Don't say Nothing. Don't say nothing.

[Rashad Bilal]

Nothing for education.

[Ian Dunlap]

Don' there's some guys who were creating.

[Rashad Bilal]

Some stuff for education that's already been created.

[Ian Dunlap]

Well, that needs to be implemented throughout New York City.

[Troy Millings]

Well, that's why even roadblocking that, like, once I found out that the institutions don't want the kids to know what they need to know. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm like, what? Even if you do it for free?

[Rashad Bilal]

Man versus machine.

[Troy Millings]

Yep.

[Rashad Bilal]

Man versus machine.

[Troy Millings]

Yeah.

[Ian Dunlap]

I know some guys.

[Troy Millings]

Yeah.

[Rashad Bilal]

But yeah.

[Troy Millings]

Crude is not going to 300 a barrel. I don't care what street they close.

[Ian Dunlap]

Oh, yeah, somebody text you that.

[Rashad Bilal]

Well, let's talk about it. Because that's something that a lot of people are concerned about as far as the price of oil with this potential situation escalating. We already said that. So I actually spoke to Shout out to Blair, my connect in China, and she was saying, like, she doesn't think this will happen, but it could potentially happen. Even last time, where. Even China. There's shipments from China that go from China to New York. It goes through, like Middle Eastern shipping routes. And. And last time it got crazy. They started hijacking ships and, you know, it just wasn't safe. So they had their reroute from Middle east to Cape of Good Hope, South.

[Ian Dunlap]

South Africa.

[Troy Millings]

Oh.

[Rashad Bilal]

Which obviously what that does is that has a longer time frame and that causes more money. So she said that she doesn't think that could happen, but it did. It did happen before. There's a precedent for it happening. Not just China, a lot of places in the world, they had to reroute their shipping because it just got too dangerous to come through the Middle East. So they, they went all. They had to go all the way down. Yeah.

[Ian Dunlap]

What's that? Additional, like two or three weeks?

[Rashad Bilal]

I'm not sure the exact time frame. But long story short, that's going to cause problems.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah.

[Rashad Bilal]

So that's one thing that could actually impact things. But the oil situation, you know, they said 20 of the world's oil gets moved through there. Yemen, like I said, Yemen already said. And they've, they've done this before. They've done this a few months ago. Trump had to. So the thing with Trump is that people don't know they attacked Yemen. It didn't work. It didn't work. That's why, that's why he had a treaty. Like, okay, look, just let our ships. Don't mess with our ships. And they, and they like, okay, we negotiated a deal and they didn't tell Israel about that. Israel Wasn't happy about that. So Yemen's like, we really don't have nothing to lose because Yemen is a very poor country. They don't have diplomatic ties with anybody. So they're like us. Hijacking ships is not really that big of a deal. You trying to attack us. We're not like a traditional military type thing. It's hard, it's hard to fight that type of fight.

[Troy Millings]

Yep.

[Rashad Bilal]

So you don't know what, how to fight that fight. So they've threatened that already. So the price of oil, is this something to be concerned about?

[Troy Millings]

Yes, but I think the over, forgive me, I, I think it's been overhyped for it to go 300 a barrel, 220 a barrel. There are some safeguards in place that will prevent that. Like if you look historically at the chart ticker USO, I think the all time high is 958. If you look at the actual crude chart on thinkorswim backslash co, the all time high is 147 27. It does not benefit any party for crude prices to go that high because the last time crude were in the ranges of a hundred dollars a barrel and upward. It does put pressure on the economy. In addition to inflation being at an all time high for our lifetime, not knowing when the Fed is going to adjust rates, weakening job market, AI decaying the job market in many careers that are unknown. It's another, it's another straw in a camel's back that is already broken that does not need to be placed there. So I try and take the emotion out of it and look at the data. I think it's less than a 2% chance that we'll go to like $150 a barrel. Will there be some constraints? Would there be price increases? Eventually, yes, but 150, 200, 300? No, the probability of that is very low.

[Ian Dunlap]

How often or maybe you don't at all do you trade crude? I found it, find it very difficult.

[Troy Millings]

You, you do though you have to have a wider stop given the erratic nature. And it's a great lesson too. I'm glad you brought this up. Every instrument that you trade has his own personality. So you have to adjust your entry and your exits based and your stop loss based on that. Crude and NASDAQ are like Tasmanian devils that are size of woolly mammons. Like it's a different beast. And when it's in your favor, one of the greatest feelings ever. But it's a very fast moving instrument. So you, you have to have a Wider stop especially on the futures market. If you're going to trade it that natural gas, the Vix, nasdaq, you have to be be careful with the slower moving ones. Like bonds are easy, they're more even kill s p500 is even kill but like the German decks, very volatile. So everything that you trade, you have to assess the personality of each and understand what your risk profile is going to be for whatever you're trading. And if you want to hear more gems like this, get your tickets to Invest Fest Red Panda. Your code is in Telegram. If you miss it, so be it. You'll be entered into the raffle for the dinners and to meet Paul Judge, maybe, who knows. No, you can't come with me to the dinners.

[Ian Dunlap]

The new raffle.

[Rashad Bilal]

Okay, the deal room.

[Troy Millings]

Get your tickets to Invest.

[Rashad Bilal]

VIP Platinum vip. The deal room. Yeah, Deal room. Okay. Let's talk about Apple. They released their paper. Did you read it?

[Troy Millings]

Yes.

[Rashad Bilal]

What do you think?

[Troy Millings]

I think that if I didn't put out any amazing AI technology while I'm sitting on enough money to buy Syria free and clear, it probably would behoove me to chat GPT a paper about why AI and Perplexity and Claude are not capable of some of the things that they're reporting to be able to do while I have no tech. It's crazy. They put out that paper and then after I've been screaming this on market Mondays, the little executives got together and are initially putting the bid together for Perplexity. You got a Microsoft Word and wrote disparaging remarks about OpenAI and Claude and Canva and Manus. Why you? Siri is the shittiest AI product in all of tech right now. And your way to combat that was a Google Doc.

[Ian Dunlap]

All right, well, let me.

[Troy Millings]

No, let's.

[Ian Dunlap]

Let's do this then. Let's do this.

[Troy Millings]

No, is it?

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah. So is it. Okay, shittiest is subjective, but is it one of the most trusted?

[Troy Millings]

IT Ian Dunlap, Red Panda. Yeah, these are my thoughts and my views only doesn't reflect on Rashad Troy. Invest Fest, earn your leisure etc.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah, yeah.

[Troy Millings]

Here he is. The shittiest AI product in all of tech. I don't give a how many times y' all close my accounts down. I'm tired of y' all wasting money in the the era of everyone wanting to partner with you and add their stuff to your ecosystem is over with. It's over with.

[Ian Dunlap]

All right, so I read. Here's why I read it. I'm with you. I'm with you. On everything you just said. But I started thinking like, yo, they're, they're too smart. There's. There's too much cash flow. This doesn't make any sense. This is starting to feel a little bit deliberate. Like, what if they're doing like this, this strategy? Like, let's just take a totally different perspective. Like, it, it becomes deliberate where they're looking at their competition over promise for months, maybe years now. And then those competitors can't deliver. Right.

[Troy Millings]

But they've delivered well.

[Ian Dunlap]

Some of them have. Some of them is still hypothetical. We don't know if the valuations will actually match the company's. Right. Actual plan on what they deliver. We don't know yet. Some of them. Right. Then the other part is from a regulatory standpoint, we don't know what the regulations will. Look around AI it hasn't been settled yet. I mean, it's still new. Are they waiting to see how that plays out? Because what they still have. And it's kind of like when we thought when you brought the question why Meta. Right. Meta has 3.5 billion users across all platforms. Apple has 2 billion phones in the world right now.

[Troy Millings]

And distribution Y.

[Ian Dunlap]

So they have the distribution model. Yeah. Are they playing the weight game to see how this plays out? To say, all right, we've seen the regulatory. We seen them not be able to deliver. Here we come with our stuff. And if that's the strategy.

[Troy Millings]

Yeah.

[Ian Dunlap]

How long can they hold out before it's too late?

[Troy Millings]

And that's my thing. I think that strategy, like, it worked for the Pacers. You're gonna come back. How they gonna do a step that's great for the first round and second round, given the regulatory environment, he doesn't. Tim Cook doesn't have the best relationship with Trump, with America having their eyes on China. I'm going to keep saying this. $56 billion invested in China and no one better than I. I've never been married, but if I was and I gave another woman 56 billion over five years, I think my wife would probably be upset. That's part of the reason they're in crossfire over Foxconn. And you can make the. The assessment that maybe they wouldn't be able to build the technology here in the United States. Do what you've been doing at the same plant here in Houston, Bring them from over from Foxconn, have them train the workers, then ship them back. I think the trying to be last to market and just inundate us with the product like they did that YouTube album on Apple music back in the day.

[Ian Dunlap]

Oh that was crazy.

[Troy Millings]

It's not going to work this time because I want everyone in chat Google. How many users does open AI currently have? And think about it. Sam Altman is not the most beloved founder or CEO either despite of right. They are kicking ass in that space and they made a whole. It's the first time in my life Since I was 11 year old writing Method man lyrics on the Apple 2 that Apple is behind the technological curve for the consumer. I never thought I would see it happen.

[Ian Dunlap]

Okay. I don't know. It does feel deliberate and even the open AI situation is interesting because that relationship that they have with Microsoft, even though there's the partnership there, that, that is fading oh very fast. So Sam, I mean he kind of.

[Troy Millings]

Sam understands his value. He, his company is the new pretty girl on the block and she don't want to be in a relationship with Microsoft. The old dusty dude. Now she want to get something fresh and new. Apple, you should have put the bid in the first time. Got you. But they have, they have the capital.

[Ian Dunlap]

To be there for the second round.

[Troy Millings]

Maybe rebound play Dennis Rodman maybe. Maybe. I just think Apple has underwhelmed the last five years.

[Ian Dunlap]

Agreed.

[Rashad Bilal]

Microsoft is reportedly prepared to walk away from his partnership with OpenAI.

[Ian Dunlap]

But I've been saying that for six months now.

[Troy Millings]

We were talking about you got to walk away. If they're ready to cheat open air, they're ready to go to the highest bidder and they want to stand alone.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah but I mean the writing was on the wall and I told you we brought this up when Stargate was brought. Stargate was an original idea between Microsoft and OpenAI. Right. When it was announced in the White House on I believe it was the 20th of January of this year, Microsoft was nowhere to be found.

[Troy Millings]

And Rashad brought this up like one of the best lessons.

[Ian Dunlap]

It was Oracle can do a good.

[Troy Millings]

Deal with a bad person. Sam Altman Elon out of Open AI if you look at the SEC even going back to Y Combinator, it's some founders in Y Combinator who talk about papers who had to paper for the. The origin idea for open AI. And then somehow Sam had a dream and now it's just that I'm with you.

[Ian Dunlap]

So then now how do we view Larry Ellison? Because Oracle says we'll, we'll take on the partnership, the star Game.

[Troy Millings]

I think Larry's just doing what he's called in his friendship, capital friendship. But like this is high level tech Game of Thrones right now.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah, SoftBank is part of it as well.

[Troy Millings]

It's a lot of maneuvering. Like it's been one of the most exciting times. But in the same way Bill Gates was kind of nefarious and how he got his initial operating system deal. Sam is fruit off of that tree.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah. And he's taking up even the partnership with Lisa and AMD when it was hey Nvidia, Nvidia, Nvidia. Now it's like hey, we, well we got somebody else we can use as well.

[Troy Millings]

And Sam realized who. I'm a king maker. I don't need to be attached to a king. Microsoft, you're great. Even going to blackout like you have to know when someone wants you for you. That's in your personal life and in business. You, you can see the right if, if he left Y Combinator the way that he did, if the nonprofit structure got reorganized and then when it became a for profit structure, certain people got moved and bought out. And now you partner with Microsoft. If a person has a history of leaving in a fashion that is not favorable, why do you think that you're going to be the lucky one?

[Rashad Bilal]

Microsoft is reportedly prepared to walk away from ongoing negotiations with OpenAI regarding the future structure of their partnership. The discussions involve OpenAI's possible shift from Public Benefit Corporation, which needs Microsoft's approval. They will also be negotiating changes to Microsoft Future ownership of OpenAI which proposals range from 20 to 49. Microsoft currently has exclusive rights to sell OpenAI's models and earn 20% of revenue up to 92 billion. Open AI is now looking for more flexible terms. I bet if they don't reach a new deal, Microsoft may continue to use its current contract which gives access to open AI's technology through 2030.

[Ian Dunlap]

Oh, 2030, okay.

[Rashad Bilal]

Microsoft's multi billion dollar investment open AI have played a major role in making it a leader in artificial intelligence space. So the thing about it, how I see it also is a thing where like I said, there's no, there's no such thing as a bad deal. You signed the record contract because at that point in time that's what you needed. He was living in your mother's basement and a hundred thousand dollars was life changing money. Then you sold $5 million and then you got on Vlad and said I got screwed.

[Troy Millings]

I got robbed.

[Rashad Bilal]

Yeah, you know, you needed, you wouldn't have signed that. If it was a bad deal, you wouldn't have signed it. It's a bad deal now because you're a multi platinum artist.

[Troy Millings]

Hindsight. Yep.

[Ian Dunlap]

You're A diamond status. Right. Yeah, you're right.

[Rashad Bilal]

Just the same thing.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah. I think when we brought up the conversation, I feel like this was months ago.

[Troy Millings]

It was probably five months ago. Yeah.

[Ian Dunlap]

It was like there was. I think your argument was, there's no bad deal. Even if they sell their shares, Microsoft still walks away with hundreds of billions. That's what I'm saying. They're still gonna make a lot of money.

[Rashad Bilal]

They're gonna get me out without.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah.

[Rashad Bilal]

Or I'll just wait. It. I'll just wait.

[Troy Millings]

Yeah.

[Ian Dunlap]

It's crazy because, like, it's the. The writing has been on the wall. You can hear the rumblings. You can hear the rumblings. Then you start seeing more. It's like you think about the amount of CEOs that Sam Altman has now worked with and now how they're calling out with. Yo. Are you talking about the richest people on the planet, Elon Ellison?

[Rashad Bilal]

I mean, Microsoft's gonna. They're gonna make a lot of money from this. Of course.

[Ian Dunlap]

They're definitely.

[Troy Millings]

Yeah.

[Ian Dunlap]

If they get 20.

[Rashad Bilal]

We'Ll see.

[Ian Dunlap]

Of revenue.

[Rashad Bilal]

We'll see what we'll see.

[Troy Millings]

Microsoft wanted to be married. Open a. I want a financial freak off. You got to partner with people who want the same thing as you. And that leech strategy is something that he has employed a lot of and other people do. You have to be. You have to look out for partners who are just trying to use you to get to the next level.

[Ian Dunlap]

Through shots at Zuckerberg last week. 100 million. He's like, you're not getting the best of our people. Of course they don't want to leave. They're happy where they're at. 100 million walk away.

[Rashad Bilal]

Wolf and sheep clothing, perhaps. Who knows?

[Troy Millings]

You never know.

[Rashad Bilal]

You never know. But we do have a guest. We got a few guests this week, but we gotta. Hey, how you doing?

[Troy Millings]

How are you? Hello.

[Liv McCray]

I'm doing well. How are you?

[Rashad Bilal]

Good, Good. So Liv McCray.

[Liv McCray]

Yes.

[Rashad Bilal]

Have a business called Live With Nature. So this is something that I think is important because, you know, we spoke with a lot of Fortune 500 CEOs and billionaires, but it's important to highlight entrepreneurs that have small businesses because that's the lifeline of America. There's a lot more people with businesses that employ, you know, five people, three people, two people. Then employ 7,000 people. Right. So Live is somebody that has a. A business and organic topicals like facial stuff and for your hair, different things of that nature. And she's all vegan.

[Ian Dunlap]

Is it all Vegan as well.

[Liv McCray]

All vegan.

[Ian Dunlap]

All vegan. Okay.

[Rashad Bilal]

And she's participated in Invest Fest for a couple of years. So leading up to that, we just wanted to highlight a couple real life stories of entrepreneurs that's, that's getting it done. So we're going to talk to you for a couple of minutes. So first and foremost, thank you for joining us. Appreciate it.

[Liv McCray]

Well, thank you so much for having me. It's, it's an honor to even be a part of this platform.

[Rashad Bilal]

So talk about, I'm interested to hear because we're going to talk about, you know, Invest Fest, but I'm interested to hear from your perspective. You're on the ground, right? We talk about the economy a lot. Have you felt any, any pressure on your business as far as people spending less money? Like have you felt the economy as a business owner? Like what, what's your take on how things is going now?

[Liv McCray]

Absolutely. My take is the ingredients that I buy, the materials that I use to make my products, they have gone up in prices. But because I'm committed to being in a premium organic product at affordable prices, my percentages have, my profit percentages have definitely decreased and I'm just staying true to the game. I'm very grateful for my A1 supporters who are still rocking with me. I offer discounts, I offer all of my ingredients are packaged in eco friendly packaging. So if you return any of the bottles or the anything that I your products come in, then I also give you an incentive for a discount as well. So I'm constantly trying to think of ways to not hit the consumer's pockets because my goal is, you know, everyone deserves to have access to premium products and not break their bank.

[Ian Dunlap]

So talk to us about live with nature's journey. Right. This started out as hand sanitizer and obviously it's evolved to so much through the course of years. Talk about how you got to this point.

[Liv McCray]

Yes. So it's been an evolution journey. Actually I thought about starting off as a hair company, hair care company because I could not continue to buy $30 worth of products that were 0.51 ounces when the pandemic hit. I wanted to have access to my hand sanitizer that was eco friendly as well as plant based and safe for everyone to use. And that blew up. That was a hit. And so over time I've developed oral care, household cleaning products, skin care. That's actually my last line that I came out with. But you know, it, that's something that's essential when you have an organic Product business. But yes, the sanitizer has carried me through and I feel like it's one of my staples for sure.

[Troy Millings]

For any entrepreneurs that are watching tonight that may be feeling the same pressure of consumer spending less, what have you done in your business to make sure that the business is profitable and what marketing ideas have you deployed like in the last year since Invest Fest, that has helped you tremendously?

[Liv McCray]

Well, I have decreased my overhead. So I did used to have a store inside the new black Wall street in Atlanta and it was amazing. I loved it. But once I crunched the numbers, I had to decrease my overhead. So because I have a low overhead, that is why I'm able to continue to offer the affordable prices that I have. Marketing, social media has been amazing for me also. Word of mouth. What I'm so grateful for is when people receive my products, receive their packages, I put care into how I package it and I'm really grateful for everyone. So they'll tell their friend, they'll tell their friend and next thing I know, I continue to have orders and like I said, I'm just genuinely grateful. So yeah, social media, word of mouth. I also do a community event. I love being a part of the community.

[Rashad Bilal]

And so it's interesting that you say that because whenever I get an opportunity to speak publicly and I get asked as far as like, what's my advice for entrepreneurs, I genuinely always say the same thing and it's to keep overhead low.

[Liv McCray]

Yeah.

[Rashad Bilal]

And I say like, that's the biggest mistake that entrepreneurs make, especially in our community, is that we start businesses like restaurants or hair salons or these are things that's a brick and mortar businesses. Right. And the problem with that is that your expenses stay the same or go up, but your income fluctuates.

[Liv McCray]

Yes.

[Rashad Bilal]

Right. And that's something that a lot of people don't fully understand when they're going into business because it's like, okay, it looks good, it's a good look to have a store. Right. Or a physical location. But it's extremely difficult to run because of what, like, you know what I just said. Right. And a lot of times that should probably be the last thing that you do. But people open the store first. We talk about the mvp, right? Minimum viable product, like go online first, then do pop ups, then do like a truck and then after you're making a lot of money, then you can do like a flagship store. But most of the time entrepreneurs work backwards. So when did you realize that you know that and talk about that? Because I think it's important for people to fully understand that, like how when cash flow goes down and you still got to maintain your rent and you know that that becomes difficult.

[Liv McCray]

Oh. So it was about seven months into me owning my store. It was actually July. I didn't realize that the summertime was the time when consumers are not spending as much money. And so when I was crunching the numbers, it's like, okay, well, you know, school will start again, you know, then we'll be into the fall and winter. But ultimately I decided the amount of money I'm spending on rent and business insurance, things of that nature, I could put that back into pop ups, which I started off as a pop up. I could put that back into pop ups. I can put that into more marketing. I could put. I had SEO optimization at one time, so that really helps me. And honestly, Invest Fest has really, really, really helps me. I have repeat customers come back every year looking for my table, because what I do is I do all items. Two for $20. You can choose any of my 26 products. Two for $20. Super easy. And people love it.

[Ian Dunlap]

So, yeah, let's talk about that. I mean, the power of Invest Fest in parallel to the success of your business, how it's been growing. I believe you were at invest in 2022. Was that your first one? That was my first talk about the experience from that until last year, when obviously you. You were part of the sponsorship team. Yes.

[Liv McCray]

So how I found out about Invest Fest, a vendor at 2021, I saw him in California. I'm from California. And I said, yo, where did you get.

[Ian Dunlap]

Where.

[Liv McCray]

Where did you get that shirt? He's called Pure Hustle. And I just love. I love marketing other. I love cross branding. And so he said invest Fest. So I looked it up, and in 2022, I was one of the last vendors to sign up. Y' all had sold out. And so I was in the very back. I'm talking about the very. I was the last yellow zone table in the very back, and I doubled my money. And I'm like, what? People came up to my table, they were like, we just want to support. What do you have? It was. It was. I felt it was such a high that lasted for a couple of months. It's almost like exhilarating and addicting. It was so beautiful to see people like me not only shop, but also network. It wasn't just about shopping and networking. It was about teaching as well. So then 2023, I was like, I gotta go back. So 2023, now I'm maybe like a row away from the entertainment, entertainment hub. And I tripled my money. I'm like, whoa, this is like, I. And now I'm telling everybody, you gotta be at Invest Fest. You gotta be. It's so much energy inside of me in regards to how Invest Fest is so powerful. I love what y' all do. I've taken your tactics, I've taken your business tactics. I used Regis, I use Atlanta Pinnacle for my business address. There's so many gems y' all have dropped that has helped elevate my business. So in 2024, that was the biggest year where the new black Wall street, we had 10 vendors from the new black Wall Street. We came in as a group and we was in there and it was just a beautiful thing seeing all of us make money, all of us, and genuinely enjoy ourselves. It was such an exhilarating. It's so beautiful to see all of us come together every year in the name of investing. You know, one of you had stated, you can go to a concert and enjoy yourself, but what do you get out of that? Well, Invest Fest, you not only can get a concert, but you can also get networking. You can elevate your business and you could also come away with life changing skills. So that way you can incorporate it and create that generational wealth that we all talk about about. So it is, I want to say, no matter where you are in the Invest Fest vendor space, you will make money. The key is having bundles, having deals, having marketing, and also just not being afraid to talk to people who walk by your table. One of my tactics is I have a sanitizer stand right in front of my table. But now it takes away my pressure of having to talk to you. You can use the sanitizer. They're like, whoa, what is this? It moisturizes and sanitizes. And now that's my foot in the door.

[Troy Millings]

So, yeah, if it was your first time again, because of course, I feel like after every event, there's always something you go back and say, I wish I could have done this for the first time. Vendors. What advice would you give them if they're not as vibrant or social as you, to get attention for people to come to their table and then be.

[Liv McCray]

Able to monetize, I would say your marketing. So whether you have signs that are visible, vibrant colors, whatever your logo colors are, but make sure it's something that, where they can read as they're walking by, scents are really good. So whether you offer products or whatever you offer, people love things that smell good as they walk by, but also just smile. Even if you are not an extrovert, just a simple smile as they walk by is something that will take you further than you even realize.

[Rashad Bilal]

And you did the swag bags last year?

[Troy Millings]

Yes.

[Liv McCray]

I'm so. Y' all don't understand how grateful. And what's even crazy is I actually made all 1500 sanitize bottles of sanitizer. I have a printing company here in Atlanta where I pick up. They actually do a lot of product labeling for other vendors as well. So I labeled it, I packaged it in the boxes, and I hand delivered it to the warehouse. And when I got to invest fest, people would walk by, they're like, I know this. This is in my swag bag. So they bought more, then they went back and brought their friends. When I went to the VIP event, people were like, yo, that's your sanitizer. I'm telling you, I'm so grateful that you open up that platform for small business owners to really be a community sponsor as well.

[Rashad Bilal]

Now, you know, I love that because it highlights a few things, and it's like, you got to work for it to work.

[Liv McCray]

Yes.

[Rashad Bilal]

Right. We can bring you to the. To the. To the ocean, but what you do at that point is up to you. So you're like, what you. What you're outlying is strategy.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yes, right.

[Rashad Bilal]

Like you're outlining strategy, not just winging it and just saying, okay, I'm here, buy my product. Like, you know, you gotta actually take this and take this serious. But like you said, I mean, you're given the opportunity to be in front of tens of thousands of people over the course of the weekend. If you have a. A business, as a vendor, you have to. You have to be able to make money. If you're not making money, then something. Something's wrong in this situation.

[Liv McCray]

Yes, absolutely. And my profit margins, like I said, you know, when I offering the bundle deal.

[Ian Dunlap]

Oh, did we lose Liv?

[Rashad Bilal]

No, we lost her.

[Troy Millings]

I thought it was me. Okay.

[Liv McCray]

I thought it was me too.

[Rashad Bilal]

Okay, you back, you back.

[Ian Dunlap]

Okay, you back, you back. Go ahead.

[Liv McCray]

Oh, I apologize. I know I was talking a lot.

[Rashad Bilal]

It's okay.

[Troy Millings]

No, go ahead.

[Ian Dunlap]

Oh, the floor is yours. Good.

[Liv McCray]

Oh, well, I was. Oh, I was just going to say, also as a vendor, you know, we get the five wristbands. And so then that's how I bring in my friends. I say, hey, this is an opportunity for you to be a part of something that'll change your life. And in turn, then they get to Work at my table and assist. They can go listen to whatever speaker they want to. My sister last year was so overwhelmed and I. She was in tears in regard to just the gems that each speaker dropped. She said it was too much for her.

[Floyd McCray]

She.

[Liv McCray]

She brought her recorder and she's still listening to those recordings now and she's still trying to digest and all of the information that she received. So, yeah, that's.

[Ian Dunlap]

That's power.

[Rashad Bilal]

That's amazing. Well, thank you for coming on. Is it me again, most importantly, thank you for coming to Invest Fest.

[Ian Dunlap]

Thank you.

[Rashad Bilal]

Can you tell the people your business website, social media, exactly all the things that just that you sell so that they, they can tap in with you?

[Liv McCray]

I apologize. I think the connection was lost again. Can you repeat that?

[Rashad Bilal]

Can you. Can you tell your business website and social media handle and everything?

[Liv McCray]

Yes. So my business website is www.livewithnature.com. so of course it's a word play off of my first name, Liv with nature.com and I'm currently offering buy one, get one half off of all products until the end of July. I don't have another promotion for Invest Fest everywhere on social media. It's at Live with Nature, Liv with nature.

[Ian Dunlap]

We appreciate you, Liv, and I personally appreciate you because the hand sanitizer play is very important. We shake a lot of hands. Some of them are sweaty palms. And I appreciate all those who have sweaty palms that decide not to shake our hands. But we need that hand sanitizer. So we appreciate you. I'm looking forward to visiting you this year. We less than 60 days away, so I'm excited to see you.

[Liv McCray]

Yes, thank you so much. I'm at booth 338, so thank you. I really appreciate it.

[Ian Dunlap]

Appreciate you.

[Rashad Bilal]

338. Thank you.

[Troy Millings]

See you soon.

[Liv McCray]

Happy Monday.

[Ian Dunlap]

All right.

[Rashad Bilal]

Ah, that was great. That was good.

[Troy Millings]

That was great.

[Rashad Bilal]

You know, I think double, then triple, a few things that. Yeah, for sure. But I really, I really, really liked and I think that was really, we should do that more often as far as bringing like just small business owners on because they speak a lot of time we talk about like Tesla, Microsoft, Apple, and we talk about stocks and we interviewing people. That's at a very high level. But I think it's good to hear from people that's, you know, on the ground just like everybody else as far as, you know, you know, making it happen. Because like I said, that's the majority of people and that's the people that you really have more in common with. But I think she spoke Very eloquently about the brick and mortar situation. Like, that's something I've been saying for a long time. So I'm glad that she said it. And I think that she was very on point when it comes to, like, the marketing that she had. Like, look, I'm doing. I'm gonna do everything for $20. Two for 20. I got that. I got the.

[Ian Dunlap]

She got the bundle swag bags.

[Rashad Bilal]

I got the hand sanitizer in front. So when you come to me, I'm already breaking the ice. I'm making it uncomfortable because you need the hand sanitizer. And then it's like, oh, what's this? And that starts the conversation. Like, these are all things you learn in sales. So, yeah, that was a really dope conversation.

[Ian Dunlap]

I think it's important what you just said, that we highlight more stories like that. Right. Because we always talk about invest in terms of your brokerage account into companies like the ones we mentioned. But more importantly, like, we can invest in our community and the businesses in our community to help them thrive, which we're going to use on a daily basis. Not to say that obviously the Max 7 and all the things in the semi space, we don't, you know, see valuing, but like seeing value in each other is equally, if not even more important. We want to see these businesses thrive. Like you said earlier, we don't get a second chance to make this. Make this right. Right. Like, we have to get it right the first time. So, yeah, it's important. We should. We should definitely continue.

[Troy Millings]

This highlight was amazing too. That's another part when people are walking around, you don't know who is who. So you may actually end up meeting an investor into your business. But if your disposition or your team's disposition is off, it can go awry pretty fast. So let's go. I think energy matters a lot.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah. Live was ready. Shout out to her.

[Troy Millings]

Yeah.

[Rashad Bilal]

Yes. I just got a text from somebody in Washington dc.

[Troy Millings]

What would they say?

[Rashad Bilal]

I will fill you in off camera. I want to film my political connects.

[Ian Dunlap]

Wow.

[Troy Millings]

Breaking news.

[Rashad Bilal]

You never know who's watching.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah.

[Rashad Bilal]

Crypto legislation is upon us.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yes.

[Troy Millings]

Yep. Right after Vanguard and blackrock got their hands in it. You never know. Yeah. Circle IPO going crazy. Somebody asked which one? Circle or core weave? Both.

[Rashad Bilal]

Oh.

[Ian Dunlap]

So here's the thing, and this is because I know we have a similar principle when it comes to companies ipoing and waiting at least six months, if not 12 months to invest. Do you. Do you make a amendment when it comes to that in terms of these IPOs, obviously they've run up. We'll wait for a pullback. I'm sure they will happen. But is does a six month barrier still hold precedent in your in your investment portfolio?

[Troy Millings]

Yeah, it does for Circle, Core, Weave and Android. Some people now if I get it pre IPO through better, that's different. But in terms of waiting to the three month or six month period. For sure. For sure. Okay. Like for people who don't remember when Facebook went public, they had an issue on the day of the ipo. And there was plenty of times over the next six or seven months to be able to get in. And then of course meta, once they made the conversion, it was plenty of times to be able to get in. So I know people feel like they're going to miss out, but the number of shares matter more than anything. And you're going to get the alpha based on great entry and great price into that stock. So the only time I would break that rule is if I can get the shares pre IPO through venture capital.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah, it feels away when you watch circle run up 300, you watch Corey run up 200 plus percent. But patience is is and it invests a long, long term game. So.

[Troy Millings]

And if you learn how to trade features and get good at it, it's going to take you two or three years, but you can get the thousand percent to 2,000% return there. Low end.

[Rashad Bilal]

Sniper. Sniper. The new Sniper program is loading. Is that a rumor?

[Troy Millings]

Rumor?

[Ian Dunlap]

It's all a legend. Or they could just watch Market Mondays. Ian. Right. We. We left gtc. We told them the companies that we saw. Surprise.

[Troy Millings]

Hello. Corey took off.

[Rashad Bilal]

Some things we can't get on Market Mondays.

[Troy Millings]

Yeah. Oh yeah.

[Rashad Bilal]

Sniper 2.0, that's different. That's a higher level, higher education.

[Troy Millings]

So I gotta come with like a duffel bag full of money to be a judge? I wouldn't be like a celebrity judge too.

[Rashad Bilal]

Laugh. Has entered the building.

[Ian Dunlap]

Duffel bag boys. You and two chains.

[Rashad Bilal]

Perpetuity contract.

[Troy Millings]

Damn. Jalen. For sure. I'll sign it. Go ahead. So you gotta be a judge for 10 years.

[Rashad Bilal]

All right.

[Troy Millings]

So all hands on deck.

[Rashad Bilal]

Before we leave, let's we have another guest. Oh yeah. Once again, shout out to Liv support her business. It's really good products too. And man, if you got a small business, I don't know why you, why you don't have a vendor Booth. That's, that's a mistake. She just said she tripled up. Triple the income.

[Ian Dunlap]

Doubled one year, tripled the Next year.

[Rashad Bilal]

It takes work to work with no commission, by the way.

[Ian Dunlap]

Say that part again.

[Rashad Bilal]

No commission.

[Ian Dunlap]

So people can understand that. These people who. Then there's no commission with that.

[Rashad Bilal]

Okay.

[Troy Millings]

Y' all get no commission on it.

[Rashad Bilal]

Yeah. No commission.

[Troy Millings]

That's crazy. What? For those who don't know, normally when you go to conferences, they get a percentage of sales.

[Rashad Bilal]

That's a fact.

[Ian Dunlap]

That's why I said re. Just reiterate that part.

[Troy Millings]

That's honorable.

[Rashad Bilal]

But. Okay. Speaking of the pitch.

[Troy Millings]

Honorable in that meeting, but go ahead.

[Rashad Bilal]

Speaking of the pitch competition, it's only right that we bring special guest up to have a word. We're gonna bring the winners of the pitch competition from last year up because why not? We're headed into a new pitch competition this year, so can we. Can we bring the guest up?

[Ian Dunlap]

Let's do it. Let's do it. Let's do it.

[Troy Millings]

Let's do it.

[Liv McCray]

Hey, hey, hey.

[Troy Millings]

There it is.

[Ian Dunlap]

There it is.

[Rashad Bilal]

There you go.

[Floyd McCray]

Divine Luminous Juices, baby. We in the building. I know y' all heard that before.

[Rashad Bilal]

Divine Loomis Goose Juice and Wellness. We have Floyd, Monique, and Tim.

[Ian Dunlap]

What's up, y' all?

[Rashad Bilal]

Thank you for joining us. Appreciate it. What's up?

[Troy Millings]

Thank you for having us, man. Yes.

[Ian Dunlap]

Floyd, I appreciate you representing for the bald man with beards. Thank you.

[Floyd McCray]

Yo, he just cleaned us off extra for y' all. Okay. So y' all feel appreciative. It's nice and soft around here.

[Ian Dunlap]

Appreciate you, my brother.

[Rashad Bilal]

Appreciate it. So last year, we did the. The Nipsey Hustle pitch competition was a big thing, and that was the first time that we really did something like that at Invest Fest. And it was a hundred thousand dollars, and it was a lot that went into it. Just planning it.

[Troy Millings]

The.

[Rashad Bilal]

The first level of, like, the auditions for it at the Friday, it was. It was a whole day, but we got to. To Saturday, and we picked four finalists, and you won. So I'm gonna ask you, you know, how everything has been, but first and foremost, how was that experience like, just even going into it, applying, you know, going to the Friday. I know we had a long line on Friday to actually, you know, do it in front of the judge on Friday, then making it and then being on stage with everybody, and it was the wax competent, the wax guy that went crazy. It was strong, strong people on stage. It wasn't like it was a weak competition. How was that? Like, what. What mindset were you in to actually, you know, see it through to the finish line?

[Floyd McCray]

So to be honest with you everything that weekend was really godsend. And I know it's hard for a lot of people to just understand and embody it, but from the time we got there, it was like a halo or a glow around us. When we got there, we knew to come with product, right? Because we can talk about juices all day, but until you try it and you taste it and you consume it, you get to feel the reality of what we're talking about. And when Tom. So Floyd didn't get to go, he wasn't babysitting. He said he was babysitting, but he wasn't feeling so hot either. So we just decided that crowd, his immune system, he should just kind of take a step back. And Tamel and I, we went there, we had. I was rolling with a cooler. I could care less about who was talking about me in a cooler. Even if you call me the lady with a cooler, that's fine because we won, right? But when we got there from the door, I had this lady that I ran into that was a volunteer. I explained to her real quick the story. She asked me why we doing juices. I told her, you know, it was off of the back of my husband and what's going on in our life. And she said, God told me to tell you that you won't just like that. Word up. Just like that. And I was like, what? And then when we got to the line, because we were there trying to figure out which way to go and how to get into the pitch competition, because we were a walk in and we were number 46 and we were told it was 50 people, right? So we like, yo, we just made it by the skin of our teeth. We got into the walk in, and I was frantic, y' all, because the juices was frozen. I was trying to thaw them and make sure they was ready for the judges. And just a lot of going on through my mind. But I was there with passion, and we were there with passion because we know that our story was impactful and we know that our juices were. Are impactful as well. So when we got. We were in line, I didn't have anything rehearsed or recited to be real with you. I literally came with my heart and my soul. And when we got into the room, they actually started introducing new judges. And I was like, oh, I had the expectation that we were going to go with these people because I did all of my homework beforehand. And when we got into the room, I was like, okay. Mike was there, MG was there, and we. And to Be honest with you, when you in that room, you're listening to everybody else pitch like you're listening to your competition in a room. It could be inspiring or it could be scary. You know what I mean? And by the time you get closer up into the line, it's like, yo, it's your time, it's your time. And by the time we got up there, Tamil and I coordinated. She handed out the juices, and we had 60 seconds. And I wanted all of my 60 seconds, you feel me? So I was like, yo, get the juices so quick. So what's the 62nd start? I could go. And I said my pitch. Part of me don't remember all of what I said because I literally was in a moment and a passion. And then we were told that we'll get an email. So I was clocking my email all day. Like, oh, where's the email? All right, well, I guess if I didn't get an email, I'm good. Nine o' clock at night, my phone rang, and I'm the type of person where if it's not a number that I know, then it's something, right? Because I know everybody who calls me past a certain hours. And I saw the number and I was like, hello?

[Troy Millings]

Hello?

[Floyd McCray]

And then I heard noise in the back and I was like, oh, my God. I started shaking. And then AB called and was like, monique, I just want to let you know Divine Lunis is going to the stage.

[Rashad Bilal]

I was like, can you feel my.

[Floyd McCray]

Heartbeat through the phone? And he was like, congratulations. So. So we didn't get to do anything on Friday. We didn't get to see anything because we were literally pitching all day. And then when Saturday came, we didn't get to take advantage of the conference either because we were getting prepared for the big stage. So initially, I felt like, dang, we didn't get to endure some of the stages and receive all of the information. But I'm like, yo, we here for purpose. What will be, will be. And then just being backstage and seeing, you know, celebrities, seeing Black Sam, seeing everybody, it just was so organic, though. Like, there was nobody back there was. There was no one back there that was, like, super starstruck or a fan. It was just a cool setting. It was like, yo, this is what EYL is building. Like, y' all are building community amongst everybody. No matter how. How famous you are, how much money you got in your pocket, it was just such a cool environment. And then we had a switch with the order. And I was like, all right, I know My order, I got time to prepare. Then they switched it on us and was like, hey, y' all. Second, y' all, not third. And I was like, what?

[Rashad Bilal]

We got?

[Floyd McCray]

And I was like, what you mean I'm gonna do? The only thing I came to do is I just gotta go up there and do it. And when I got up there again, I literally recited, like, the first three seconds, and the rest was just literally from the heart. And that's it.

[Ian Dunlap]

I mean, this is an incredible story. You want to talk about organic? We ran into each other a few times. I had no idea in the pitch competition, but talk about the marketing, having a personality, walking in purpose. Talk about how much that weighs into presenting yourself in front of people. Like, I said, you. You gave me a few samples, and I was like, oh, this is great. This is the juice lady. Then I saw you backstage. It didn't hit me till you were coming up on stage that you had given me the juices twice already. I'm like, oh, I had no idea how much that plays into it.

[Floyd McCray]

Did you remember backstage when I saw you, you was looking for the cooler. You like, where the juices at? Everybody with you like, oh, where the juices that you got the juices today? And I was like, yeah, but I'm trying to make sure I didn't hand out every oil so the judges couldn't get some. But I was like, all right, I got you later. But to be honest with you, when it comes to your business, you know, there are some people that. That are in business to make money, but you have to find a seat of passion in it, because that's what's going to give you that. That caliber of confidence. That's what's going to basically stomach that lower that the butterflies in your stomach. You are truly scared, and you feel like you're not good enough and also tapping into that higher power. And I know who we are, and I know what we stand for, and I will be honest. Trey and Rashad, y' all are so approachable. So y' all need to give y' all some credit for that. Y' all did not have this demeanor around y' all that we couldn't approach you. You embedded yourself into all of us as entrepreneurs. The first person I ran into was Rashad, and I was like, yo, I want to give you a juice, and I'm gonna have you try it. So let me know what you think. I'm ready to walk away. He cracked it right there. He was like, hold on, I got you. He cracked it, and he tasted it. You remember, you remember Rashad? And you was like, yo, yeah, like this. And I was like, so that also helped to build my confidence too. And my sister, like, she, she don't talk much. She'll be talking today. But she was literally my anchor of support when I had those moments where I'm like, yo, like, I'm nervous, but I'm like, what do I have to lose? So you have to walk with that seat of passion, but you also have to be presentable. Wearing a smile, even if you don't feel like smiling, having that. It's an aura around you that makes people know who you are before you even enter the room or when you enter the room. Is that. That makes sense?

[Troy Millings]

Absolutely. I know traditionally that they'll tell you in a pitch competition to have a particular framework, but can you tell us how passion has helped you get to this moment, the origin story of why you created the company and how you think that helped you elevate past all the competition from last year?

[Floyd McCray]

Absolutely. So I will, I'll start off and I'll let you know. Floyd and Tymo chime in because Floyd is one of the bigger parts of this story. So passion is great, but when you feel like you are down on your last, that's when you have to pull on everything you got. And for many people that know or heard, when we were on stage, you know, Floyd has been. It's been. It just made. Four years. Two days ago, he's been diagnosed with a rare stage 4B. The letter B. Yes. Stages have letters which we didn't know he's diagnosed with. He was diagnosed with or is diagnosed with a stage 4B cancer. And throughout our journey, we've suffered from hardship, whether it's emotional, whether it's marital, whether it's physical, and him not feeling well or me feeling depleted from handling so many things. But the financial is what hit us the hardest. And he came to me and he was like, monique, we gotta do something. And I didn't know what to do because I was working a part time job that was barely getting us by. Plus whatever he may be getting, you know, at Social Security because he cannot work right now, you know. And then I was like, yo, maybe we can sell deuces. We're Jamaican. We come from a Jamaican background, island background. Floyd is a phenomenal cook. We cook. That's right.

[Troy Millings]

Toy.

[Floyd McCray]

We come from a background where everything that we do is with heart and with passion, but with flavor. And we know what we have to provide. And my personality, it Wasn't hard to just come up with this plan, but I needed to execute it. So we decided to go in a barbershop selling juices. But also, Floyd can tell you, when he went through his treatment, both radiation and chemo, he lost his smell and his taste for six months. Six months, y' all, he couldn't smell or taste. He had to eat from muscle memory, meaning we had to cook the same food, Jamaican foods that he remembered. So he can eat from his brain, mental. Mental memory of what this food should taste like. But it's the juices that help carry him through. Go ahead, Floyd. Share some of what you want to say.

[Troy Millings]

Yeah, I wish I could speak like her, you know, I'm a type of behind the scenes type of person, you know? But, yeah, the juices is what helped me, up to this day, survive. And growing up in Jamaica, we used to. We have a lot of fruit trees around, so we go around and pick fruits, eat fruits all day. We don't even have to cook, survive off of fruits, just fruit. And even if you don't eat food, you know that you have the fruits to survive. They are the fruits to give you the nutrients, the fiber, all that good stuff. So when I was going through my illness, I realized that the food is not helping. So I've had was to resort to, you know, juicing, which give me the. The vitality, the nutrients that I need to keep my weight on, you know, because the food. I wasn't eating the food to keep the weight on.

[Floyd McCray]

Yeah. And also, y' all because of the diagnosis he has, it's nasopharyngeal carcinoma. So in his nasal pharynx, where the back of the nose, throat meets. So getting chemo and radiation swelled up his throat and made it extremely sore to actually swallow. So what's the best, next best thing is to drink, Right? Yeah. And it was more so from the radiation. Especially when your throat is sore and it hurts, drinking something cool will be more supplements. You know, it feels cooling and soothing to your body. So when before this, I'm a certified health coach and life coach, and I was in a digital world just trying to find my way in traction, but I was struggling. But I felt like this was also born to help leverage my knowledge. And now we have a product that people can believe in. Right? Because again, once you try and you had it shot, you had it or you had it, y' all can speak from firsthand experience, not. It's not just juice. And we pray over these juices. All right? We are very serious about health and restoration because we're dealing with it in and of itself. This is again, four years, and he looks so damn good to have been going through so many trials and tribulations. So that was the underlying battery in my back. Because what do I have to lose? What do I have to lose other than to share this journey? Because we're not the only ones. We are not the only ones. Entrepreneur and entrepreneurs who are going through life trying to live and bring purpose and struggling with a diagnosis. Yeah. To help others. And we feel like this is something that needs to be more spoken about.

[Rashad Bilal]

So the big question, obviously, after the hundred thousand, how. What. What happens after the hundred thousand? How has life been over the last year?

[Floyd McCray]

Go ahead, time. I'll take that over. Tumultuous. It's been ups and downs. You know, people think that you get this grant and. And all of a sudden. And I feel like we felt it as well, that we was just gonna blow up. Everything was going to be great. It was going to be magic and rainbows and lights and, you know, there was still the work that has to be done. So we had some challenges. We had some. Some great accomplishments as well. So we were able to buy a commercial freezer so that we're able to.

[Liv McCray]

Stock juices and stock inventory.

[Floyd McCray]

We were able to get a trailer so that we're able to go out and go to these events and bring the juices and those personalities in person. What else did we do? We had a facelift to our tenant and vendor setup. And trust me, that made a big difference, y' all. Just us bringing in new quality as a tent. It draw. It drew more people to come to our tent and to try our juices. We also. Oh, we also got our website, y' all. We didn't have a website, which was one of the downfalls when we won this grant. We were not prepared because one of my goals when we went to invest fest was to absorb knowledge, was to learn trade and stock. Get up, get up, get all up in Ian's business, right. And learn all the things. And then I didn't. We didn't expect to win, right? So we weren't prepared. We didn't have a website. We didn't have links. But we learned those things the hard way. We have a fully functioning website that's absolutely beautiful. We're able to do a photo shoot. We have a SEO system. We have. We still deal with shipping. We have some little shipping challenges just trying to make sure we are using the right carriers and Couriers to get the juices there in a timely manner. Because we are dealing with power structures, goals, we were able to get a marketing agency to help us with ads and spread the love and the information of what it is to make us widespread, y' all. We ship to Cali. We ship to Cali. We ship to Texas. We shipped to New York. We shipped to Jersey. We shipped, I mean, New Orleans. We ship all across the nation. We just don't ship, you know, international. We were also able to get nutritional panels, because that's important. There's a lot of people that are like, oh, how much sugar is in it? How much calories are in this? You know what I mean? And these are helpful information that people need to see. And when we decided to go for this, we. We don't want Divine Luminous to be a. Oh, Nipsey Hussle 2024 winner. We want to be a forever brand. So we started strategizing as to how we can be that forever brand. So we've changed our logo where. So we've changed it, but we haven't introduced it, which we're hoping we could reveal today. We have labels around our bottles versus, you know, this logo and then the label. And again, this is impromptu. We start from humble beginnings. It was writing on bottles. Now it's this. And now we're in the process of getting our full labels that's wrapped around the bottle. Some of the other things that we were able to accomplish, we did a consultation with Pinky Cole and a lot of insight and information for our business that was help propel us in the future. And I mean, to be honest with you, when you have the funds, you're able to get more visibility. We were able to lock in on more festivals, more vendor opportunities that would have took taken maybe about a month to accrue the cost to pay for it just to be there. We were able to, boom, show up. Yeah, more products, more inventory, so we can sell stock and basically start shipping out. So there's been, again, a lot of triumphs, a lot of victories, and then there's been some challenges that spot a business we got to work through. We got to work through even the right bottles, y' all, because these are great squared, but squares are more expensive when it comes to wrapping a bottle. Cylinder bottles are better, but when we get cylinder bottles, we've been having a little challenge with. Once we freeze, then it thaws. It starts. Starts to indent. So we're having to talk to different producers and manufacturers to see if the bottle can handle freeze points. And then when it thaws, because we don't want people to get it and then have it indented. And the. The visual looks like, oh, this is not good quality, even though it is. So there's still a lot of things that we're working through. But when I tell you the hundred thousand dollars has blessed us tremendously. It has. But I also realized it gave us the reality that $100,000, especially when you come from, you know, humble beginnings, it sounds like a lot, but when you are building a business, oh, my God. And I had to fight with my spirit because I never wanted to feel ungrateful. I never wanted to feel ungrateful for this lump sum of money because it has literally, like Black Sam said, he said, I feel like this. This money will take this person to the next level. And it most definitely has. But our vision of what we thought it was gonna do, we still working on it.

[Rashad Bilal]

Yeah.

[Ian Dunlap]

You know what? I'm glad you brought up Black Sam. And congratulations again on winning. One of the things, as we were deliberating, he was saying, which one of these entrepreneurs embodies hustle spirit? Who has that hustle? And overwhelmingly, you know, the family together was saying, Divine Luminous. So congratulations again. We appreciate y' all coming on. We so proud of y' all. And I'm looking forward to my juices.

[Troy Millings]

Yes. I need my own little. Cool. We got you.

[Rashad Bilal]

What's your website? Instagram, all that stuff.

[Floyd McCray]

So website is www.divine d I v I N E Luminance, y' all. L U M I n a n c-e juices.com. our IG is Divine Luminance. You will also see a secondary IG of Divine Luminous Juices. That's my sister's account as a backup. We were just trying to be proactive, make sure nobody stole the name. Steal the name. Trying to steal us. And one more thing. We got our trademark. That is something that's very big, too. That hundred thousand dollars locked in our trademark. So we are. Are super official.

[Rashad Bilal]

The check. The check cashed.

[Floyd McCray]

Yo, let. Yo, let me tell you, you. If y' all don't know how many people was asking us if it was legit, there's nothing about Eyl that's illegitimate. Yes, it was legit. Microsoft, Darrell, everybody. We did have some house, but I know we gotta go, but we'll. We'll go on to our page and shout out y' all, come follow us. But, yes, the check was legit. Was legit. And we got it in a very timely Manner. We did not have to wait. They are a real bucks.

[Ian Dunlap]

Oh, yeah. Yeah. This isn't that 90. This ain't. This ain't that 90. Yeah. Appreciate you.

[Rashad Bilal]

Appreciate you. Thank you.

[Troy Millings]

Appreciate you.

[Ian Dunlap]

All right. Y' all be good.

[Rashad Bilal]

All right.

[Troy Millings]

Yeah, they're amazing.

[Ian Dunlap]

They still have that same energy, man. I love it.

[Troy Millings]

Sure.

[Rashad Bilal]

Man.

[Troy Millings]

Yeah. Like, I'm not making a claim or health claim, yada, yada, but there is something special about the juices. Like, I've had a bunch of juice companies. They have something special in that bottle. No pun intended.

[Rashad Bilal]

It's interesting what he said when he was like, you know, coming from Jamaica, I was just eating the fruit. He's like, you don't even have to. We ain't have to cook if we like. Like, everything is, is. Is on the earth for you to survive. So we talk about health a lot, especially on blackout. But a lot of times, like, we. It's interesting because it's like in more quote unquote advanced societies, the more money you get, you actually are working backwards from the original creation. Creation of what's provided for you. Like, everything is provided for you. Like, even in worse circumstances, you don't even have enough money to actually buy food or I have a gas stove or to cook. You can literally, you can live off of fruit.

[Troy Millings]

Yeah.

[Rashad Bilal]

Without the land, like, you know, but we go so far away from that and a lot of times and that causes problems. Right. So I thought that was like, real insightful for him to say. But why would people think that we. We would give a check and not actually.

[Troy Millings]

They're haters. Yeah. They'd be wishing for the death. I ever told you we started doing blackouts. They're like, you shot closer than that.

[Ian Dunlap]

Real business happens. Right. Like, and we, we deal in that space where it's like, oh, it's going to be net 140 days post today. You know how this goes, Ian. We. We're more of the net now people. So, like, yo, we said we're gonna do something, it's gonna get done the most. I think that the longest time barrier is like making sure that everybody who's going to receive it has all the information in order to. That's it. Because we ready to go. If we say we doing it, we ready to go.

[Rashad Bilal]

Yeah, man. That was. That was two enjoyable conversations.

[Ian Dunlap]

I like that. I like that, that business highlight piece.

[Rashad Bilal]

Yeah. You know, invest fest, man. It's more than celebrities. It's more than something.

[Troy Millings]

I know I got criticized for the hundred thousand dollar take, but a Business owner just told you.

[Ian Dunlap]

She just said it. She, she definitely, just said it.

[Rashad Bilal]

Definitely to use that money to ramp up. Not, it's not like you could just use that money. Just kick your feet up and it's, it's over. Yeah, she said you, you so, so many expenses.

[Ian Dunlap]

But yeah, man, it turned the hustle into overdrive.

[Rashad Bilal]

Lifechanging experience. Yeah, I, I don't know why you were not into the pitch competition. And like I said, this year it's Even, it's more money.125,000, but it's even more curated. It's, it's specific to tech. We got Paul Judge who's gonna mentor after the money is given. Like, it's just so much so. Everybody should be entering that pitch competition. If you have a business and if you don't have a tech component to your business, add one. And every business owner should be having a vendor booth because you're going to make money. And everybody should go to Invest Fest because why not?

[Troy Millings]

And if you're building your business, to be very honest, they will never say it, but the curation of audience plus people who are speaking, if you just tried to pay for it will probably cost you 10 to 15 million dollars. I'm just talking about on an advertising acquisition cost basis, like, it's, it's really tough to get that many people who are investing into the market, have businesses, have money, and all you have to do is get a 200 ticket and go and network.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah.

[Troy Millings]

Important one, I want you all to.

[Ian Dunlap]

Take note of the, the personality, the energy that she brings. That's, that's on an everyday basis every time we have an encounter. But I think she said something important about us as well is like we're personable. People gonna see us and they're gonna realize it's the same people that they've seen on Market Mondays or Blackout or on your leisure.

[Troy Millings]

And no different.

[Ian Dunlap]

It's no different. And we're going to give you advice and we're going to talk to you because we are people. We were made by the people. Right? This is not done without y' all. And so we are very aware of that. So we want to make sure we give our time to y' all.

[Rashad Bilal]

Ladies and gentlemen, blackout this Wednesday at 10 o' clock. We got punch. We got Ray Daniels. Nine, six o' clock on Thursday. Earn your leisure. We got Kurt Franklin, his business partner. Norm, get the tickets to Invest Fest. We're running the Ghana sweepstakes for another week. And the last thing I'll Say about Invest Fest is shout out to Gusto. They are doing. They're sponsoring 10 tickets, free tickets. So. Okay, first 10 people to hear this. If you go to invest fest.com and enter Gusto at checkout, you'll get a free ticket.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yes.

[Rashad Bilal]

That's going to be going by. I finished saying that it is officially done.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yo, and I'm glad you said listen to. Do us all a favor, right? Shout out to everybody on Eyl Network. Make sure that you go and download the audio. Go listen to it. If you're in your car, it's important that you listen to it. Go listen to Blackout. Go listen to Earning Leisure. Definitely go listen to Market Mondays. Get those audios numbers. They. They subscribe. Subscribe, comment, like, share with us. Let us know the feedback. Some things that y' all want to see, want to hear. All those metrics are important. So if y' all love us and y' all support us, go do that, please.

[Troy Millings]

Can I sponsor BE Simone, Take it to Invest Fest.

[Rashad Bilal]

Shout out to B. Simone, man. Blackout.

[Troy Millings]

That's Blackout, friend of the show. I got three tickets for you.

[Rashad Bilal]

Shout out.

[Ian Dunlap]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. We gotta. We gotta what? There's an app she's building. Is that what's going on? I didn't see the whole interview. They said there's an app that's costing a lot, but. Yeah, we don't know. Okay.

[Troy Millings]

But I do know Red Panda for sure. Absolutely. Lifetime.

[Rashad Bilal]

I feel like that's Lifetime for real investing. We're gonna talk about it on Blackout. But there's some valuable lessons. There's some valuable lessons in that.

[Ian Dunlap]

Great spirit, though. She's a great spirit, great human being. Love BE Simone, friend of the show.

[Troy Millings]

Yeah.

[Ian Dunlap]

Outside the show. Just a good person to us as well. Yeah.

[Rashad Bilal]

But don't sleep on Zara.

[Ian Dunlap]

Why would you H M either. No, no, no. You could buy.

[Troy Millings]

Get the app.

[Rashad Bilal]

Super valid.

[Ian Dunlap]

H m is valid.

[Rashad Bilal]

Yeah.

[Ian Dunlap]

Valid sty.

[Rashad Bilal]

I know from firsthand experience.

[Ian Dunlap]

I'm not saying I wear it right on the phone.

[Troy Millings]

Go right to Mexico.

[Rashad Bilal]

Zara's a good hit in any economy as well. No, it really ain't.

[Ian Dunlap]

It is.

[Rashad Bilal]

Product.

[Ian Dunlap]

I'm not saying that I shop there. I'm just. I know people that I obviously do.

[Rashad Bilal]

I've been. I.

[Ian Dunlap]

You shop there.

[Rashad Bilal]

I used to.

[Ian Dunlap]

Okay. And quality is not good.

[Rashad Bilal]

It's not the quality. It's the Zara has dope styles, like the styling of it. Like Zara.

[Troy Millings]

The look five times better.

[Ian Dunlap]

The quality of the clothes.

[Rashad Bilal]

Yes, quality and look. Quality and look. Yeah, but the look. For sure.

[Troy Millings]

Yeah.

[Ian Dunlap]

For men, women, and. Well, my kids have. Have H M stuff, for sure. I know that.

[Rashad Bilal]

Yeah. I mean, if you're a kid, you could wear anything but facts. God bless America. First and foremost. Be Simone. We're gonna talk about it.

[Troy Millings]

I got you. You gotta know in your up moments, you have to be humble.

[Rashad Bilal]

Stash bread at all times. Two tech to index facts.

[Troy Millings]

I know some of y' all be on me. Hey, yo, you don't never want to go. Nope. Got a Richard Millie. I said, are you crazy? You don't have a Millie in real life.

[Rashad Bilal]

What?

[Troy Millings]

Yo, man, you gotta get you one of these. No, I don't.

[Rashad Bilal]

Oh, man. All right, ladies and gentlemen, it's been real.

[Ian Dunlap]

It's been all right, y' all. Love is love. Be good.

[Troy Millings]

Peace.

[Floyd McCray]

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[Rashad Bilal]

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[Floyd McCray]

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[Rashad Bilal]

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[Floyd McCray]

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[Rashad Bilal]

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