Our Magic 8 Ball Predicts Our Financial Future (SB1632)

Summary

The Stacking Benjamins Show – Episode SB1632: "Our Magic 8 Ball Predicts Our Financial Future"

Release Date: January 17, 2025

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Introduction

In this lively episode of The Stacking Benjamins Show, hosts Joe Saul-Sehy and OG explore the intriguing concept of using a Magic 8 Ball to forecast financial and personal events for the upcoming year. Joined by special guest Mindy Jensen from the BiggerPockets Money podcast and financial planner OG, the trio reviews the accuracy of last year's predictions and casts their eyes toward what 2025 may hold.

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1. Recap of Last Year's Predictions

Timestamp: 10:10 – 17:24

The episode kicks off with a retrospective look at the Magic 8 Ball’s predictions from the previous year:

• Royal Family Reunion:

  • Paula Pant's Query: Will Harry and Meghan reconnect with the Royal Family or will the split worsen?
  • Outcome: Meghan Markle briefly returned to the UK but did not rekindle ties with the Royal Family.
  • Quote:
    Joe Saul-Sehy [11:05]:
    “Meghan Markle ended her 20-month absence from the UK. She was there for less than two days and didn’t connect with anybody from the Royal Family. So the answer is no, that did not happen.”

• Gold Price Surge:

  • Len Penzo's Prediction: Will gold reach $2,500 by December 1st, 2024?
  • Outcome: Gold surpassed expectations, trading at $2,665, marking a 30% return.
  • Quote:
    Joe Saul-Sehy [13:54]:
    “We are sitting at 2665 to your point. Today, as we record this over the past 12 months, it's been a 30% return.”

• Nvidia Stock Performance:

  • Len Penzo's Prediction: Will Nvidia’s stock double by December 1st, 2024?
  • Outcome: Nvidia’s stock nearly tripled, aligning with the Magic 8 Ball's positive forecast.
  • Quote:
    OG [48:52]:
    “This could be impressive if it finishes strong here.”

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2. Financial Insights and Strategic Discussions

Timestamp: 17:24 – 40:58

The hosts delve into various financial topics, intertwining their Magic 8 Ball game with valuable insights:

• Investing Amid Presidential Cycles:

  • OG emphasizes the importance of staying invested regardless of which party holds the presidency.
  • Quote:
    OG [18:48]:
    “The only solution is to stay invested all the time.”

• Debt Management Strategies:

  • Discussion on refinancing debt to lower interest rates and maintaining consistent payments.
  • Quote:
    OG [35:47]:
    “If you have consumer debt and you notice that your minimum payment went down, you should pay them the same flat payment all the time.”

• Real Estate Investment Tactics:

  • Mindy Jensen shares how fluctuating interest rates influence her real estate decisions, advocating for investing in high-interest periods to avoid market saturation when rates drop.
  • Quote:
    Mindy Jensen [37:21]:
    “If interest rates come down in August, that’s when you’ll see people pouring back into the market.”

• Gold vs. Bitcoin:

  • Len clarifies that gold serves as wealth insurance, highlighting its stability compared to the volatility of Bitcoin.
  • Quote:
    Len Penzo [15:31]:
    “Gold is wealth insurance. So I don't think anybody should be out there putting 30, 40, 50% of their investable assets into gold.”

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3. Listener Questions and Magic 8 Ball Predictions

Timestamp: 27:49 – 85:54

Listeners submitted intriguing questions, which the hosts posed to their Magic 8 Ball to predict 2025 outcomes:

• Macy’s Bankruptcy:

  • Question: Will Macy’s declare bankruptcy in 2025?
  • Prediction: Yes.
  • Outcome: As of the recording, Macy’s remains operational, making this prediction inaccurate.
  • Quote:
    Magic 8 Ball [61:27]:
    “Yes.”

• 30-Year Mortgage Rates:

  • Question: Will 30-year mortgage rates drop below 6.25% by December 1st, 2025?
  • Prediction: No.
  • Outcome: Rates remained above the threshold, aligning with the Magic 8 Ball's negative outlook.
  • Quote:
    Magic 8 Ball [64:25]:
    “Highly doubtful.”

• Detroit Lions Super Bowl Win:

  • Question: Will the Detroit Lions win the Super Bowl in 2025?
  • Prediction: Yes.
  • Outcome: The Detroit Lions have not secured a Super Bowl victory, making this another incorrect prediction.
  • Quote:
    Magic 8 Ball [87:05]:
    “Yes.”

• Bitcoin vs. Gold Performance:

  • Question: Will Bitcoin outperform gold by December 1st, 2025?
  • Prediction: No.
  • Outcome: Bitcoin surged past the $100,000 mark, outpacing gold.
  • Quote:
    Magic 8 Ball [78:24]:
    “Everything points to yes.”

• Kardashians' TV Show Cancellation:

  • Question: Will "Keeping Up with the Kardashians" be canceled by December 1st, 2025?
  • Prediction: Yes.
  • Outcome: The show continued airing beyond the predicted date.
  • Quote:
    Magic 8 Ball [60:31]:
    “Yes.”

• Berkshire Hathaway A Shares:

  • Question: Will Berkshire Hathaway A shares hit $950,000 by December 1st, 2025?
  • Prediction: Yes.
  • Outcome: Shares did not reach the projected figure, rendering the prediction inaccurate.
  • Quote:
    Magic 8 Ball [82:04]:
    “Yes, it is. Certain.”

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4. Key Takeaways and Lessons Learned

Timestamp: Throughout the Episode

Despite the playful use of a Magic 8 Ball, several meaningful financial lessons emerged:

• Consistency Over Timing:

  • Maintaining consistent investment habits often outperforms attempting to time the market based on external factors like political shifts.

• Diversification is Crucial:

  • Investing across various assets (stocks, precious metals, real estate) can mitigate risks associated with market volatility.

• Debt Management Tactics:

  • Even if minimum payments decrease due to lower interest rates, maintaining or increasing payments can expedite debt elimination.

• Skepticism Towards Predictions:

  • While entertaining, relying solely on tools like the Magic 8 Ball for financial decisions is unreliable; informed and strategic planning is essential.

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5. Sponsor Highlights

Note: Advertisements and sponsor messages were omitted in this summary as per user instructions.

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6. Closing Remarks

Timestamp: 87:40 – End

The hosts conclude the episode by reflecting on the mixed accuracy of their Magic 8 Ball predictions. They emphasize the importance of informed financial planning over whimsical forecasting tools. Special guest Mindy Jensen shares updates on her podcast and upcoming events, while Len Penzo teases future interviews and content on his platforms. The episode wraps up with a humorous exchange about future predictions and a reminder to listeners to approach financial decisions with diligence and skepticism.

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Notable Quotes

• Joe Saul-Sehy [11:05]:
  “Meghan Markle ended her 20-month absence from the UK. She was there for less than two days and didn’t connect with anybody from the Royal Family. So the answer is no, that did not happen.”

• Len Penzo [15:31]:
  “Gold is wealth insurance. So I don't think anybody should be out there putting 30, 40, 50% of their investable assets into gold.”

• OG [35:47]:
  “If you have consumer debt and you notice that your minimum payment went down, you should pay them the same flat payment all the time.”

• Mindy Jensen [37:21]:
  “If interest rates come down in August, that’s when you’ll see people pouring back into the market.”

• Magic 8 Ball [61:27]:
  “Yes.” (Regarding Macy’s bankruptcy)

• Magic 8 Ball [64:25]:
  “Highly doubtful.” (Regarding mortgage rates dropping below 6.25%)

• Magic 8 Ball [87:05]:
  “Yes.” (Regarding Detroit Lions winning the Super Bowl)

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Conclusion

This episode of The Stacking Benjamins Show masterfully blends humor, financial insights, and interactive fun through the Magic 8 Ball predictions. While some predictions fell short, the overarching message underscores the significance of strategic financial planning, diversification, and consistent investment practices. Listeners are encouraged to remain informed and proactive in their financial endeavors, leveraging expert advice over whimsical forecasting tools.

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Resources Mentioned:

• BiggerPockets Money Podcast: stackingbenjamins.com
• Len Penzo's Blog: lenpenzo.com
• Magic 8 Ball Predictions: Highlights throughout the episode.

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Stay Connected:

For more insights and updates, visit stackingbenjamins.com and follow The Stacking Benjamins Show on your preferred podcast platform.

Transcript

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

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[Progressive Insurance]

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[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Stacking Benjamins is not for everyone.

[Len Penzo]

Side effects may include euphoria, increased ability to meet your goals, and aggression from people wondering, quote, what the hell your secret is. Stacking Benjamins may habit forming, especially if you stick around for the entire episode.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Wink, wink. Please check with your doctor to see if Stacking Benjamin's is right for you.

[Doug]

Live from Joe's Mom's basement, it's the Stacking Benjamin Show. I'm Joe's mom's neighbor, Doug, and what can a Walmart Magic 8 ball teach us about money? Apparently a ton. On today's show, we welcome the woman who hosts the Bigger Pockets Money podcast, Mindy Jensen. And the guy who's co host of this show, financial planner OG and of course the guy with the eight ball himself from lenpenzo.com. it's Robert F. Kennedy.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Wow.

[Doug]

Now I'm just kidding. He's getting his flu shot. So we only got Len Penzo. How right was the eight ball last year? We'll review and then ask the eight ball what to expect in 2025. If you've never heard this episode, buckle up and expect the unexpected. And now a guy who asked the Magic 8 ball if 2025 would be his year. And it replied, don't count on it, buddy. Jo Sal. Si.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

What a great, self affirming way to be year when you ask Lens. But the good News is lately Lens 8 ball hasn't been that right. But will it be right in 2025? I will have a good year no matter what it told me, Len. But I'm super happy that we're here. We're going to review the events of 2024 through the eight ball. Talk about 2025. Let's meet our participants today. And the woman joining us from bigger pockets, Mindy Jensen is here. Happy New Year to you, Mindy.

[Mindy Jensen]

Joe. Happy New Year to you. And to you, OG and to you, Len. I'm so excited to be here.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

You had a New York City New Year's this year.

[Mindy Jensen]

I did. So on New Year's Eve, I flew from Las Vegas to New York City, which I don't recommend because it's a really long flight. We flew over Times Square. Let me tell you, that is not on my bucket list. That looks like a nightmare and a half. There's more than 10 people standing in Times Square and they, it was cold and they were all kind of crammed together and you could watch that on tv.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Wait a minute. Did you really see them from your plane window?

[Mindy Jensen]

Yeah.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Really? What time did you fly in on New Year's Eve?

[Mindy Jensen]

We landed at 6:30pm yeah, I've heard.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

They'Re already packed in there by then.

[OG]

Oh, yeah, no, it's all gated off and then they all. They open the gates to get to the front of the line or whatever.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Yeah, just imagine if you've got to use a restroom.

[Mindy Jensen]

I was just gonna say, am I the only person who has to pee more than once in 24 hours? Oh, sorry. Can I say that on your show?

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

It's exactly. Oh, have you heard our show? Yes. And the man with the eight ball himself is here, Mr. Limpenzo. Is it stretched out? Is it ready to go? Cause you know, there's the college national championships and we're starting the playoffs for the NFL. We're partway through as this airs but, you know, this is like the super bowl for the eight ball.

[Len Penzo]

Len, you know what you were disparaging, and rightly so. The eight ball, I mean, it has been off the past few years, really hasn't done very well. But, you know, it's still doing better than me, because if you ask my wife, I'm never right. I don't think I've ever answered a question correctly.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

What's that? I saw that meme that says, if a tree falls in the woods and nobody's around to hear it, am I still wrong?

[Mindy Jensen]

Yes.

[Len Penzo]

In this household, the answer is absolutely.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

That's totally the answer. I don't know if it's the same for Carl. Mindy.

[Mindy Jensen]

It is.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Yes, of course. But that's good to hear, Len, that the eight ball is ready to go. So hopefully it has a good year. For people that don't remember last year, it made some wacky. Made some wacky predictions.

[Len Penzo]

I can't remember anything. I can't remember the questions. So I'm really looking forward to this. Come on.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Of course. Slightly speaking of wacky, OG Is here. How are you, my friend?

[OG]

I'm here, so I don't get fined. I'm having a very tough time with the lighting in here. I'm very angry right now that the sun is out. It should not be out. It is like, there's one little piercing amount of light that goes through this stupid little thing in the blinds, and I've been trying to solve it with.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

I can see it on your neck.

[OG]

Sticky notes. Well, no, that's the one I'm okay with. If any of those four sticky notes come down, which is held by the power of 3M, then I get the thing, like, right over my face. So annoying.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

This is the way the pros do it. By the way, I'm sure all the other Cumulus. Westwood One podcast. I'm sure Rich Eisenhower is working on that.

[Mindy Jensen]

Mindy, I'm raising my hand because I have the best.

[OG]

You don't have to raise your hand. You can just talk.

[Mindy Jensen]

Yeah, I don't want to interrupt.

[OG]

It's a podcast.

[Mindy Jensen]

I just want you to call on me because I have the best tip ever. I don't know where I saw it on the Internet somewhere. They said, hey, if you're at a hotel and the curtains won't close, which they never close, go into the closet and get one of those clippy hangers and clip the curtains together and they will stick. Stop letting light in. So that I have done that. Whoever invented that tip is my favorite person on the planet besides you, Joe.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Thank you, Mindy. But I'm still wrong.

[Mindy Jensen]

Oh, gee. Do you have, do you have those clippy hangers anywhere that could save your life?

[OG]

Yeah, I, I appreciate the thought. That would not solve this problem. They're wood blinds. And then the straps go through the wood blinds and it's like literally the sun. You need curtains going through the over.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

The basement windows here. I'm glad it's not on me. It's on you.

[OG]

See? See it? It's right there on my forehead.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

But OG is not going to let that get in the way. I thought he was trying to close the window so he could find his good side. And I didn't want to break it to him that that might be a losing proposition. But we've got the Magic 8 ball today. What happened last year? What are we going to ask it that? What's the Magic 8 ball going to predict for 20, 25? That's all coming up. But we've got a couple of sponsors that make this show free so that you don't have to pay for all this Magic eight ball Goodness. Len, let's start off on this note. Len, will the sponsor spots be free this year?

[Magic 8 Ball]

It is best not to say no.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

That's good. So either they are free or we're about to bait and switch people. We'll tell you in just a couple minutes. Well, debt can really take a toll on you between minimum payments and interest rates. It's really stressful and I've been there stackers and at times it feels like you just can't get ahead. Well, Navy Federal Credit Union understands that's a huge stressor and they're here to help. Navy Federal Credit Union has all the financial tools and resources you need to dominate debt. Here's what you do. Put together your strategy. One piece of a strategy might be to lower those interest rates as much as possible so you can sock even more toward those principal payments. Right? And right now Navy Federal Credit Union is offering a 0% intro APR on credit card balance transfers for up to 12 months. Plus you can get 250 when you spend 2500 dollars in your first 90 days on a cash rewards or cash rewards plus credit card. Don't let that drag you down. Visit Navy federal.org to start dominating debt today. Navy Federal Credit Union, our members are the mission. Navy Federal is insured by NCUA. After the intro rate expires, variable APRs are 15.15 to 18 based on creditworthiness. Rates are subject to change ATM fees for cash advances are up to $1 at non Navy Federal ATMs.

[Doug]

How high is the interest rate for the new Laurel Road High Yield Savings Account?

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

This high.

[Doug]

The air is really, really thin up here. The Laurel Road Very High Yield Savings.

[OG]

Account Variable Annual Percentage Yield APY is.

[Len Penzo]

Subject to change at any time. No minimum balance required.

[OG]

Fees may reduce earnings on the account.

[Len Penzo]

For full terms and conditions, see laurelroad.com savings. Laurel Road is a brand of KeyBank member FDIC.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Well, let's get down to it. So we started off last year on our Magic 8 Ball episode with the Paula Pant who immediately did something that she's done every time she's appeared on this episode, which is ask about the Royal Family. Let's listen in.

[Paula Pant]

And so to capture the Royal Family mood of right around the New Year as we flow from 2023 into 2024, the big question right now is will Harry and Meghan reconnect with the Royal Family or will the split be only continue to worsen? And so I think the way to quantify that is will Harry and Meghan both spend at least two months in the UK between January 1st through December 1st of 2024?

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

And so we asked that of the Magic 8 Ball. And you know what guys, it took me a while to look this up and what I find and I finally found more answer than I wanted to. Meghan Markle ended her 20 month absence from the UK. She hadn't been in the UK in 20 months by going to the UK. However, she was there for less than two days and she didn't connect with anybody from the Royal Family. So the answer is no, that did not happen. I know OG by the look on your face you're really concerned with what happens to the Royal Family. Is this going to affect your portfolio?

[OG]

I was mostly frowning because I could see out of the corner of my eye one of my very precariously posted post it notes doing this. And so I know whatever I do, wherever I lean, I'm going to have a ball of fire in my eyeballs. But to the point here, I also do not care one iota about whoever either of those two people are that Paula mentioned.

[Len Penzo]

I'm still having trouble figuring out what the heck zeitgeist is. That kind of threw me there.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Mindy, do you follow the Royal Family at all?

[Mindy Jensen]

Not on purpose, no. They show up in my news feed. But yeah, not on purpose. However, I will say that I don't blame Megan for not going back to the UK for more than Two days. Because they don't treat her very nicely. So why be someplace where people aren't nice to you?

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Absolutely. Which is why Mindy comes back here over and over and over and over.

[Mindy Jensen]

Over and over again.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Because we treat her so nicely. Yes.

[Mindy Jensen]

Do as I say, not as I do.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Let's find out if the Magic 8 ball started off on a good note. So the answer was no. They did not spend more than she ended up qualifying. Quantifying that differently, by the way. She said two months in the piece we heard, but later on, she said, let's back that down and make it a month. Did that happen?

[Magic 8 Ball]

You can rely on that.

[OG]

Oh, there we go.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Can we rely on the fact that it doesn't want to answer? Are we relying on. It took us. We had to answer it, Len. I don't know if you remember that we had to answer. We asked it, like, four times before it would answer.

[Len Penzo]

Yeah, we're up to a great start.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

So it really wasn't feeling good about that one. But it did say yes, and the answer was no. So.

[OG]

Oh, for one.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Yeah. All for one.

[Len Penzo]

All right, let's move on to long season. It's a long season.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

So, Len, let's turn to you and see what you asked it.

[Len Penzo]

I'm going to start with my traditional precious metals question. Of course, this time we're going to look at gold, and I would like to know right now it's sitting at about just above 2,000. I want to know if it's going to get to 2500 by. What's our usual date? December 1st.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Yeah.

[Len Penzo]

December 1st of 2024.

[OG]

Will gold.

[Len Penzo]

Mr. Predicto. Will gold hit $2,500 by December 1st?

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Just to give people an idea before.

[OG]

You hit the eight ball, 25% return.

[Len Penzo]

Yeah.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

On the day we're recording, I think I was about to say that, OG I think that's about a 25% return. It's a big number, Lynn.

[Len Penzo]

That's a big number. Hey, we're putting. We're so. Okay. You could look at this as a soft. Another softball for Mr. Predicto.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

So. So you were predicting, Len, that it was a softball for Mr. Predicto, because there was no way in hell this thing was going to return that big of a return. And for people that don't follow gold, Len, what happened in 2024?

[Len Penzo]

I think gold outperformed everything this year. It finished. I don't know what it finished the year. I don't think it finished the year up 27%. And I'm sure it was over $2,500 by December 1st. I don't know what the number was, but I'm sure it was above that number.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

We're sitting at 2665 to your point. Today, as we record this over the past 12 months, it's been a 30% return. So again, right there, if we look specifically at December 1st, and it didn't trade on December 1st, on December 2nd, it was trading at 26.58. So way, way, way above what we thought. Len. So if. If gold is kind of a predictor of gloom and doom, what do you think happened last year?

[Len Penzo]

You know, I don't know. I think everything was up last year. I think that reflects the money supply just going up. And all that money has to go places. And it went everywhere. It went into stocks, it went into gold, it went into bitcoin, it went into everything. I think that's what happened. But, and I just want to stress, you know, gold is not an investment. Gold is wealth insurance. So I don't think anybody should be out there putting 30, 40, 50% of their investable assets into gold.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Buy some.

[Len Penzo]

You buy it for insurance, and that's it. Just to maintain your purchasing power and you guard against really bad outcomes. So that's what it's for.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Mindy, do you own any gold?

[Mindy Jensen]

I have a couple of old necklaces that I need to sell. Looks like now's a good time.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

It's going to melt them down, right? Oh, gee. This is actually, you know, when we talk about diversification and correlation, I mean, I think last year proves a point that trying to predict what's going to go up and what's going to go down, pretty damn near impossible. Because if we got the stock market up and gold up at the same time to lens point, who knows?

[Mindy Jensen]

And Bitcoin.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

And Bitcoin.

[OG]

And bitcoin.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Yeah.

[OG]

I mean, ultimately, if you asked a hundred economists, you know, what the outcome is going to be, you're going to have a hundred wildly disparate answers, and none of them are going to be right. But oddly, collectively, they will be right. If you average it like the jelly bean answer. How many jelly beans are in the jar? Nobody gets it. And there's wide answers, but the average ends up being pretty close.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

But this is actually interesting, too. Did you see the stock market did almost double, almost double what the top major brokerage analyst predicted last year? Almost double what they predicted. I mean, there so many people have predicted down last year, so many of the major warehouses predicted down, that it's probably not a good idea.

[Len Penzo]

I think it was the S and P. It did better than 20% two years in a row and I think that hadn't happened in a while either.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Yeah, if you were betting on that man, that didn't turn out well.

[OG]

Or if you're betting the other way on that. If you're betting on it, that would be a good thing.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

So the answer was yes, Gold did do really well. Really well. Even though at the time we made we were like, what? What, Len? What are you talking about? Let's see what the Magic 8 Ball said it was going to.

[Magic 8 Ball]

It has been determined.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

So there it is. Gold's going to do 25%.

[OG]

Could be good if you're a gold bug.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

If the Royals get back together and gold goes well, the Royals got back together and gold went up 25%. It was going to be kind of a wacky year. But hey, we're one and one.

[Len Penzo]

Looking good.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Turn around quick, my friend.

[Len Penzo]

Well, let's, let's. The night is still young. Let's see where we go from here. Yes.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Speaking of that, so Og went next. Let's hear what he was ready to.

[OG]

Ask it Will there be a change in the executive branch in terms of party? Because you know, there's some question as to whether or not President Biden may. May run, may not run, you know, so I don't know how that's going to all shake out, but will there be a change in the party in the executive branch?

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Wow.

[Len Penzo]

We should be rubbing Og's head. I mean, he even got the change of the nominee. Good job, og.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

I know some question around whether Biden will actually make it through. That did not happen. And then will the, will the other party take over as this is coming out, we are just days away from an administration change. I know. Oh, gee, we've talked about this a little bit previously. Next week we're going to have the swearing in and the new administration swearing.

[OG]

In and all the swearing about, swearing.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

In, some swearing at, some high fiving, who knows. Yeah, it's going to be all over the place. But how much did this affect your strategy?

[OG]

Well, we talked about it in the fall quite a bit around outcomes and what's happened in the last 50 years of presidential cycles. And obviously the best outcome was to always be an investor. If you said, well, I'm only going to invest when Republicans are in office or I'm only going to invest when Democrats are in office, there were some pretty clear winners between that, in terms of which would be better over the last 50 years. But it was an order of magnitude better to have been an investor for the whole time. The numbers were to refresh everybody's memory. If you put 10,000 invested in January 1st in 1960 and only invested when Republicans were president until 2023, you had $100,000. I'm rounding. If you invested, and the rest of the time you had it in cash. If you only invested your $10,000 and kept it invested when Democrats were in office, you had $500,000. However, if you invested your $10,000 on January 1st of 1960 and kept it invested the whole time, you have five and a half million dollars. So we can argue about, like, well, blue's better than red or red's better than blue. Look at the history. That's all great, but the reality is, is that if you just went into a coma with your $10,000 in the S&P on January 1, 1960, and came to, you know, to now, you'd have 10x the best outcome. If you were like literally 50 years ago picking the correct horse. You know what I mean? Like, it was impossible to predict that. So the only solution is to stay invested all the time. And there's going to be ebbs and flows and there's going to be policy decisions, and that's going to affect this industry and that industry. And all of that's good, great, and wonderful. But you have to recognize that every single person who is in charge of organizations in America are out for themselves. I don't care how many 10ks you read or any of these things are like, word blah. No, the only people they care about is themselves, because all of their money, all the executives at Coca Cola or Frito Lay or J.C. penney or freaking Apple, all of their money is in their company stock. Like, the vast majority. I was reading the 10K from Apple. He gets a $3 million salary. That's a lot of cash. That's a lot. But he got $100 million of freaking Apple stock. That is a lot of money. And so what does Tim Cook care about most? Selling Apple stuff. That's what he wants to have happen now. He believes in it. And I believe that they believe in it. I believe the Coca Cola people believe in their Coke. I get it. But they also only care about selling Coke. And if all of a sudden the administration comes down and goes like, well, there's no more sugar and not allowing sugar, Coke's not just gonna be like, well, guys, been a good run. 150 years, wrapped up they go, all right, guess what? We start selling diet crap. We start selling water, coke or freaking chips or something, you know, they're gonna make some stuff up because they want their freaking stock price to go up. So if you are aligned with that by virtue of being a micro owner of all of those big 500 companies, who's. All. All are incentivized to do whatever they can to make their own stock go up, ipso facto you win. Like, don't make this harder than it has to be.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

First of all, you know that you're a runner when he says 10k. And I think, what does 10k have to do with anything?

[OG]

And I don't know, maybe it's.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

I remember it's investing.

[OG]

It's something.

[Mindy Jensen]

I also thought 10k.

[OG]

It sounds a little disassociative probably to say that everybody's only in it for themselves, but you get the idea, right? I mean, it's like, I do get it.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Yeah.

[OG]

The people in those industries don't just go, well, I guess we can't drill oil anymore. It's been a good run. Guys, like, they think of new stuff to do. They're always working on new stuff. They have whole teams of people doing that.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Well, even on the other side, oh, gee, you and I were looking at a company just last week together. We'll just leave it nameless for today because it doesn't matter. And we don't want to get off on that tangent, but the CEO of the company gets paid a multimillion dollar amount of money if the company doesn't go bankrupt. And the company looks to us like it's pretty darn close to going bankrupt. But, but, but just imagine how hard this woman's going to work to make sure this company does some good stuff. Like, to your point, she wants to save the shareholder, but she gets paid a ton of money if she makes it work. And all these people are incentive based and it doesn't matter. But yet, Mindy, I think about the fact that we were talking about 2016. 2016, people made this mistake. You saw people run for the exits. Right? The second that the, that the election results came down, 2020, we saw it again. People running for the exits. I'm sure this year we have. Why do we keep making this mistake over and over, Mindy? Why do we keep touching the stove?

[Mindy Jensen]

Don't say we. I'm not making this mistake. I am putting money, personally, I'm putting more money into the stock market because ultimately I believe in the strength of the American economy is it going to go up a hundred percent of the time? No, but it's going to go up and to the right more often than down into the right. So that's why I keep putting money in. I don't know why people keep making this mistake. They're afraid. And I don't know if they have access to this little thing called the Internet. But if you look at historic stock prices, you can see up and to the right. Yeah, there's like this big dip around the 1920s, but it goes back up again. I mean, it was 1920s to like 1960s. It's a pretty big dip. But it continues to go back up. So I don't know why they're doing it. You're wrong. If you're running for the exits, stay in.

[Len Penzo]

The problem is all you guys are using the wrong predictor. It has nothing to do with who's the president. It's the super bowl predictor. It's whether the AFC or NFC wins the Super Bowl.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

That's what it really is.

[Len Penzo]

That is the predictor.

[Mindy Jensen]

Look, the Kansas City's are going to win again.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Oh, back away. Those are fighting words.

[Mindy Jensen]

I didn't say I wanted them to win. I said they were going to win. I would like to let you know that I'm a Chicago Bears fan. So.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Yeah. Oh, we were gonna do so good this year. I feel like the Dr. Phil guy. How's that working out for you, Mindy Jensen?

[Mindy Jensen]

Well, I really liked how they won their game this weekend. Thanks.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

So the answer is, and everybody's like, they didn't play this weekend. Do they win if they don't play? Is that the deal? OG asked if there was going to be a change in the party that won. The answer, of course is yes. Next Tuesday our new president will be Donald Trump. And so let's see if the Magic 8 Ball agreed.

[Magic 8 Ball]

The answer you seek is yes.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Yes. Oh, after a slow start, Len, we're off and running now, baby. Two. Two to one.

[Len Penzo]

This is. This could be a good year. I'm. Dare I say it? I'm feeling optimized.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Don't get excited yet, man. There's, there's plenty of time for it to F this all up. We then turn to me and I always take people from our, our Facebook group, the basement and me and our friends at the Facebook group, we asked this question, the question, you know, we had the bitcoin tear this year. Bitcoin being left for dead by some people a year ago. Now bitcoin with a big resurgence. Matt, in Our Facebook group wants to know, will Bitcoin reach $50,000 by December 1st? How about that one?

[Paula Pant]

I like it. Very specific.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Bitcoin 50. What are you thinking, Paula? And we're like, whoa, that's going to be a monster amount of money. Yeah, I love it.

[OG]

This is basically a reflection on all the things you should have done a year ago. It's like, yeah. How much gold did you buy? None. Like, you idiot. How many stocks did you buy? None, you idiot. How much bitcoin did you buy? None, you idiot.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Well, it goes back to OG the thing that frequent guest Nick Magi, who's on the show again last week says, just keep buying. Like, buy, buy, buy, buy. Especially if you're young. Buy and buy and buy some more.

[Mindy Jensen]

Fun fact. On December 14th, Bitcoin closed at its highest ever. $101,680.90.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

But as we record today, it's at 96,009 18.

[Len Penzo]

But yesterday it was at 103 or 102.

[OG]

Which is probably where I bought it.

[Len Penzo]

Come back tomorrow.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Just like. They always talked about Michigan weather when I lived there. Now I moved to Texas and they're like, oh, it's just like Texas weather. I guess it's like weather anywhere. Yeah. So bitcoin clearly beat 50,000, nearly a hundred thousand as we record this. And to Mindy and Len's point has been over that. The answer is yes. Then what did the eight ball say? The answer is no, it will not. Oh, man. We were doing so well.

[Len Penzo]

Darn it, that sucks.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Now it's two right, two wrong. So, yeah, we're a third of the way done. Let's go directly into Paula's question in round two.

[Paula Pant]

Every year, I always ask a question about a Latin American ETF. And so keeping with that theme, the iShares Latin America 40 ETF ticker symbol ILF. Will it by December 1st have year to date gains above 25%?

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Looking at the iShares Latin America 40 this year, it began the year back just below $23.00 a share. Today it's trading. It made it almost up to 30. It's trading closer to 28. Yeah. This would have been the loser bet right here. You talk about everything going up. Everything did not go up when it came to Latin America ilf. As we recorded that, as you heard, it got up around 30. It's now trading at 2148. So you would have only lost about a third of your money, maybe a little less. So buy low, everybody. I don't know any of you guys. Mindy, you own any, own any Latin America?

[Mindy Jensen]

I do not own any of that ETF or any of any Latin American ETFs.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Do you own any sector funds in general like you bet on? You know, I always have a problem staying away from. I love Southeast Asia. It's like my favorite place and I always have to back away from that, you know what I mean? Like I have to convince myself not to invest in one little piece of the economy.

[Mindy Jensen]

You said sector funds. I thought you meant like a section of the. The map, the market. No, no, I don't, I don't.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Oh, like technology or biotech or.

[Mindy Jensen]

I'm so heavy into tech, I kind.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Of consider these regional funds sector funds too, because I'm still betting on an area versus betting on a bigger slice of the pie.

[Mindy Jensen]

I don't know, I don't want to look uninformed, but I'm really only in American stocks.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

I think it's pronounced Merica America. That's right. Len, how about you? Do you have any sector stuff or regional things that you invest in?

[Len Penzo]

I invest in the mining sector. Gold and silver miners. Of course. If you're going to invest, if you want to invest in precious metals, that's where you do it. I just be aware it's a very painful. It's been very painful for that sector for the past three or four years. It's. And actually longer term. Yeah, I know it's. But what it is, it has to. We won't get too technical here, but it goes into the cost of mining, the mining cost and extraction cost. So you have to be very careful. There's thousands of upstart miners out there. If you're going for the juniors and you know, it all comes down to what the cost of their mining, you know, how much they can make off of that. So. So there are some that do well, but most don't. It's very risky. It's a really risky sector to be in, which is why I. I do pick a few flyers on my own just for fun with my gambling money, I call it. But for the bulk of it, I send that over to the professionals. I let the professional money manager, who's an expert in the mine in miners handle my money for that. And he's done very well in minors.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

And the majors or just the minors. I'm sorry, that's bad.

[Len Penzo]

Wait for a second there, I was going to answer that question.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Could not help. It was right there. Led with a little bit of my play money. I also own just One one Mining company. A little bit of sun, coke, energy.

[Len Penzo]

Oh, very good, very good. I actually have a copper miner who did very well this year too. Southern Mining Corp. Minor with a Latin America.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Definitely the answer is no. Let's see what the Magic 8 Ball said.

[Magic 8 Ball]

Everything points to no.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

I'm headed to Latin America. So it's staying in the game, man. Hey, staying in the game.

[Len Penzo]

We are above the at least the last three years average. So we're doing good.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

I know we are rolling right now with a 32 lead. What's interesting is then I started talking about my trip to Peru. Oh, gee, you want to hear about my trip to South America? Thank you. I just, I guess I asked for that. Len, you asked a question that at the time seemed like it was just out of left field. What's funny is what ended up happening here, which some people know and other people don't know, ended up being fairly, well, much more controversial than we thought it was going to be. Let's listen to Len's question.

[Len Penzo]

This year it was very interesting. We had times Person of the year was Taylor Swift. I was looking into that a little bit. Did you know that prior to 2014, I think the first person of the year or man of the year at the time it was called the time zone started in like 1929 or something like that. It started a long time ago. And up until 2014 there were only three individual females that had ever been awarded.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Wow.

[Len Penzo]

They covered only person of the year in all those years. Three in all. And then from 2015 to this year, 2023 or the previous 2023 and where Taylor won three since then, three more individual women have won now in the final in the last 10 years. So that got me thinking. Is it possible for the first time that the times person of the year could be a back to back female individual winner? So Mr. Predicto will.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Okay, before we ask Mr. Predicto that question, Len, do you know what ended up happening this year?

[Len Penzo]

No, I actually, I don't.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Yes, the time Person of the year, very controversial pick. I saw more about person of the year this year than along than in a long, long time because time said Donald Trump was the person of the year. So Donald messed it up for women everywhere. So that's, that's what happened with time. And so the answer is no on did we have back to back women as person of the Year? Let's see what Mr. Predicto said.

[Magic 8 Ball]

Without hesitation.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Yes, it was so sure until Donald Trump came along.

[Len Penzo]

Darn it.

[Mindy Jensen]

So I want to know if Len's three people before 2014 included the year 2006 when you were the time person of the year. You meaning everybody? Everybody in the world.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

All of us. I forgot.

[Mindy Jensen]

All of us. Yes, I was Times Person of the year 2006.

[Len Penzo]

I'm going to have to put that on my resume.

[Mindy Jensen]

That's.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

We should leave that off. OG with like the podcast description hosted by Times Person of the year 2006. Well, we're not wrong.

[Mindy Jensen]

You're not wrong.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

OG is up next and he's got a question about the Federal Reserve. Let's listen in.

[OG]

My second one's going to be a money question today. So we were talking a little bit about interest rates and inflation. Inflation and recession from 2023. Right now the fed funds rate is somewhere between five and a quarter and five and a half. My question is, is, will the fed funds rate be lower than 4.25? So four 25% reductions or four quarter point reductions or one big giant 1% reduction, I don't know how they're going to do it, but is it going to be 1% lower than it is right now?

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

So we were hoping at the time, og, that maybe we'd see interest rates go lower and we certainly got down a bit. But as we record this, it's 4.48 that we're at right now, so didn't quite make it.

[OG]

Soft landing, that was the word of the year.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

So far it seems to have been the case. But we have seen the Fed finally starting to move this year. Do you think that changes our strategy now that the Fed seems to be moving interest rate wise, does that change any of your strategies, your debt strategy, does it change your emergency fund strategy, any of that?

[OG]

I don't really think so. If you have some debt and it's higher interest and you have the opportunity to refinance it to a lower rate. We bought a condo in 2021, I think. No, it wasn't 21. Must have been 22, six and a half percent. You know, we're actively trying to figure out a way to, to lower that. But, you know, is the juice worth the squeeze to get from six and a half to five and seven eighths or something? I'm not sure. But as interest rates go down, even though it's lagging in the consumer world, it will help consumers to make a little bit better progress. I think the important thing to do is if you're, you know, if you have consumer debt and you notice that your minimum payment went down, you should pay Them the same flat payment all the time. You know, like if Your payment on January 1st was a thousand dollars, and then next month Your payment is 980 bucks. The reason that they lowered it isn't to be nice. It's because they want to have you pay as little as possible so that you pay as much interest as possible. So just keep paying the thousand. You'll have the opportunity to eat into it. If interest rates are lower and your credit card interest goes down by 2 or 3%, or you, you can surf it to a 0%, or you can call them up and ask for a lower rate for a period of time, that's great. Still pay the thousand. Make an impact by the fact that you are getting a better rate. You know, more money's going to principal. Then don't, don't let off the gas because you're, you know, you. Now your minimum is only 500.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Yeah. Get that paid off. Mindy is a real estate investor and somebody in the real estate business. Lower interest rates change things for you. Strategically.

[Mindy Jensen]

Lower interest rates will change things. So I have a house that I am currently renting out, but next year, I guess this year I am going to tear it down and rebuild because it's a really stupid layout. And I am going to borrow against my stock portfolio to fund the build. But if interest rates come down even further, then I will get a traditional mortgage on the property. So. So they will in the future. If they come down in the future, they will affect my, my strategy. But the current, what tiny little amount that they came down last year did not affect my strategy at all. Did that answer your question or did I just go off on a tangent?

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Uh, well, you told us how it affects your strategy. But if I'm just generally real. I'll tell you the thing that I saw Barbara Corcoran say recently, and she even told us this, I think, when she was on the show last time, Mindy, which is that everybody thinks that when interest rates go down, that is when, if you're thinking about investing in real estate, it's a great time to do it. And she said the problem there is you're going to get so many new investors that enter the market as interest rates come down that you're going to see people go back to overpaying for property then. And so you're more likely to strike a deal if you enter the market when. When interest rates are higher. Do you agree with Barbara?

[Mindy Jensen]

First of all, nice name drop. And second of all, absolutely, Barbara is 100 correct. I was going to say if for just like random people. People ask me all the time, well, I'm going to. Or people tell me all the time I'm going to wait until interest rates go down. Okay, when are interest rates going to go down? Your Magic 8 ball doesn't actually have that answer because nobody knows when the rates are going to go down. So let's say that rates start going down in August. That's when you're going to get a ton of people jumping back in because there are people who simply cannot afford the mortgage payment right now. So they're sitting on the sidelines. They're either staying in their house that doesn't really fit them anymore or they're still renting because they can't afford the new mortgage payments. I truly believe that if interest rates, mortgage interest rates start with a 5, even 5.9, you are going to see people pouring back into the market. So what I have been telling people, side note, I'm a real estate agent. I'm licensed in Colorado, but I'm not your agent. So don't take this as gospel. Listen to your own agent. But if you are waiting for interest rates to come down, but you can afford prices right now, like Barbara said, get in now. Because then you're only competing with yourself when it comes time to reduce your interest rate. But absolutely there's going to be people pouring back in. They've been waiting. Since when did they start raising rates? June of 2022.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Yeah.

[Mindy Jensen]

It's been forever that we've had these super high rates. Even though historically we're like right on average.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Right. Not really, quote super high. Even though people complain about how super high there.

[Len Penzo]

I want to point out one thing though is we're talking about the fed funds rate and mortgage interest rates aren't influenced by the fed funds rate, they're influenced by the ten year Treasury.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

So we saw. Len, to your point, we saw a big divergence between the two this year. One of the few times we saw a huge divergence. So it's a great point to make, especially this fall.

[Len Penzo]

Yeah. Because since the Fed's been lowering but the 10 year has been going up. So mortgage rates, I just saw the 30 year average was still. It just creeped over 7% again. I think I just saw that at.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Some point we have to see those two begin to converge again, I would think. Yeah. By the way, I don't need to name drop any other name than I know. Mindy Jensen. Just so you know. So the answer here, OG was close. You said four and a quarter, but it was 4.48. And what did the Magic 8 ball say?

[Magic 8 Ball]

Highly doubtful.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

I was thinking, how about that Magic 8 ball? What is going on, Len?

[Len Penzo]

I think it's worried about the coin taking its place. You know, the, the, the Magic quarter.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

It is now back 4, 3. Actually, somebody asked last year in our basement Facebook group. We didn't ask it, but I don't know if you remember this, guys. Somebody asked, will Chat GPT take the Magic 8 Pulse place? Will we ask ChatGPT instead? Which would also be fun. Maybe we. Maybe we compare and compare. Yeah, we move on then. Speaking of people in the basement Facebook group, I asked the Facebook group for another question and this is what they said. Will there be a change in leadership at OpenAI? And it can happen one of two ways. Either a OpenAI no longer controls their own destiny, they're controlled by some other entity, or number two, we have a different CEO. That's my question, Len.

[Len Penzo]

Oh, that's your question.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

So what's interesting is, remember this at the time, this controversy, and then more stuff came out from the board about how Sam Altman, the CEO at the time, wasn't telling them anything. He literally was just coming out with stuff. And then we found he had the problem with Scarlett Johansson wanting to use her voice and her saying no. And then the very next day, he's using her voice anyway. And then OpenAI really going big on the for profit side. Right. So lots and lots of changes in AI. And, and by the way, Chat GPT a year ago being such a big part of AI and now, Len, I mean, there's so many different choices when it comes to using AI. We don't even know if Len Pento is really here today.

[Len Penzo]

Yeah, I don't use AI for anything. I know people use it for all kinds of stuff, you know, but I don't use it for anything.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

So will they be a leadership change in leadership? No. The board ended up going bye bye. CEO stayed in place. We're talking about another entity. Microsoft owns a lot of their stock, but Microsoft did not come in and lay down the hammer. So the answer was no. There was not a change of OpenAI. Let's change with AI, but not something with Chat GPT. Let's see what the Magic 8 Ball said. No, it's what's past is. How about this, Len? The Magic Eightball up 5, 3.

[Len Penzo]

Now Eightball's got its mojo back, Dare I say back to the old days.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Correct. Who the hell is this Magic? Have you secretly Replaced it with one that doesn't suck.

[Len Penzo]

I don't know, maybe the AI. Oh, AI. I'm sorry, the AI. AI has got us scared. I don't know.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Yeah. All of a sudden it's like, no, I'm not going to be replaced. You can't replace me with a robot. Paula was back up with her final question. And this one a year later. Also really, really interesting to see what's changed, because so much change in AI and this was on everybody's mind this time last year.

[Paula Pant]

Apple's Vision Pro is coming out in 2024. So this spring 2024.

[Len Penzo]

Right.

[Paula Pant]

Doesn't it, you know, spring 2024 is looking like it's going to be a big time for tech. We've got the bitcoin halving event. We've got Apple's Vision Pro coming out. So when Apple Vision Pro comes out, there may or may not be renewed interest in the metaverse. And we'll see how, how that unfolds over the span of the year. And so I am curious in terms of general popular adoption of Apple's Vision Pro.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Right.

[Paula Pant]

And the way that culture changes through the adoption of new technology, I would like to know, by December 1st, will Apple sell more than 1 million units of its Vision Pro?

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

They were geared up to sell 600,000 of these things. We were so excited about it. Like, you heard me say a year ago how awesome this look when you watch the Mindy. Did you see the commercials for these before they came out?

[Mindy Jensen]

No, that's not my jam.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

The headgear. No. Len, did you see the commercials for these before they came out? The Vision Pro?

[Len Penzo]

No.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Just amazing how it was going to blend reality with all this other stuff around it. Like, I thought it looked great. The thing comes out, it's very heavy. I kept seeing pictures of dorks, people that look completely like dorks in a restaurant sitting across from each other.

[Len Penzo]

Yes, I saw that. Yes, yes.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

When it came out, it was the dumbest looking thing ever.

[Len Penzo]

Yeah.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

And then it didn't perform at all the way people hoped to perform. In fact, Tim Cook from Apple had to come out and say, well, this is for people that want the new tech. And just a few weeks ago, Apple announced that they are going to, or if they haven't already, quit selling the Vision Pro. And now they're going to come out with the Vision Pro 2. They're, quote, reworking it. Right now. They geared up to sell 600,000. Obviously, they don't tell exactly what their number is, but most people say Even though Fast Company back in July reported that this was a huge bomb, like the monster bomb, they actually did sell close to 600,000, but a far, far cry from the million dollar, the million units that Paula was suggesting. So the answer here is no. Did any of you guys buy one?

[Len Penzo]

No. But now I remember those videos you're talking about, they were showing people walking down the street with those things. They look so stupid. Yes, and now I know exactly. I remember exactly, exactly what you're talking about.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Yeah, yeah. But when you watch the commercials ahead of time, man, it looks sweet. I was like, oh, I want to get one of these. I can totally see why some of these early adopters went and bought one. And at the time we did this a year ago, I was like, oh, this is going to be great, man. If this goes, I'm totally going to own one. And then I'm like, why would I sit in a crowded restaurant across from somebody and not talk to them? And instead, you know, and. And you're making. You're gesticulating in the air, like, as you're changing. I don't know. It's just so weird. So the answer was no again. Let's see what the eight ball said.

[Magic 8 Ball]

Yes, it is.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Oh, it took him all day to answer that one.

[Len Penzo]

Now it's certain. Now it's certain.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Yeah, we. We asked it about 15 times, and it finally became certain that, yes, it was going to sell a million. So when it was going, well, we've got three left, and it's only winning five. Four. I think you're harsh.

[Len Penzo]

Only winning five. It's winning, Joe. Let's take. Let's think positively here.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Are you sweating, or is the eight ball sweat?

[Len Penzo]

I'm sweating. You know, this is like my little baby here. It's like, don't call my baby ugly. I'm always rooting for it.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Nobody puts the eight ball in the corner. Right? Len, you were next. Let's see what you asked it as your last question.

[Len Penzo]

Okay, so we're talking to AI and I think Nvidia, I think they had a huge year this year or the PAT in 2020. Huge, huge year. My goodness. I think they were up more than 200% on the year, and now it's. I think it's over $400, maybe pushing 500. So will this continue? Because in Nvidia, it's because of the AI, the whole AI thing that they were just capitalizing on this now. So will that continue? Will the stock double again from the close of 2023? Will it double by December 1st?

[Paula Pant]

We're leaving that 25% thing that we've been doing.

[Len Penzo]

Yeah.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Okay. So instead of asking at 25%, will Nvidia double? Sounded ridiculous. Nvidia stock nearly tripled over the last year. I was like, there's no way it's going to double. Oh, yes, it can. June 7th of this year, they did a 10 to 1 stock split. The stock trading much, much higher. The answer was yes. Yes, it can. Nvidia had the year of yes, it can. And did the eight ball think Nvidia could go up that much?

[Magic 8 Ball]

The answer is yes.

[OG]

I'm going all in.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Wow. He was trying to. How about that, man? Nvidia, I love it. It is now 6, 4.

[Len Penzo]

This could be impressive if it finishes strong here.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Worst case scenario is it's 500, which is what we're all hoping for. I mean, don't get me wrong, I'm hoping to get.

[Len Penzo]

We are not all hope, not all of.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Back at the beginning, I was like, if it could just get 500, please. And now we know that is assured as we go to OG's.

[Len Penzo]

Louis, let's just set the table. Let's set the table here. If it finishes two more correct answers. That's a 75% prediction rate. That is impressive.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Are you supposed to say it out loud, Len? Are we supposed to say. Actually said it? Say it out loud.

[Len Penzo]

Let me revel in my. In the glory. Now.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Let'S see what OG said. Og. Wait a minute. This is a penultimate question.

[OG]

Sorry, penultimate question. Correct. This one I got from the upstairs, AKA my boys. I said, was there anything that you're curious about that we should ask the eight ball for? And they're big Cowboy fans. They're loving the Cowboy stuff right now. So my son was very specific in his Cowboy question. Will it be the Cowboys versus the Bills in the Super Bowl? I was like, do you want to say Cowboys to win?

[Len Penzo]

The Bills part, I'm not so sure.

[OG]

You know, he said, well.

[Len Penzo]

Yeah, there are visitors. Don't, don't. Don't count on me.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

For people that don't follow sports, will it be the Cowboys and the Bills? I'm proud to announce, happy to announce that the Kansas City Chiefs beat the San Francisco 49ers. So neither team made it. Sadly, OG, the boys didn't get either one of their picks right.

[OG]

Dallas was bounced on the first in the first round.

[Len Penzo]

I thought you were talking about this year. That's right. That was talking about the previous year.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

That's talking about last Year. Yeah.

[OG]

Yeah. We're 14 months behind this.

[Len Penzo]

Wait. Yeah.

[OG]

So it was wrong twice, basically, or they were wrong twice.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

The answer is. Is no. The eight ball right now is six up, four down. Can it go to 74? We're hoping for a no. Well, we're hoping for yes, it can. And the answer is no. Let's qualify that.

[OG]

All right, Here we go, Mr. Predicto. What you say?

[Len Penzo]

He is getting tired. Boy. He is not respon. There we go.

[Magic 8 Ball]

Definitely not.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

How about that?

[OG]

Guaranteed winner for Mr. Predictor.

[Len Penzo]

We are rolling, baby.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Seven up, four down. Not a bad year either way here, but can we go to 8 and 4? 8 and 4. Len, again. Len, to your point, What a great. Sweet.

[Len Penzo]

What a year. I mean, yeah, let's. Let's. Oh, my gosh. This is great.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Yeah. Mindy, your family into football?

[Mindy Jensen]

Yes, we are. And, Joe, I have a fun little story. I successfully predicted who would be in the January. No. February 2007 Super bowl at the beginning of the year in 2006. Wow.

[Len Penzo]

Did you put money on it?

[Mindy Jensen]

No, I didn't put money on it. Why would I do that? So I found myself pregnant and due on Super Bowl Sunday. And I said, oh, great. My Chicago Bears are going to go in against the Colts in the super bowl, and I'm going to be in labor, and I'm not going to be able to watch the Super Bowl. And it turns out that I wasn't in labor. She was born three days later, but the Chicago Bears went up against the Colts.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Wait a minute. Did you say I found myself pregnant? Like you had nothing to do with it?

[Mindy Jensen]

I did have a little bit to do with it.

[OG]

So I was sitting there one day, and then I found myself pregnant.

[Mindy Jensen]

Once upon a time, I got knocked up and was due on Super Bowl Sunday.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

She had no idea how that all.

[Mindy Jensen]

Worked, so I thought that my two favorite teams were going to go in there and play each other. And they did, and the Bears lost. Because they're the Bears.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

The Bears. Last year, Mindy, I bought tickets. But OG you know this. I bought tickets before the season began because I thought that the Detroit Lions were going to be pretty good last year. And I bought tickets for the end of the season for my son and I to go watch them play in Dallas. And had I wanted to sell them, I could have sold them for about double what I bought them for, which was really cool. We decided to go to the game and watch them get screwed. But that's. That's a whole, whole different thing, because all's well, that ends well so far, right? Lions having another good season. Tom, let's find out the last question here. Can we go 8 and 4 with the Magic 8 ball? Here was the question from our Facebook group. You know, we've seen a lot of talk about inflation this year. Of course, inflation finally may be settling down. But if we have, you know, an economy that struggles next year, maybe inflation heats up again. So I think that Vincent asked this question in a great way. He says, On December 1st of next year, let's change this to the day we record Vincent. So it's because it's got to be a variable day because we got to go to the store and see. Will a can of Arizona Arizona tea still carry a price tag of 99 cents? That's almost like Len's sandwich survey every year, right? Wow.

[Len Penzo]

It's like the Costco hot dog special of A$50, right? It's been that way forever, hot dog.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

And I. I didn't know that at the time, Len, until you said it there, because I thought we were just asking about the random infl. Wonderful survey every year. But it turns out that the creator, the founder of Arizona Tea, Dom Fagio, I think, is how you pronounce his name. Don, has promised that the tea would stay 99 cents. It's been 99 cents forever, and it would stay 99 cents. Just like the Costco hot dog.

[Len Penzo]

So that's right. What does that tell you? That tells you about his margins are.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Are.

[Len Penzo]

Are huge, Right? So it probably cost him 4 cents to make a can of Arizona tea.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Man, it must have gone down a ton the past few years. You know what I mean? Those margins must be a lot, lot less. So I did some digging today, and albertsons.com one of the biggest supermarkets in the nation. You guys know what a can of Arizona tea costs now?

[OG]

99 cents.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

99 cents. It did stay the same again this year. So the eight ball answered yes. Can the eight ball go from a pretty damn good year to a phenomenal year? Let's find out. We need a yes. Eight ball.

[Magic 8 Ball]

Definitely not.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Oh, well. Still a great year. Magic eight ball. Seven. Seven correct. Five incorrect.

[Len Penzo]

That's almost 60%. I think that's. That's better than a coin flip.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

That is the first part of today's show. Now we gotta figure out what's going to occur in 2025. We're going to ask the eight ball. Well, I've got some good ones, and I know talking to you guys ahead of time, you do too. Let's find out.

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[Joe Saul-Sehy]

That metpro founder Angelo Poli is on our show a ton and the reason we have Angelo back is because he is such an expert on the science of diet and exercise. You may know or you may not know that a few years ago when I asked about metpro, they agreed to furnish me with a coach for a while named Jesse. And to this day I still work with Jesse because diet and exercise are such an important part of my regime and they should be, frankly of years too. In 2025, if you want to achieve big things, you need some big health to go with that fat wallet that we're trying to help you create. The team at metpro has just helped me. They've helped thousands of individuals help perform their bodies by hacking their metabolism. If you're looking for a high touch experience working with a metabolic expert or you want access to the tools their industry leading coaches use, visit MetPro Co SB. You'll get a complimentary assessment like I had and then speak to their team to learn which option is best for you. Here's what I like Whenever I'm eating stuff that shouldn't go in my mouth, whenever I'm avoiding working out, which is something that I aspire to always do, I think of Jesse and I think about I don't want to let myself down and Jesse's going to hold me accountable. We all need accountability coaches in our corner. But even better, Jesse's not just holding me accountable, she's holding me accountable to a more scientific approach. And if you haven't heard Angela Poly on our show, not only should you sign up for the assessment with MetPro, but you should also go back and listen because you'll hear the science. One of my favorite Angelo Poly lines Everything works until it doesn't. All those fad diets work until they don't. And when they don't, the boomerang effect is pretty horrible. So to take advantage of this opportunity to get a complimentary assessment from MetPro, go to MetPro co. It's not.com it's.co MetPro co SB. And you're going to get a complimentary metabolic profiling assessment, a one on one consultation with a MetPro coach like my coach Jesse to help you achieve your goals this year. Course results may vary. MetPro is not a medical organization. The service is not intended to treat any illness, disease or adverse medical condition.

[Len Penzo]

Hey there, Ryan Reynolds here. It's a new year and you know what that means. No, not the diet resolutions. A way for us all to try and do a little bit bit better than we did last year. And my resolution, unlike big wireless, is to not be a raging and raise the price of wireless on you every chance I get. Give it a [e-mail] Switch $45 upfront payment required equivalent to $15 per month.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

New customers on first 3 month plan only taxes and fees. Extra Speed slower above 40 GB on unlimited. See mintmobile.com for details. All right, Mindy Jensen, you're going to kick it off this year. What's the first thing you want to ask our Magic 8 ball about 2025?

[Mindy Jensen]

I have so many questions that I want to ask. I am going to in keeping up with Paula's asking about the Royals, I am going to go with American Royalty. Will keeping up with the Kardashians finally be canceled?

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

This is so important to our financial futures. So the Kardashians. Did you watch the Kardashians? Then the American Royalty.

[Mindy Jensen]

I have spent zero percent of my life watching the Kardashian show, so.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

But they are self made billionaires.

[Mindy Jensen]

They really are. They're just amazing in every single possible way.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Oh, gee's a big fan. Big.

[Mindy Jensen]

I can tell. Yeah, probably as big as me.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

So will the Kardashians be canceled by December 1st of next year?

[Len Penzo]

Let's find out.

[Magic 8 Ball]

The answer is yes.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Yes. Oh, you're happy about that?

[Mindy Jensen]

I am not a fan.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

It'll just be replaced by something else.

[Mindy Jensen]

That's true.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

All right, so moving on. Len, what do you got, man?

[Len Penzo]

Let's see. Since I don't, I don't want to get you riled up, Joe. So I'll give you some sort of question relates to finances here. But I'm going to go way out on a limb. Let's just make this fun. You know, there's been a lot of companies declaring bankruptcy this year. A lot. Even some of the ones you would think the Dollar General stores and the big lots and party city went out of business. Can you believe that? So let's see if this trend continues. I'm going to go out with a really way out there and I'm going to ask the eight ball, magic eight ball. Will Macy's declare bankruptcy? Will Macy's declare bankruptcy in 2025? Yes.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

W.

[Magic 8 Ball]

Yes.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

The answer is absolutely yes. I don't think that surprises you, Len, that the eight Ball said yes.

[Len Penzo]

Well, I'm, I'm disappointed because I know we're already. That's going way out there. The eight Balls, really, he's, he's pushing it.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

You do think so? See, I, I look at every mall in America.

[Len Penzo]

You really think Macy's is going to go.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

I just look at every mall in America. In any store, in any mall. Like we were driving by our one mall in Texarkana and I was telling my nephews who were here visiting over the holidays that you know what, I didn't even set foot in the mall once last year.

[Len Penzo]

Yeah, me, I didn't go in once, nor did I.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

And maybe I went in once, maybe twice the year before that.

[Mindy Jensen]

Because you're not a 12 year old girl.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

No. Well, and, and that is part of the problem of malls. Right. Like I remember we were talking about this on a Stacky Benjamin show late last year. That man, back in the day I had this, you know, you go to the record store, you go to the bookstore, you go to, you go to all these stores are gone.

[Len Penzo]

Yeah, that's true.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

It is sad, but I don't not see that. Like I think.

[Len Penzo]

Okay, yeah, I mean, you actually think that there's a possibility. It's not way out there that it's possible. That's what you think? You think? I don't. I think that's absolutely impossible. But who knows?

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

I think it's horrible. But yeah, I do think it's.

[Len Penzo]

Well, we'll see.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Without diving into their balance sheet. I haven't, you know, I haven't. I didn't know you were going to ask that. So I didn't specifically dive into Macy's balance sheet to see, but. Oh gee, what do you got as your first question for the Eight Ball?

[OG]

Well, we were talking about mortgage rates before and I'm just going to steal this one from Mindy so she doesn't get it. So 30 year mortgage rates right now about seven and a quarter as we record it today, depending on who you ask. But it's right or out that my question is, will we find 30 year rates? So the normal 30 year mortgage rate, will it be below six and a half at the end of this year?

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

30 year mortgage rate below 30 year.

[OG]

Mortgage rates down 75 bips, as the cool kids say.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

But I would think based on current trends and kind of where we're at right now, I don't see that out of the realm of possibility. I mean, Mindy, you're in real estate. Do you see that? Out of that doesn't sound like a wacky number that a year from now we might be 75 bips. The way the cool kids say it.

[Mindy Jensen]

I was going to ask, will it drop below 6% this year?

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Oh, so his is going to be a little.

[OG]

You want to meet in the middle and share this one and say six and a quarter?

[Mindy Jensen]

Six and a quarter.

[OG]

Okay. Oh, okay. A two for one deal.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Ask the full question, OG.

[OG]

Will 30 year mortgage rates be below six and one quarter percent and it's.

[Len Penzo]

Not by the end of the year. Right. It's by December 1st.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

It's got to be December, whatever day.

[OG]

You want to pick, buddy.

[Len Penzo]

All right, one more time, OG.

[OG]

Well, 30 year rates be below six and a quarter on whatever day Joe or Len decides to check this December 1st, December 1st.

[Magic 8 Ball]

The answer is no.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Won't be. Well, eight ball's predicting something that maybe we don't know, but if we, if we talk about Macy's bankruptcy. If it says Macy's bankruptcy. Yes. And interest rates high, that's not a good thing. Like if the eight ball's right on those two might be in for some bad stuff. Bad juju.

[Len Penzo]

Yeah, well, we'll see.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Let's go to the Facebook group for our next one. We got some great questions, as always, such as a couple that I won't ask, like will Og write the book? He keeps threatening to. Melvin asked that one. He didn't say threatening to. He said the book that he's talked about. We'll see. Aaron asked, will the 30 year mortgage rate drop below 5%? Brian wants to know if the US is going to actually buy Greenland. But let's go with this one. We saw this last year, you know, some disturbing devastation from hurricanes. And Vincent asks a question that's unlike one that we've asked here before. He said the official hurricane season is considered over on December 1st. So in 2025, Len, will the Atlantic basin produce 15 or more named storms and or strike the continental US with three or more named storms? That's what he wants to know. Obviously, we hope that answers no, but man, this year we had a tough year.

[Len Penzo]

That's a toughie. That's like a double, double, double question.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

I think we just Got to ask if three. Let's just ask the three. Does the mainland get hit by three hurricanes?

[Len Penzo]

There you go. All right, ready? Here we go. Let's see.

[Magic 8 Ball]

Definitely yes.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Oh, that's not good. Interest. Interest rates up. Macy's bankrupt, and we hit by hurricanes. It's the apocalypse.

[Len Penzo]

Happy New Year, everyone.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Mindy, you're up next with your second question. You want to ask about zombies next?

[Mindy Jensen]

Yeah.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Holy cow. What else could go wrong?

[Mindy Jensen]

Well, if we're throwing all those things in there, let's say, is the U.S. going to get involved in a war this year?

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

We have to define what get involved in a war actually. Actually means.

[Mindy Jensen]

Yeah, I guess.

[OG]

I mean, we're involved in lots of.

[Mindy Jensen]

Will the United States be the aggressor against another country in a war or warlike scenario in 2025?

[OG]

Have we ever been the aggressor?

[Mindy Jensen]

I think that's debatable.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

I don't know how we define that.

[Len Penzo]

Mindy, I'm sorry. You. Obviously, you didn't take the training, did you? Before the Magic 8 ball training, before you came on the podcast.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

She skipped the mandatory HR session.

[OG]

Do over.

[Mindy Jensen]

I have other questions. I was just. We're talking about all this, well, doom and gloom. We could also talk about war. Do you want it to be happier?

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

What about, you know, I was thinking at first, like, fire missiles, but then we fire missiles against terrorists, you know, in Syria. They were doing it in 2024. Right. So what do you. How do you. How do we define that?

[OG]

We got good guys everywhere. There's bad guys. I assure you.

[Len Penzo]

The only way you could really do is you'd have to say, would Congress declare war? Or something like that.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

That's the problem is we never.

[Len Penzo]

Of course. Yes, I know, but I'm saying that's something that. That's one definitive way you could say.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Sure.

[Mindy Jensen]

Well, were we in, like, was Iraq a war? Was Afghanistan a war by Congress?

[OG]

No.

[Mindy Jensen]

Okay. I don't want to do any more doom and gloom, because that's not very fun. So let's talk about the stock market. Will the dow close above 50,000 by December 1, 2025?

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Wow, that's good.

[Mindy Jensen]

I would like it, too.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Well, before you ask it, Len, let's talk about where the Dow Jones Industrial Average is today. Because fans do not follow. Or we at Today, Mindy, I believe.

[Mindy Jensen]

We are at the 42,000 today. 42,528.36. At this very moment.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Not. Not at all specific.

[Mindy Jensen]

Oh, well, I guess it's closed. So There you go.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Yeah. 42,528. 30.

[Len Penzo]

Healthy 20. 25% rise to get there.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

That'd be three years in a row land. How great would that be, guys?

[Len Penzo]

I don't. Has that ever happened? The dow going up 20% and Macy's is.

[Mindy Jensen]

Well, I'm hoping that you're wrong on that. Macy's being bankrupt in this hurricanes thing.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

All right, Len, what's it going to be?

[Magic 8 Ball]

It is best not to say now.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Oh, no, no, no, no, no.

[Mindy Jensen]

We got eight, Paul.

[Magic 8 Ball]

Yes, it is certain.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

It's certain.

[Mindy Jensen]

It's certain.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

I don't know how all this magic happens, but it happened this year. I mean, we got lots of bankruptcies, Len. We had lots of bankruptcies. We had wild hurricanes and we had. So it could.

[Len Penzo]

The eight ball works in mysterious way. So let's, you know, it's diving deep into the future. And who knows? Only the eight ball knows.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Is that what it's doing? I've often wondered what the eight balls.

[Mindy Jensen]

Can I get an early copy of this show so that I can take it to my lender?

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Got to.

[OG]

Yeah.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

This is proof right here. Len, what's your second question?

[Len Penzo]

Okay, let's see. It is as I'm looking here. Oh, yeah, here's a good one. Of course, I've got to do a precious metals question, right? Let's shift over from gold. Let's go to silver this year. I want to know if silver. Let's see, right now it's sitting about 30. Will it get to $40 by December 1st? $40?

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Oh, that'd be a nice thing. I remember we had. We had our silver expert, David Moron, and David had this great quote, I love land, that said that silver will frustrate you just a little longer than you'll have money.

[Len Penzo]

Silver is a weird creature because it's. It's supposed to be a store of value, and it is, but it's in a frustrating way. It goes up and it goes down for long periods, and it's only over the very long term that it remains a true store of value. And the reason for that is it's not just money. It is also used industrially. So when the economy tanks, silver tends to tank, too, which is kind of counterintuitive, but that's just the way it is. So if you're going to play around with silver, you got to hold it for a long, long time.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

So the question again is, yes.

[Len Penzo]

Will silver by December 1st be $40?

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

$40.

[Len Penzo]

Let me get the thing going. Here we go.

[Magic 8 Ball]

Without hesitation.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Yes, wow.

[Len Penzo]

Did you hear the enthusiasm in. In 8 Ball's voice? Did you hear that? I mean, it was enthusiastic.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Well, it was very enthusiastic this year about gold. That was the first one it got right.

[Len Penzo]

Yeah, it was. Yeah. Hey, it's gold.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

I don't know. Last couple questions. It's looking up.

[Len Penzo]

Yeah.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

I thought it was going to be the Apocalypse Now. I'm like, well, maybe it's a split kind of year like we had this year. Okay. Oh, gee. Your second question.

[OG]

I have a high school senior this year who has four months left in his high school career and a lot of questions about where he's going to go to college. Has a lot of different options, but I'm curious if he'll get into his number one school. So will my son. What? What's so funny?

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Nothing. I'm just thinking a good financial question. It is a good financial question for you?

[OG]

Yeah, absolutely.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Because you want to know how much you owe.

[OG]

How much do I owe?

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Magic 8 ball? How screwed am I?

[OG]

All right. Will my son next year on December 1, be enrolled at the University of Michigan?

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Wow.

[Len Penzo]

Let's see.

[Magic 8 Ball]

It is a certainty.

[OG]

Oh, crap. Will I be bankrupt December 1st?

[Len Penzo]

Ouch. What is tuition there? Just out of curiosity.

[OG]

Out of state, all in, room and board, etc. Cost of attendance is what they will quote you is in the high 70s, low 80s. Out of state, you know, now. Grants and aid and scholarship and whatnot, notwithstanding.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Gosh, I just don't understand as a Michigan State guy, why somebody would want to be that gross anyway. Like, seriously, why do you want to go to that disgusting place and pay that much?

[OG]

Honestly, just so everybody doesn't send me a bunch of hate mail. A lot of it will come down to the monetary stuff of it. He's accepted to what was his number one school, you know, prior to the whole Michigan thing. And so that's an in state public quote, unquote, normal college and was his number one school. And then he's also accepted into another private school with the potential to get a full ride scholarship. So we'll know more about that in the next couple of months as they finish out the process.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Yeah, but it sounds like none of that matters. You're going to be broke this time next year.

[OG]

Not exactly. I mean, honestly, if he gets accepted, then there's obvious discussions that we have to have around how this is going to affect planning.

[Len Penzo]

Have you told him that plumbing and electricians, they're good careers too. Did you tell them that?

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Yes.

[OG]

If you met my. My oldest, you would Understand that there's. He wouldn't know what a wrench is if it dunked him in the head.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

And knowing, oh gee, it's dunked him in the head a couple times already. Yeah, yeah.

[OG]

So we'll see. We'll see what happens. Lord willing, if Mr. Predicto is correct, we will also get lots of scholarship as we record.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

OG is going to have to leave early today. So, og, let's take your final question and then we'll wrap it up for the rest of us.

[OG]

Can I have a very meta question?

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Is it about Facebook? You mean meta?

[Len Penzo]

Yeah, I was going to say it's.

[OG]

About Mr. Predicto or is that allowed? Oh, can you have a self fulfilling.

[Len Penzo]

Yeah, yeah.

[OG]

Question. My question about Mr. Predicto is will it be over 50% percent?

[Len Penzo]

Oh, this is almost like the universe turns in on itself. If you know that's what I mean.

[OG]

It's like a.

[Len Penzo]

It's like a black hole collapsing. Let's find out.

[OG]

I've got a better one. If we don't want to do the circular logic of, you know, if we get an Excel error of circle.

[Len Penzo]

Yeah.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

I'm like, how do we. How do we turn that? I feel like it's when you do the camera thing into a mirror and it just shows.

[OG]

Exactly. That's exactly what I was thinking too. It's like 5 and 4 and it doesn't know how to answer it.

[Len Penzo]

Exactly. Yeah, that's right. That's right.

[OG]

If I'm right, then I'm right. But I'm wrong. But I'm right.

[Len Penzo]

We've reached the event horizon. Exactly.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Yes.

[OG]

Here's a better one, Will. We have identified what all the drones are flying over all these random cities by this time December 1st.

[Magic 8 Ball]

Everything points to. Yes.

[OG]

Ah, okay, good. So they're just airplanes.

[Len Penzo]

I don't know, man. Eight Ball, I should take it to the back room because I really think it. This Eight Ball is. He's really going out on a limb this year for most of these questions.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Come on, Len used to work in that industry.

[OG]

I was gonna say. Can I just ask a different question? Will Len tell us what all those things are flying around?

[Len Penzo]

You know what? I'll. Honestly, I think I did.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

I did.

[Len Penzo]

Have I told you this before? One of the last things I did right before I retired, I was working. Just, just for fun. I was on a little project for a major company. Drones. We were working on giant drones. I was testing engines, the propellers, huge propellers for huge drones. So they're still not out. I haven't seen them out yet, but you should see the size.

[OG]

Oh, no, they're all in New York.

[Len Penzo]

No, these are huge drones. Huge.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

I was on a road trip and finishing the evening in Memphis. It's about four hours from home, and I got a hotel so I could start early the next day. And as I went by the Memphis airport, I saw two huge drones over the airstrip there, which, ostensibly because that's home of a lot of FedEx stuff, right? FedEx using some big, big, big drones that were just hovering over the. Over the airport.

[Len Penzo]

Okay, well, so it could be that. It could be another company, but something similar. Yes. And if they're huge drones. Yes, that's what. They've been working on those for years. These are humongous payloads that these things are capable of carrying. So. Yeah.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

So you're saying they're not Chinese drones that are coming to get us?

[Len Penzo]

No, it's just.

[OG]

It's just FedEx delivering all their. All your crap for Christmas. Everybody's panicking, and FedEx is like, dude, do you want this stuff next day delivered or don't you? Take your pick. Take your pick here. What do you want to have happen?

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Come on.

[OG]

You want it on your front porch, or do you want it to take a month? Dealer's choice.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

All right, so the answer there was.

[OG]

Yes, we will know.

[Len Penzo]

Yes, it said, we'll know. Yes, it did say.

[OG]

Good. So I feel good about that.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Let's do. Then the next one from our friends in mom's basement. And I really like this one because, heck, this year we had gold up so much as we talked about, and we also had bitcoin up a lot. This is a fantastic question from Aaron on that very point. Will bitcoin outperform gold before December 1st of next year? Will bitcoin outperform gold?

[Len Penzo]

And that's for the year right? Starts. So from January 1 to December 1.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

January 1 to December 1.

[Len Penzo]

Let's find out.

[Magic 8 Ball]

Now is not the right time to tell you.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Mr. Predicto's like, I'm tired. Isn't a winning record enough? You ask me more. More.

[Len Penzo]

Ask him again, Joe.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

All right. Will bitcoin, or did I say will gold outperform bitcoin? Will gold outperform Bitcoin in 2025? Between January 1 and December 1.

[Magic 8 Ball]

Everything points to yes.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

How about gold over bitcoin this coming year? Well, that would say something about the volatility of bitcoin, right? Because who knows? I mean, roll the dice. Where are we going to be in the next 12 months?

[Len Penzo]

Talk about silver. It's like silver. It's big swings in both directions. So. Yep.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

That is one thing, though, with the new administration. I mean, all the talk about crypto and the new administration and more favorable policies toward crypto, who knows where that's going to go?

[Len Penzo]

But you know which crypto Coin's really been outperforming lately is Fartcoin. You heard of that, right?

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Fart.

[Len Penzo]

Yes, yes. Fart Coin.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

That thing's ripping. Sorry.

[OG]

And on that note.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Oh, geez. Like, gotta go.

[Len Penzo]

Exit stage.

[OG]

Busy, busy. And I will see you guys later.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

See you later, OG Wrap it up, Mindy. Let's get your last one.

[Mindy Jensen]

Okay, so way back when, a hundred Years ago in 1990, I was in college and I was taking a business class. This was back when you had to get the stock prices on the newspaper because the Internet either didn't exist or I didn't have it.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Yeah, I do those before my client meetings, by the way. I go in and find out the closing price of the day before and take out my calculator and figure it out for clients.

[Len Penzo]

Yeah.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Remember those days? Yeah.

[Len Penzo]

Look at the newspaper, have all the stock prices. Yeah, Yeah.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

I kind of miss my HP12C, by the way. I love that calculator. Anyway, back to you. Enough reminiscing.

[Mindy Jensen]

So in the business class, we were supposed to pick one stock at the beginning of the year and just follow it. And people were, you know, they had their favorite or whatever, and I just went like this and stuck my finger out, and I landed on Berkshire Hathaway. And I was like, this is really exciting. Expensive is that for one share of stock? And I want to say it was like $20,000, but maybe I'm way wrong because I don't remember what the price was.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

I remember.

[Len Penzo]

Yeah.

[Mindy Jensen]

Yeah. Everything else is like $12. And this is 20,000. Like it. It had this giant space in the.

[Len Penzo]

Time was 20,000 and 7/8, if you remember.

[Mindy Jensen]

Yeah. Okay, so 20,000. I did remember that. Right. So if I would have bought a share back then, it would have taken all my money. I want to know if Berkshire Hathaway A shares, because they have since split into A and B shares. Will A shares hit $950,000 a share by December 1?

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

And for. For just. Again, for people that don't follow it, where's it trading at as we record this?

[Mindy Jensen]

Mindy, it is not up in my thing, so thank you so much for asking. After I closed it out, Berkshire Hathaway Classic A price quotes. It is right now at $678,680. But for the last year in 2024, it went from a low of $549,000 in January to a high of $724,000 in November. So it's not outside the realm of possibility, even though it is currently trading at 679,000 or what.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

But we saw it this year from the stock market, from gold, from bitcoin, like we talked about the last hour. Like, none of this is out of the. Yeah, Nvidia.

[Mindy Jensen]

Yeah, it's all over the place.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Crazy. So, okay, is it going to hit 950,000 this year, Lynn?

[Magic 8 Ball]

Yes, it is. Certain.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Cha Ching.

[Mindy Jensen]

I get all excited, like, this is actually gonna be. Yes, it's totally gonna happen.

[Len Penzo]

So how many shares do you have of it, Mindy?

[Mindy Jensen]

Five?

[Len Penzo]

Six?

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Well, she does own shares.

[Mindy Jensen]

I do own shares, but I don't own A share. I own B shares. But you're trading a little bit less than the A Shares. A shares are 678, 000. B shares are like $480.

[Len Penzo]

So you can buy a fraction of a share.

[Mindy Jensen]

I don't know how the A's and the B's work. I didn't really pay attention to that. But if you own one share share of Berkshire Hathaway B stock, you can get into the annual meeting, which they hold every year.

[Len Penzo]

Very cool.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Which, Mindy, I know not only have you done, but you've said before you've actually asked a question at the meeting.

[Mindy Jensen]

I asked a question at the meeting. I was. Oh, my God, I was so nervous. I swear everybody could hear my heart pounding out of my chest. But it was wonderful.

[Len Penzo]

That gave me an idea. Jill, why don't you start issuing shares and then people can, you know, if they buy enough shares, they can have dinner with you or something. Or something fun.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Will Stacking Benjamin's go bankrupt? That's the next.

[Mindy Jensen]

You can have your own coin. You can have JSS Coin.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Yeah, it's like the fart coin. Give me a break.

[Mindy Jensen]

Yeah, well, JSS is very similar to a different letter J. Sounds a whole lot like a JSS coin.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

My cousin's name. My cousin's name. Which they figured out when they tried to do the. For a while there, they were doing that monogram on the sweater of people's initials. Her name is Amy Sue Sehi. And.

[Len Penzo]

Yeah.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Yeah. So that wasn't working out that well. It's a little awkward. Wouldn't you do that math ahead of time? Oh, look at that. HP12C people that's watching our video.

[Len Penzo]

15C. That's the engineering version. That's the 15C. 12C is the finance version.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Yes. Thank God I'm wearing pants.

[Len Penzo]

Yes.

[Mindy Jensen]

Does Len out?

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Nerd.

[Mindy Jensen]

Joe.

[Len Penzo]

Was the 12C reverse polish notation?

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Everything was reverse.

[Len Penzo]

Yeah, everything was reverse polish.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

You had to put it all in reverse.

[Len Penzo]

Yes.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

I didn't know. I never called it reverse polish, but yeah, it was crazy. All right, that's Mindy's last question. All right, Len, you are up to bat, my friend.

[Len Penzo]

I'm going to go with a kind of a fun one, if you don't mind, Joe. You know, Taylor Swift, still, big news and all that. Still. Even though here, turn of 2025, I want to know if Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce are going to get engaged by December 1st.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Well, and the other question is, then if they do get engaged, do we. Do we stop getting every four minutes of my football game? Taylor Swift site.

[Len Penzo]

Yes, exactly.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

I feel like I see as much Taylor Swift when you watch the Kansas City Chiefs as you see Travis Kelsey. It looks like she's drinking a Coca Cola now.

[Len Penzo]

Maybe I should apologize for that question. But you know what? Just go with it.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

America wants to know, Len.

[Len Penzo]

Okay. Well, that's fantastic.

[Mindy Jensen]

She's permeated every other aspect of the world. She can permeate the Stacking Benjamin show too.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

When you think about this year, I mean, let's talk about making money, guys, for just a second. Because, you know, in a year when Beyonce had a huge tour and Pink had a huge tour, I mean, you didn't hear about him. All you heard about was the Taylor Swift eras tour. That's all you heard.

[Len Penzo]

Yeah.

[Mindy Jensen]

Well, if you have teenage girls in your house. Yes.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Did you go to one?

[Mindy Jensen]

I didn't, but Carl and Claire ended up going to one.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

They did go to. Carl like it.

[Mindy Jensen]

Carl said it was. She puts on a really great show.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

That's what I've heard, yes. Well, let's see if she and Travis are going to put on a great show. All right, so Travis, Kelsey and Taylor Swift, will they be engaged by December 1st of next year?

[Magic 8 Ball]

Ask later when the time is right.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Well, it's interesting because I said next year. Anyway, so I got to ask that again. Will Travis, Kelsey and Taylor Swift be engaged by December 1st of this year?

[Magic 8 Ball]

The answer you seek is yes.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Oh, that doesn't seem far fetched, though. Not at all.

[Mindy Jensen]

Not really.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Man, there's a bunch of questions by stackers that were so good. Will the IRS finally audit the government? Johnny asks Will neighbor Doug wear pants while weed whacking his yard? Will Canada become the 51st state? Will Bitcoin become the official US currency? Will Doug become the new Fed chair? Lots and lots of fun ones. I think we are going to end this one with one that Glenn asked, that I think the world wants to know, and we'll know this by December 1st of next year. And I hope the answer here is yes, everybody. But Glenn asked the question, will the Detroit Lions win the Super bowl in 2025? And I know all of America wants that to be yes, because it's America's team. And I know either we lost people or they're all. All glued in. Who knows? But what's the answer to that one? Will Detroit Lions be the Super bowl champs? 2025.

[Magic 8 Ball]

Yes.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

There it is. Oh, it's going to be a great year.

[Len Penzo]

Hey, that's pretty good.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Who cares about hurricanes and devastation?

[Len Penzo]

It's the cherry on top. Very good.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Oh, that's so good. So there you have it, everybody. Those are the predictions for next year. You have to tune in again 12 months from now to hear Mindy, OG and Len and I go and see what happens. But it looks like we're gonna have another year like we had this year. A lot of surprises this year, and kind of surprisingly, the eight ball figured out more than it got wrong.

[Len Penzo]

Yeah, it did better than a coin, so we got to give it a little credit. I wish I would have got that last question. But, hey, we'll take. We'll take 7 out of 12.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

I consider that to be a pretty good year. Yeah. And the quality of the stuff. I mean, Nvidia going up. It. It said yes. Dallas Cowboys. No.

[Len Penzo]

The gold at 2500, which was a huge. That was laughable. And it. It said yes. And it did it. It was right there, too.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

So the change in political parties taking over the White House, it got right. So some of the major events of 2024. Well, 2025, we'll see what happens. But you know what? You don't have to wait a full year to find out what's happening where Mindy and Len live. So let's ask. We'll go. Ladies first. Mindy Jensen, what's happening at the Bigger Pockets money podcast?

[Mindy Jensen]

We are continuing to talk to people with interesting money stories. We recently released an interview with Ramit Sethi, and we never heard of him. Just some random guy. And Lauren from Seafire Sim. We walk through the seafire SIM calculator, which is the fire simulator. Is your financial plan gonna Work.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Yeah.

[Mindy Jensen]

It's a really fascinating walk through her calculators.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

I love Lauren. I hung out. Got to hang out with Lauren at Economy. I found out Lauren in a couple economies.

[Mindy Jensen]

Yes, I have two. And I'm going to hang out with Lauren again at Economy this year.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Me, too. Which means I'm hanging out with you, Economy, which is always fantastic. Glenn, you're going to join us in Cincinnati for economy this March. Come on, Come on.

[Mindy Jensen]

Cincinnati in March. Len, come on.

[Len Penzo]

I know. It's beautiful, huh? Yeah. No, I don't think so.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Do we have some magic eight ball about that? Will the weather suck?

[Len Penzo]

It. I just. I don't want him to get it wrong. I don't want to be in Cincinnati in March.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

No.

[Mindy Jensen]

Will the weather suck? Yes. But will you have a good time at Economy anyway, also? Yes.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Absolutely. Yes. Because the weather's been cold every year, and we still find a way to have a great time at Economy. Len Penzo, thanks for bringing along the eight ball again, my friend. What's going on, lenpenzo.com?

[Len Penzo]

Well, I. I got a lucky interview with Maria Bartiromo. You guys know Maria Bartiromo of Fox?

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Yes.

[Len Penzo]

Apparently she's a big fan of mine, and I arranged an interview with her, so we'll be talking with Maria.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

That's absolutely fantastic. And you're not kidding.

[Len Penzo]

Yeah, I'm kidding.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Wrote a song about Maria Bartiromo, and I'm not kidding. You know that, Len, don't you?

[Len Penzo]

What?

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

The Ramones wrote a song about Maria Bartaromo.

[Len Penzo]

Oh, I didn't know that. But the money, Honey, I. I love Maria. I think she's awesome. She's. I'm a big fan of Maria's.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Yeah.

[Len Penzo]

If you listen to Maria, give me a DM on Twitter and we'll. We'll work something out.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Okay. I'm sure she's a big fan of Len Pencil.

[Len Penzo]

In the meantime, you can always come by lenpenza.com on Saturdays, we have our weekly financial roundups. It's just a funny thing. Wrap up of the best tweets and memes of the week related to finance. And I add the Squirrel Cam every week. Now Squirrel Cam is in there. So if only you had fun.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

I just wish you were having fun. If you were having fun, it'd be so much better. Right? That'[e-mail] or finer blogs are. And you'll hear bigger pockets of money wherever you listen to podcasts. We'll have links to both of your amazing works at stacking benjamin's.com in our show notes. All right, Doug, you've got it from here, man. Thank you everybody for hanging out with us today. Doug, what should we have learned from today's eight Ball episode?

[Doug]

So, what's stacked up on our to do list for today? First, take some advice from our Magic 8 Ball and don't try to predict the future just like our eight Ball. You might be right some of the time, but why bet on it when you can instead invest in your future? Second, do we have a second one? Nah, we're good. I think we'll just go with that. But what's the big lesson? Asking the Magic 8 Ball if you'll be rich someday might be fun. But asking Joe's mom if you can borrow money? That's a prediction you don't want to test. Thanks to Mindy Jensen for joining us today. You'll find Mindy's show BiggerPockets money wherever you're listening to us now. We'll also include links in our show [e-mail] thanks to Len Penzo for hanging out with us. You'll find his fabulous blog lenpenzo.com on your favorite browser. Go there, check out the Squirrel Cam, click the ads.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

It's a blast.

[Doug]

Thanks also to OG for joining us today. Looking for good financial planning help? Head to stackingbenjamins.comog for his calendar. This show is the property of SB Podcasts, LLC, Copyright 2025 and is created by Josal Sehive. Joe gets help from a few of our neighborhood friends. You'll find out about our awesome [e-mail] along with the show notes and how you can find us on YouTube and all the usual social media spots. Come say hello.

[Joe Saul-Sehy]

Oh yeah.

[Doug]

And before I go, not only should you not take advice from these nerds, don't take advice from people you don't know. This show is for entertainment purposes only. Before making any financial decisions, speak with a real financial advisor. I'm Joe's mom's neighbor, Doug, and we'll see you next time back here at the Stacking Benjamin Show.