Red Hot or Icy Blue?

SPEAKER_00 0:05

You're gonna do a really great financial future. Tom and Don are talking real money.

SPEAKER_03 0:12

Now it may have been a few years ago, but I want you to think back. Remember that great economy we had under President Bush? The second. Bush the second, not Bush the first. Remember, remember that? And remember that terrible economy we had under Barack Obama? His term? Oh, wait, wait, I'm sorry. Wait. Oh, okay. Do you remember the terrible economy we had under Bush and the great economy we had under Obama? Hmm. Now I'm confused. Are you? Well, if you were a Republican, you thought the economy under Bush was great. If you were a Democrat, you thought it was terrible. Obama? If you were a Democrat, you thought the economy under Obama was great. And the economy under if you were a Republican, it was terrible. We're going to talk about what Spencer Jacobs calls the color of money here on Talking Real Money. I'm Don McDonald, along with Tom Cock. So who is right? Was the economy great under Republicans and terrible under Democrats, or great under Democrats and terrible under Republicans, Tom?

SPEAKER_02 1:20

And more importantly, how about the stock market thereof? In other words, how do markets respond to Republicans or Democrats? Are you, when it comes to investing, are you red, white, or blue? Which there's a white option? I only saw the red and the blue option. I know. I'm just checking all the boxes to make sure I'm covered either way. It's a fascinating thing. I mean, it's absolutely and there's a great takeaway from all this, which I hope I hope we are able to reinforce. But you go back, for example, to September 2024, not that long ago, right? That's less than two years. And uh, you know, the University of Michigan, the University of Michigan does the survey of consumer sentiment at top 70. A decent report. But self-identified Republicans said, no, the economy is not very good. Less than 50 percent were were thought it was doing well. But the rep the Democrats who were polled, 92.6 percent. As you said, I say tomato, you say tomato, right? I mean, it's very confusing. Um, and then even worse, you ask them, okay, what's the stock market going to do in the near term? What's going to happen? And in the next six months, they asked people this January, 81% of Republicans said it's gonna go, it's gonna be good, it's gonna rise. And then they asked Democrats, 35%. So 80% or 35%. And uh it's absolutely in he he he qualifies this as academics dubbing this the presidential puzzle that uh that presidents get blamed a lot for the economy and for the stock market. And the reality is they have very little to do with either one. But the more importantly is people who support one party or another, and that number, by the way, for both of them keeps getting smaller, right? More people are like, ah, not a Democrat and not Republican. But if you do, you have a tendency to believe the future is bright if your party is coming into power, already in power, and you think things are bleak if your party's not in power, or your your your your guy got beat in the or woman got beat in the last election. Absolutely fascinating. And we'll we'll talk we'll talk about some takeaways from all that just a moment, because it's a pretty important topic. Trevor Burrus, Jr.

SPEAKER_03 3:37

You know, it's fascinating though. You you know the phrase beauty is in the eyes of the beholder. Apparently, truth is in the eyes of the beholder, too. We don't we don't accept any factual information. It's all about how we feel about that information. It's not about what that information is or is not. And that is well, it seems counterintuitive to me, but uh what uh what do I know? I'm a fact kind of guy.

SPEAKER_02 4:10

I can remember even more dramatically uh the the the 2016 election, the election eve, uh no, the the election night, pardon me, when Hillary Clinton appeared to be on her way to winning, and then a couple of the Midwestern states turned and uh voted for Donald Trump, and then the market went straight, the futures went straight down, right? It was down like 900. I can remember telling my wife, wow, tomorrow's gonna be a busy day because people are gonna be calling. Should I get out of the market, et cetera, et cetera? And then at some point somebody went, Well, wait a minute, that aren't isn't that good for the economy and stuff and the market turned and went straight back up. I mean, sediment turned overnight. That fact.

SPEAKER_03 4:50

Well, Dimensional Funds has done some really in-depth studies of presidential impacts on the market, and they have found that overall, this is this is where we get back into fact territory. Who is in the White House has not mattered to the market at all, at all long term. So does this matter to you? Should this matter to you? Only from an emotional standpoint. If you're looking at it from a practical standpoint, you should pay no attention to who's in the office or who isn't in the office, because so far, so far, they the President of the United States cannot act with impunity on the economy. They can't solely direct the future of the economy. The economy is way too complex for any one human being to impact over, again, a longer period of time. Yes, people can have impacts on the on the way we feel at any given moment, and that may move the the market minute to minute, day to day, even week to week. But year to year to year to year, no. Presidents can't, and well, at least haven't so far, been able to move markets.

SPEAKER_02 6:07

Yeah. And and and the dimensional does a wonderful job showing you the numbers, Democrats versus Republicans, and how little difference there's been between Republican presidents and Democrat presidents in terms of stock market returns. But for those of you really feel strongly about that, you said something very important there about emotion, which still we all want to believe we're rational. Yeah. But the emotions pretty much take the decisions most of the time. I mean, we're kidding ourselves. Yeah, I know we are kidding ourselves. But if you're one of those people who says, wait, I I really think that because my party's in power, things are going to be great or things are going to stink, there's a couple things you can do. There is an exchange traded fund with the ticker symbol mega launched in 2017. That's the good news. If you're a Republican, it's trailed the SP uh by 75 percentage points. What? Wait. 75 percent. 75 percent less. And the expense ratio is 0.72 for that fundraiser. Bridge America First ETF, is that the one? M-A-G-A. You may have heard of those. Yeah. And then and then uh if you say, well, no, I I think things are gonna be better with the Dems, then you buy the DEMS DEMZ launched in 2020. That's less behind, but it's also pretty expensive. It is overweight tech and energy, but it only costs 45 basis points. Still, I'm kidding.

SPEAKER_03 7:36

The Dems are cheaper than the reps.

SPEAKER_02 7:38

Exactly. Which you gotta think that through for a minute. Yeah, wait a minute. So okay, but just to go back for some takeaways here, but that I think are pretty important. Number one, we did I did just mention those two ETFs. Don't buy gimmicks. There's a new gimmick every day on Wall Street, uh literally, uh, especially now with ETFs. Number two, we've said this several times, uh, and we'll continue to say it. Don't let politics influence your money decisions. Really, they they shouldn't. I know people say, but it's gonna be this way because my guy's in there. Nah, not really. Uh, you may think so. I'm sorry if you get mad at me because of that. Things we'd like to believe are that change according to what we think the agenda should be, but it rarely happens. And at the end of the day, this is something we've mentioned again a couple of times. You're really building the correct asset allocation for your needs, for your risk tolerance, for your future, not around who's in power then, who may be coming into power, which party does better with the economy, any of those factors, because nobody, absolutely nobody, I don't care what party, I don't care what economist, knows nothing about what's going to happen in the next five minutes, right? I mean, after that, it's all conjecture, folks.

SPEAKER_03 8:49

All right. I I I I you know you know me. I kind of like to dig into the numbers because I find them fascinating when you look at them closely. The the MAGA ETF, M-A-G-A, opened in uh twenty sixteen. Or was it twenty seventeen?

SPEAKER_02 9:07

It says twenty seventeen.

SPEAKER_03 9:09

I'm sorry, yeah, I'm looking at this wrong. In in twenty seventeen, twenty nineteen, twenty no, twenty twenty, it had to be early in twenty twenty, a ten thousand dollar investment in that fund dropped to about eight thousand dollars. Now this was during Trump's first term. Doesn't sound too great, does it? No. It wasn't until the election of twenty twenty. The election in twenty twenty less that one, yes. When he lost, the MAGA fund soared in value. Rising wait, rising from ten thousand dollars, a ten thousand dollar investment rising to eighteen thousand dollars by the twenty twenty-four election. So it did really well under Biden. That makes a ton of sense, doesn't it? I don't understand how these things get priced. Now, under the the Trump administration so far, uh it's gone from about eighteen thousand to uh twenty-one thousand or so. A ten thousand dollar investment has gone from eighteen to twenty one.

SPEAKER_02 10:18

But these are trendy, these are expensive, and these are traditionally active management, right? These are the like they just said, the Dems are overweight, energy, and technology, which have been good places, well, energy this year certainly, um technology up till about the start of the year. But this is this is silly. Uh I hate to say it, and I don't want to insult anybody, but but if you're making bets with your money based on who's in in office, you're making a bet. You're not investing. Trevor Burrus, Jr.

SPEAKER_03 10:47

It's proven not to be a good strategy. Trevor Burrus, Jr. No. Not at all. If you have questions about your strategy, about your portfolio, about your retirement, about your kids' college education, about your job, your career, your business opportunities, the scams, the swindles, the ripoffs, the whatever you run into that have something to do with money. If it's a money-oriented question, we want to spend some time trying to help you s answer it or solve the problem. And you can do that by going to talkingrealmoney.com and uh clicking on ask a question, and you can type it in or you can speak it in. And sometimes when you type them in, Tom either reads them or he's discovered something new. He's this thing, they they call it a telephone. And he calls you on the telephone and he answers your question with his voice.

SPEAKER_02 11:38

And so we go to the phones, and from the beautiful Bay Area in California, we go to Kevin. How are you doing today, Kevin?

SPEAKER_01 11:47

Oh, I'm doing great. Hey, thank you so much for taking my call.

SPEAKER_02 11:49

I greatly appreciate it. My pleasure. Thank you for being a longtime listener. I know you've sent us other questions, which are always good, but uh, what's on your mind today?

SPEAKER_01 11:58

Well, you know, recently I heard you guys have a caller that brought up a pension um uh conversation. And pensions always pique my interest because I'm gonna be one of those pension people. Uh I operate in public safety. I, you know, that's been my career is public safety and uh public safety, many public safety um uh between fire departments, police departments, and other city governments, uh we we have pensions that we uh um are gonna get at the end of our careers. And uh during the conversation that you guys had with this gentleman, he had indicated that he was moving into a career with a pension. And he pointed out the fact that it was a potential 80% at the end of his career for that pension uh to receive 80% of his base pay. And that was kind of a little red flag to me listening, going, okay, this guy um probably is in public safety or some kind of government capacity for 80%. That's you know, that's a pretty substantial amount for a pension. Um, the reason I bring that up is as I've gone through my career and recognizing, oh my goodness, you know, I better learn about the pension. There's a lot of uh unanswered uh uh questions for people who have pensions, especially when they're young and they don't they just know that they're gonna get a pension and they start focusing at the end of the pension and what it's gonna be. And during the question, he was trying to make up his other 20% that he would not be getting through the pension. And it was mentioned about Social Security and what it kind of flagged to me was whether or not he's aware that many pensions don't pay into Social Security. And many of those folks that I work with and stuff, they start out early in life, they get uh, they go through their careers or 30, 30 plus year careers to find out they haven't paid into Social Security because they weren't paying attention to it. And two, they didn't earn their Social Security credits to qualify for uh Medicare and stuff. And they have to retire and go get another job to uh make that up. And I wasn't sure if um, you know, I just wanted to share my my uh history and my what I have learned about pensions. And there's a couple other things, but I'll let you chime in.

SPEAKER_02 14:21

Well, yeah, the first of all, thank you for your commitment to public safety. And this has been such a tum, it's always been a difficult job, but I think the last decade has been so tumultuous. So thank you for your commitment to that. And and I hope other people tell you that on a regular basis, because you because you should. Um they should, pardon me, and and I'm glad to do it. Um in terms of, yeah, this is a fascinating topic, right? Because here in the city of Bellevue, where I reside, uh, yes, public employees do not pay into Social Security. And as you pointed out, they have their own retirement system in a way. Um, but what I'm hearing from you is two things. Number one, at any point in your career, if you're just starting out in public safety, whatever part of it, you should probably at least know the lay of the land, not just say, well, the pension is gonna cover everything. No, as you say, I'm not gonna have Social Security. Um, I I got to figure out the rest of it. Because part two is absolutely, and you mentioned this, I think, later in your note that you sent us, you should be saving elsewhere, right? I mean, and most of the time that's a 457. Um, and that allows, you know, tax-free growth. Obviously, you're gonna pay income tax when it comes out, but that would supply the other 20% or the other whatever percentage that that would really make the difference in retirement. You don't want to get to a place where you retire and you have to take an you have to take another job to supply healthcare or supply the money you need to uh cover your expenses. So you're spot on. I mean, here's the here's the thing about these things when they come up, and and this is one of the problems with radio shows, podcasts, et cetera, is many times people ask us these questions, and really to get to really do it right, you really need to sit down with somebody, you know, an advisor and have them pull everything apart, pull it all, you know, to make sure those parts work, plus one, two, three, four, five. The challenge is on a radio show or podcast, we don't have time to do that. That's an hour-long meeting, et cetera. You really, and and I advocate that for anybody, I think, because especially when you're starting out, you got to know, as you just said, what the finish line is gonna look like, how you're gonna pay the bills. And in public safety, my goodness, I mean, a 30-year career is that's asking a lot of you as a person, I think, both physically and mentally and emotionally, and all those things, not easy. So, no, I'm I'm with you 110% on that.

SPEAKER_01 16:38

And yeah, and another thing that you know, a lot of there's a lot of people look at pensions almost as you've you've won the golden ticket to a certain extent. And and what I try to tell people is one, please don't forget, we pay into our pension. It's not given to us, we have to pay into it. So we are paying into this system that is going to give us income, but it's not gonna generate us wealth. So at the end of my life, I don't have a portfolio to hand down to my kids. There is no growth. I I have income, but everything that I've put into my pension is the pensions, not I I'm I contribute to that portfolio that is owned by everybody that's part of that pension. And I think a lot of people, a lot of people don't realize that when I we got the like we got the luxury of the knowledge of um you know great uh leadership from my father-in-law and stuff to understand pay pay yourself first. Yep. And we started that process in conjunction with the pension. But I look and I go, that as I watch that portfolio grow, I realize my pension isn't gonna grow for me. I'm not gonna be able to reach into my pension to go, hey, I I need money for my daughter's wedding. I need money for this, I need money for that. I I gotta wait till it comes in.

SPEAKER_02 17:59

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 18:00

And then once I pass, my wife will get the pension for a certain period of time. Sure. But then once it's gone, there is no institutional wealth to pass on to my family.

SPEAKER_02 18:10

Yeah, no, I think that's very well put. Uh the the second part of that is something that that deserves mention. This is not a gift. Uh this is, you know, some of your money, some of the the some of the money that that they're paying you, because in some ways the expectations are paying you less than if you went out on the private market than you'd make. So, no, that very much so. So I'm in agreement there. Did you have another quick question? Because we got to run here pretty quick.

SPEAKER_01 18:33

Nope. I just wanted to say thank you for everything you and uh Don do. You know what you're the way you uh uh present everything, the way you're consistent with your message, but not only that, you offer specific advice. You don't just lead us to the water, you teach us how to drink. And um, I greatly appreciate that and we'll continue to listen. And we'll continue to tell other people to listen because uh once people realize they can they can build themselves a machine that can work for them as they move forward, you know, they they get a chance to relax a little bit in life.

SPEAKER_02 19:07

Which is what they should do, right? I mean, we don't want to make money central to anything in your life, we want to make it part of it because it has to be. But once you do it right, it's on a disciplined approach and it just should take care of itself. So thank you again for your service. Thank you for listening, thank you for reaching out, all those things, and we wish you the very best.

SPEAKER_03 19:26

Thank you so much. Appreciate it. Thanks, Kevin. And if he doesn't answer your questions with his voice, then he reads them on the show, and we answer them together, like the big, happy, co-hosting family that we are. And here is the next question.

SPEAKER_02 19:46

Yeah, this is this is the next question. We do them one after another. We've been getting a lot, by the way, so if you don't hear your question answered, it'll be there. It's coming. It'll be there. But it we have a lot of questions. And thank you for all of them. I love absolutely love it. And I I love talking to many of you on the phone. Um, from Center Reach, New York, which I'm not familiar with, Anthony writes us 401K currently, 50 percent in the Vanguard 20 uh target 2040. That's target date fund for retiring in the year 2040, which I think is about 15 years from now. Uh-huh. Uh and half in the target date 2035, which I think is about 10 years from now. He says he's 50. Should I make any changes? Half in the 2035, half in the 2040.

SPEAKER_03 20:30

50. That's 10 years. No, I think this is fine. I mean, he's not a lot of work, but you know, sure. It's not a lot of work. It's too fine. It's not a lot.

SPEAKER_02 20:41

Just pick one. Come on. Why are you talking about it? I don't know.

SPEAKER_03 20:44

He's hedging. He's hedging. He's being a little bit. It's a conservative tweak.

SPEAKER_02 20:49

I'm going to let you do the research right now. What is the stock-to-bond ratio in the 2040 versus the 2035? I'm betting. Don't even tell me. Let's see. I'm going to say it's less than a five percent difference when it comes to the ratio between stocks.

SPEAKER_03 21:04

It's about a five percent difference.

SPEAKER_02 21:06

You looked it up?

SPEAKER_03 21:07

Yeah. I'm looking at it. It's about a five percent difference.

SPEAKER_02 21:09

So why in the just take one or the other? Come on.

SPEAKER_03 21:13

Anthony. Actually, he's wishing that there were a 2037 and a half fund.

SPEAKER_02 21:18

Which is what basically what he has. But it's not that hard.

SPEAKER_03 21:22

You act like it's like I have to rebalance between 2034 and 2040 again. Okay. Actually, you don't even need to rebalance between those because they do it for you. So you just own the two. I bought two funds, I put them in my account. Where's the bigger?

SPEAKER_02 21:41

But you'd expect one would go up faster than the other.

SPEAKER_03 21:43

But I'm coming back to the to the question I was going to ask. Where's the work?

SPEAKER_02 21:48

You're gonna have to sell the one that went up faster and buy the one that didn't go up as fast.

SPEAKER_03 21:52

No, no, that's not what you're saying.

SPEAKER_02 21:54

You're gonna let the twenty thirty-five just get bigger and bigger and bigger in ratio.

SPEAKER_03 21:57

No, because they're gonna rebalance internally stocks and bonds. You don't rebalance between funds. You don't rebalance between the always going to have the twenty thirty-seven and a half portfolio. That's true. But I don't have to be taking the one that went up faster and moved it into the one that went up slowly.

SPEAKER_02 22:16

Anthony, I love you, man. Okay, uh, let's go to another question. Who cares to blow this whole thing up? From Mirana, Arizona, David writes, I have a$100,000 variable annuity as part of my traditional individual retirement account held at Edward Jones. That doesn't surprise me. When it's time for retirement, is it better to draw from the annuity first or from the traditional IRA? Please advise the pros and cons. Well, how old did he? Did he say how old he was in that? Did not say how old he was.

SPEAKER_03 22:56

But uh what which one would be first? Because you see, I uh this question I haven't considered because I never ever suggest anyone have a variable annuity in their account. So given that, given the fact that variable annuities are are stupidly expensive, it would be the first thing I would tackle just to get those high expense products out of my portfolio, ignoring the tax ramifications of the fact that everything, by the way, here's the downside of variable annuities. You ready? Yeah. If you put this money in an ETF without an IRA around it, you would only be paying taxes at your capital gains rate on the growth. With the variable annuity, yeah, you got tax deferral, but now every penny that comes out gets taxes ordinary income. So it's a much higher hit for most people who have a decent portfolio. But given the fact that these are very expensive, that not only do you have the fund expenses, which I would guess if it was sold by Edward Jones are high enough, you also have the expenses and mortality charges of the annuity, which could run your expenses up to 3% per year, which is just stupid high. Uh just take the annuity first.

SPEAKER_02 24:07

And okay, back to that just for a moment, so I'm understanding. So with the variable annuity, can he take out an even amount each year? Can you set it up? Is there any sort of uh riders in terms of the income, or are you just take it out.

SPEAKER_03 24:21

You just tell them, tell your broker to liquidate it.

SPEAKER_02 24:23

Yeah. Okay, fair enough.

SPEAKER_03 24:25

Or or here's a better idea. If do some tax planning. Yeah, yeah, you hear that little knocking? You got that? Are you in the laundry room again? It sounds like it doesn't matter. It's like I hear the launcher on spin cycle.

SPEAKER_02 24:39

It's not me shaking because I'm not that nervous, but that is a weird sound. I don't know. Yeah, I think that's smart. So clean it up, get rid of the high expense stuff, build your retirement income. So those would be the advantages. The advantages. I don't see a whole lot of disadvantages to that.

SPEAKER_03 25:02

So there's the spin cycle again. Oh, it's it's done. It's gone.

SPEAKER_02 25:06

You know, I put an extra heavy load in there, so maybe it's having a little bit of a it's like you put a rug in.

SPEAKER_03 25:11

Something like that. That concludes the question. Are you done with the question part? Oh, I gotta tell you, I got a couple of things to share with you since we have time. Oh, then you're gonna love this. I got an email just before we started recording. You're gonna love this email. Gonna love it. Wait, this isn't live. No, we record this time. Oh, okay.

SPEAKER_02 25:31

Well, I never know.

SPEAKER_03 25:32

So there's a uh there's what appears to be, but it really isn't. This is a an HTML news newsletter-y kind of email. But they made it look like it was that uh this was a forwarded message to me. And it says, Hi, Don. My general manager asked me to reach out, see below, regarding the signal awards, which recognizes podcasts that define culture. We feel your work from talking real money-investing talk. They took the title that's our uh title, our SEO title. Yep. It is a good fit and deserves to be recognized. If this sounds interesting to you, I'm happy to send some more information. Do you know what this is, what the deal is? How much you gotta pay to be on the list?$300. Okay. Yeah. Unless unless you want to be in three categories, then it's only$855. That's the only two levels we can't move up even more? Oh, no, you can at$300 a pop, you can buy as many as many different categories as you want. And I bet they have hundreds of categories. So I thought I'd let you know that deal. That deal. That's a great deal.

SPEAKER_02 26:45

And I'm gonna go ahead and say no to that one.

SPEAKER_03 26:48

Oh, and I was hoping we'd win a signal award. Darn it. Now all my you've ruined all my fun. That's my job. Yeah, thank you. And then, and then I was looking at Kindle Direct Publishing and I looked at uh Financial Physics. And financial physics, get this, out of the like three million books on uh Amazon. And it's a lot, it's in the millions. Financial physics lately is number three hundred and forty-one thousand in the entire country. Wow. Three hundred and forty one thousand, ladies and gentlemen. Three hundred forty one thousand. That's we broke the top half a million.

SPEAKER_02 27:33

Yeah, I think there's nothing wrong with that.

SPEAKER_03 27:35

That's like I it's like twenty-four orders. I've gotten twenty-four orders for it.

SPEAKER_02 27:39

And this is this oh, this financial physics, this is not the Civil War book.

SPEAKER_03 27:43

No, that's not available for order yet. Okay. That won't be available for order.

SPEAKER_02 27:48

When am I getting my copy? I feel like Okay, here's the problem.

SPEAKER_03 27:51

I sent you a link to uh an ePUB that you could read. Okay? You can't figure out how to get it into your Kindle.

SPEAKER_02 27:59

It's confusing.

SPEAKER_03 28:01

It's not. It's a link. It's a button. You click this and you go email this to my Kindle. That's how you do it. But here's the problem. I cannot get it's not it's not available to the public until decoration day weekend.

unknown 28:14

I use that.

SPEAKER_02 28:15

That would be Memorial Day?

SPEAKER_03 28:16

Yeah, I use that title because that's the old Civil War name for it. Decoration day. Decoration Day. Um The problem is the author's copies, the review copies that I can get, they will not send to any address other than mine. So I'm waiting for them to get the printed copies to get to me, which is a really long process because they put the author's copies at the end of the queue. And then when I get them, I have to turn around and mail them, mail one to you. Wow. This is really elaborate. I'm telling you, if you just read the ebook, it would be easy.

SPEAKER_02 28:54

I'll try clicking on the one button again and see what happens.

SPEAKER_03 28:58

I'll send you another link and feel like I have an idea. Oh, I'm so excited. You remember that woman you married? I was gonna say which one, but yeah, no, no, the recent one.

unknown 29:11

Okay.

SPEAKER_03 29:11

The younger one.

SPEAKER_02 29:12

Okay.

SPEAKER_03 29:13

Yeah, that one. The one who gets technology.

SPEAKER_02 29:15

Thank goodness she doesn't know how to listen to a podcast. The one who gets technology. I'd be looking for another one now, too.

SPEAKER_03 29:20

So I bet you she can figure out how to make it work.

SPEAKER_02 29:23

That would that would that would mean that she's willing to help me with that.

SPEAKER_03 29:26

Oh, wait, I have another idea. Wait. Yeah. She hasn't graduated yet, right? Your daughter? Ah, the daughter. Yes, that's a great idea. Sure. She's in high school, correct?

SPEAKER_02 29:36

Barely, but okay.

SPEAKER_03 29:37

Okay, but and then she's gonna be in college. Who knows how to use technology better than a high school/slash college student? Nobody. Nobody.

SPEAKER_02 29:45

Okay, I'll take it home.

SPEAKER_03 29:46

Can you do this? I'm gonna send you the book. The book is called The Line Uncrossed. It is my first ever novel.

SPEAKER_02 29:53

It looks great, and I love the story.

SPEAKER_03 29:56

It looks great. I don't know what it reads like, but it looks great.

SPEAKER_02 29:59

We'll soon know. I've read your stuff before. It's good. All right.

SPEAKER_03 30:02

Yeah, you've read my you you yeah, I have I have my short stories that I've read. I've read some of those. But this I decided to do a novel, and this novel, by the way, is based based. Not it's not strictly, it's based. Inspired by the life of my great-great-grandfather, who um who joined the Union Army at age 14, literally. Went to fought at Shiloh, fought at Stones River, fought at uh Chickamauga, was captured at Chickamauga by the uh Confederates, and was imprisoned at Libby and and Andersonville.

SPEAKER_02 30:36

Not a fun place. And by the way, he was nominated for a single award. So congratulations for that.

unknown 30:43

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 30:44

Signal or single? Signal. Signal. Okay. Signal. Congratulations. I gotta check the time here. Oh yeah, we're done. Yeah, we're done. That's enough. I could go longer, but I see no reason to to to to prolong the misery. Thank you all for listening. Thank you, Tom, for just kind of being there.

SPEAKER_02 31:05

That's what you get from me today. Tomorrow, hopefully better. We'll see.

SPEAKER_03 31:10

We'll we'll I'm sure. I'm sure tomorrow will be so much more fun than today's episode. And uh remember to send those questions in at talkingrealmoney.com. Oh, oh, oh, yeah. What about meeting with an advisor? Can people still do that? Yes, we're love to hear from you. And uh this is a good time. We're love to hear from you.

SPEAKER_02 31:26

We're love to hear from you. Is that is that a southern thing or something? I don't know.

SPEAKER_03 31:30

Just made it up.

SPEAKER_02 31:31

We're love to hear from you.

SPEAKER_03 31:32

Yeah, we'll look we're loving to hear from you.

SPEAKER_02 31:35

Pretty easy to do. You go to talkingrealmoney.com and click on meet an advisor. That's still up there, right? Did they ever fix that?

SPEAKER_03 31:41

Yes, they fixed that. Okay. Yeah, they fixed that. All right, so do all that. Do all those other things. Tell your friends and loved ones about the lovely, lovely program we do, and uh, you know, nominate us for a signal award and keep listening to Talking Real Money.

SPEAKER_00 31:58

The opinions and views expressed on this podcast were current on the date recorded. Opinions, estimates, forecasts, and statements of financial market trends that are based on current market conditions constitute our judgment and our subjects change without notice, including any forward-looking estimates or statements which are based on certain expectations and assumptions. Although information and opinions given have been obtained from or based on sources believed to be reliable, no warranty or representation is made as to their correctness, completeness, or accuracy. Information presented on the podcast is not personalized investment advice from Apollo Well. The views and strategies described may not be suitable for everyone. This podcast does not identify all the risks, direct or indirect, or other considerations which might be material to you when entering any financial transaction. We hope you realize that the information provided on Talking Real Money is for informational, educational, and hopefully enjoyable purposes only. The podcast is not trying to get you to buy or sell any financial products or securities. Instead, the program is provided as a public service by Apello Wealth, a fee-only registered investment advisor. Please see Apello Wealth's ADB part two, edit on our website for information regarding Apellos, fees, and services. A public capital, LOC DBA Apello Wealth, is an investment advisory firm registered with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The firm only transacts business in the states where it is properly registered, or excluded or exempt from registration requirements. Registration with the SEC or any state securities authority does not imply a certain level of skill or training. Apello does not provide tax or legal advice, and nothing either stated or implied here should be inferred as providing such advice. Thanks for listening, and please visit talkingrealmoney.com for more information and important disclosure related to performance of any specific index or fund quoted in this podcast. The lawyers get richer.