Do You Know the Secret Weapon for Financial Freedom?

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All right. Our process at Markowski Investments and the Watchdog on Wall Street Show, things that we’ve been trying to teach for decades now. We’re going to be talking about basic fundamentals over the next couple of weeks, because guess what, guys? I’m going on vacation. Yeah, I’m going to be checking in and doing some regular podcasts while I’m away.

Much to my wife’s chagrin. She’s none too happy. None too happy when I do that. But I’m like, what’s the big deal? I do it before you guys even get up in the morning. So I will be checking in. Again, if I take a day off, if I miss a day, if I miss a day, where were you? I feel like, you know, the Richard Dreyfus character and what about Bob? And Bob Wiley’s chasing him down. He’s like, I’m on vacation, I’m on vacation. I’m not even on vacation. Sometimes I I miss a flight or something like

Anyway, anyway, I’m going to do a bunch of fundamental based podcasts in regards to what we do at Markowski Investments. And again, things that we have been teaching for decades. I can I want to remind everybody this is not wisdom that I have come up with. This is just what works. And I made this perfectly clear to quote my my younger brother.

Matthew, I’ve talked about Matthew on the program. Many of you are familiar with him. He’s a mathematical guy. As a kid, he had this phrase whenever you argue with him, he’s like, I’m right, you’re wrong. I’m right, you’re wrong. It’s Matt Markowski. That’s his quote right there. We’re right, everybody else is wrong. Not everybody else. The people that we follow, again, we all do the same thing. It’s no big secret.

There’s no big secret in regards to being a successful investor and building wealth over time. And that’s one of the things that we’ve tried to get across. Anyway, neither here nor there. Our process. It’s been some time now. It’s got to be almost. I put out a rules of the road. boy. It had to be maybe 20 years ago. 20 years ago, I did a column on it and I added to it to some degree.

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You you live and learn and life. But our original rules to the road, real simple. This is what you need to do to be a successful investor. Compounding the royal road to riches. Again, play with a compounding calculator. Understand how you have to understand the mechanism, how it works. I couldn’t tell you what the formula is. Just know that it is magic. It’s real life magic. Do it

Okay, Google it, start playing around with it and see what type of wealth you can build for yourself over time. That’s what works. The bulk of stock market returns throughout history have been due to, believe it or not, dividends and compounding those dividends over time. Number two, number two, simple, Why are we? Master the obvious, Markowski. Don’t lose

Me and my don’t lose money is you never let risk lead to ruin. You protect your downside. You take massive losses in a portfolio. It can take a decent amount of time to make them back. So you don’t lose money. Meaning guess what? You don’t speculate unless you can afford to speculate. If you can’t afford

To gamble, don’t gamble. So I can’t stand this all the time. I can’t go into casinos, I can’t. I can’t. They give me the willies. They give me the willies. When I see people, and again, when I see people at slot machines pumping money into slot machines, knowing that these people can’t afford to be doing what they’re doing, I can’t. Can’t handle it, gives me agitation. So again, okay.

Don’t speculate unless you can afford to speculate. And what I mean by speculate, if I see something, say for my portfolio, okay, that I think is interesting, but I know that there’s a lot of risk involved, okay, whatever I put into that, I’m already assuming that I’ve lost it. Already assuming, so it’s no big deal, okay? I took a chance on that. And you know, if I make money on it, I make money. If I lose money,

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That to me is speculation. Invest like a multimillionaire again. Do you think when you’ve seen the markets move, the violent movements, let’s just say over the past week, do you think really wealthy people are bent out of shape? You think they’re they’re checking their apps, their Robin Hood accounts, looking to see what they can move and groove around? No. No.

There’s that great line, great line by JP Morgan. And I’m paraphrasing, OK? I think it’s not exact. He said, during bear markets, stocks return to their rightful owners. Now, what did he mean by that? Well, it’s kind of like almost like a, it is, it’s,

It’s very much like I own you type of a moment. What he’s saying is people do stupid stuff and I’ll just take advantage of it. In essence. And he’s not wrong. He’s not wrong. It happens all the time. Most human beings buy high, sell low. Don’t do that. Wealthy people don’t do that. You want to become wealthy? Actually act like you’re already wealthy when it comes to your finances.

And of course, again, this is faster than the obvious, buy assets on sale. Now again, you’re never ever going to get in at the exact bottom. You’re never going to get out at the exact top. Just doesn’t work that way. You got to understand, you got to take a look at what the value is and where you see this company’s value five, 10, 15, 20, 30 years down the road. And don’t fret. Don’t fret, OK, if

get into something, jeez, it goes down a little. You just got to know what the value is. So you’re looking to buy things on sale. Simple rules, right? I’m a big fan of simplicity. Big fan of simplicity. I like things that work, that make sense, that are simple and easy. Hey, pretty much made Apple Computer pretty successful as well. There’s an old saying.

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saying that successful investing is like getting oneself in great shape. Simple, but not easy. the one to the two things that I expanded on and I put this in a column about five, six years ago is. It’s a change, some of it’s also your mindset, your mindset if you want to be a successful investor, one of the important things, it’s not important.

You need to realize this. is not important to be right in the here and now, but it’s important to be right. Eventually, if that makes any sense, what conventional wisdom says is the greatest investment. Today, more often than not, a lousy investment in the future can take a look at all the disruptor companies from not too long ago.

Markets are not efficient.

Markets are not efficient over the short term. Many of the calls that we’ve made, man, people go back and look at our website. They’ll see some of the columns that I’ve written and the things that we’ve called and whether it be Enron and .com collapse and the great recession and all of these things that we’ve called over the years. And, you guys were right. I was like, yeah, we were right, eventually.

Hey, we called Enron, but over the next year, the stock went straight up until it didn’t. So again, that’s what you need to understand. But by knowing that, by knowing that, you have to have a couple of things. You’ve got to have patience. You’ve got to have patience to know that, OK, this is my process. It’s my process. This works. And again, this stuff’s applicable in everything in life.

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applicable in everything in life. You to be a great basketball player and you’re going out there every day and you’re taking 500 jump shots. You’re taking how many free throws? You’re doing all the layups. Go back and watch those Larry Bird workouts or Kobe Bryant or Michael Jordan. The process that they go through, don’t deviate the work that they put in. Same thing. You need to have patience, but then as well because guess what? You got chattering classes everywhere.

You’re going to be bombarded with news. So you’ve got to have a little courage as well, patience and courage to stand in the face of the chattering classes. It’s a simple process, people, but it works. Watchdog on wallstreet .com.