From Losing Money to 50% Returns | Sean Tepper

#023: Sean Tepper is an experienced investor and the founder of Ticker, a B2C SaaS platform designed to help retail investors build disciplined and sustainable investment portfolios. With a background in tech and a history of successful stock market investing, Sean brings a practical and no-nonsense approach to stock investing for beginners. His expertise lies in guiding individuals through the process of understanding stocks, ETFs, and even crypto, with a focus on practical strategies to achieve long-term financial growth. Sean's down-to-earth demeanor and real-world experience make him a valuable source of insight for those looking to navigate the world of stock market investments.

00:00:00 - Introduction and Business Overview
00:00:48 - Business Model and Pricing
00:02:07 - Passive Income and Options Trading
00:06:11 - Wealth Building vs. Wealth Protection
00:09:16 - Journey to Building a SaaS Business
00:12:29 - Building Confidence in Stock Investing
00:13:19 - The Mistake of Selling Stocks Too Soon
00:14:40 - Principles of Investing and Not Losing Money
00:15:39 - Stockpiling and Dollar Cost Averaging
00:20:11 - Triggers for Market Recession
00:24:48 - Vision for the Future Business
00:25:08 - Top Investment Choices
00:27:12 - Scalable Business Models
00:28:37 - Portfolio Analysis and Future Moves
00:35:39 - Wealth Building with Stocks
00:37:34 - Starting Investment Strategy
00:39:23 - Investment Indicators
00:40:21 - Market Downturn Strategy
00:41:44 - Cryptocurrency and Pharma Stocks
00:44:13 - Where to Learn More

Sean Tepper's Links:
IG:  thepaybacktime

Dylan's Links:

• 🎙️Podcast: BusinessConfessionsPod
• 📽️YouTube: @BizConfessions
• 📷Instagram: DylanWillx
• Linked-In: /dylan-williams

Other Episodes you might like:

• 7-Figure Blueprint for Any Business | Chandler Saine
• Building a Unique Online Fitness Empire | Lee Maasen
• Land Investing & Building Multiple Streams of Income Daniel Martinez
• Hiring Top Talent Overseas | Stratton Brown

Past Guests: Chandler Saine, Daniel Martinez, Stratton Brown, Lee Maasen, Nico Lagan, Daniel Roman,Tim Branyan, David Van Beekum, Nick Hutchison, Deirdre Tshein, Sanchez Zehcnas, Christina Lopez, Keigan Carthy, Hemant Varshney, Taniela Fiefia, Jennifer Blake, Nicki Sciberras, John Chan

Transcript

Track 1: 0:00

my business makes, well, it's on track to make about 300 K this year, 2024.

dylan-williams_1_03-20-2024_120736: 0:05

Nice. how do you do it?

Track 1: 0:06

So Ticker is a B2C SaaS. We serve the retail investor and help them invest with confidence. Our business model, just to be transparent, we're a screener and educational platform all in one. People come to us looking to understand, Hey, is Tesla a good stock? Is Palantir a good stock? Is Apple a good stock? We have about 40, 000 stocks, about 1600 ETFs, and we even have crypto. And then we've got other tools in a platform, like a watch list tool that keeps track of stuff for you, portfolio tracker alerts, and then everything education wise, so you know, like when to buy, when to sell, how to reduce risk and everything in between. So we're Basic B2C subscription platform. and that's how we make money. Our plan we're we'll get right to it. We're a 14 day free trial, no credit card. And then people can upgrade to the base plan, which is either 15 bucks a month or 99 a year. Majority of the people go with the yearly option. Cause you save three months.

dylan-williams_1_03-20-2024_120736: 0:59

Yeah. Yeah. you also have an education arm on that as well, right? With this software.

Track 1: 1:04

Correct. So our main SaaS platform is Ticker and then we do have Ticker EDU, which is, it's, we phrase it as a nice to have, not a need to have, but if you want to get into courses, we've got three different courses. One is stock investing for beginners. It's 60 modules, 10 minutes or less that are really to the point. Then the second one is how I, me, how do I use Ticker? It's like looking over my shoulder and showing you how I use Ticker. Ticker in every way possible. The third course, since you're a real estate guy, you'll appreciate this one. This was how to create passive income with options trading. We use covered calls. That course actually is in production as we speak, should be going live in early. April, but that's been in high demand. So yeah, people can go with those. And then I do offer limited time basis, one on one coaching, but I only can take on a few clients a month. At once. And we're actually almost booked on that.

dylan-williams_1_03-20-2024_120736: 1:56

So you said passive income in my ears perked up here. So

Track 1: 1:59

huh.

dylan-williams_1_03-20-2024_120736: 2:00

is that something that you just, sit and let it go?

Track 1: 2:03

pretty close. So take a step back. Investing in the stock market is very passive. If you're using a tool like ticker, cause it does a lot of heavy lifting for you. You really only need to use it maybe 15 to 30 minutes a week. If you really wanted to, cause it. It really analyzes stocks, in seconds, Hey, is this stock a good stock? For example, Tesla or Apple and Microsoft, but with passive income, with stocks, you're not really creating passive income because you're using compound interest in building your portfolio. You don't really want to take money out of your investment account until you achieve financial independence or retirement. So it's not really creating income. However, there's a strategy called covered calls, selling covered calls and how it works. I'll keep it in simple terms. What you do is you need to own one contract, which is 100 shares. Not every stock has an options contract attached to it, but I'll use an example like Caterpillar or John Deere. You can buy a hundred shares, one contract. And then what you do is you sell a contract 30 days out at a strike price. Let's say the strike price is 200 bucks or the share price is 200 bucks. Strike price is 210. If the stock goes to 210, you sell for a profit. If it misses the strike price, even if it goes down, you collect premium. So no matter if it goes up, Or down you make money and it's a rinse and repeat strategy. You can apply every month in the course teaches you. It gives you all the tools of training. I've got an Excel sheet, but you really only need to use that Excel sheet and ticker. Maybe 1 to 2 hours per month, and you can be making about. 500 to about 2, 000 profit to start out. And then of course you can dial it up from that.

dylan-williams_1_03-20-2024_120736: 3:45

Is there a limit on that end?

Track 1: 3:47

No limit at all. It's, if you want to own as many contracts as you like, that depends on how much money you have, you could do, you got to go minimum one contract, but you can go unlimited. You could buy 10 contracts, but then you're going to be putting in several hundred thousand dollars. But in that case, you could be making. tens of thousand dollars per month.

dylan-williams_1_03-20-2024_120736: 4:05

do you personally get into things like that?

Track 1: 4:08

I don't with options anymore. The reason I have multiple streams of income. Number one being ticker, my SAS, so every bit of money that could be used for options has been applied to building the business just cause the ROI is significantly more with a SAS business. however, I do continue to invest in the stock market. One should never stop investing. In the stock market, like using compound interest, seriously, eighth wonder of the world. You, there's no way, like my favorite case study, I'll share it really quick as a janitor by the name of Ronald Reed, who built up a portfolio of 8 million. The question is how does somebody who's making Minimum wage, become a multimillionaire. The answer hold about 10 stocks or less really strong stocks, value stocks, and then keep buying every more every single month. You can't skip a month. It's discipline got to buy every month. And that's seriously, when you do that over five years, 10 years, 15 years, it's, it does some incredible things. I do consulting as well. I won't get into that, but ticker yet. No more options. You have to. Pick your battles. And I'm like the multiple and we could get into this on a SAS business can be very high. And eventually I do want to sell, we are getting offers all the time to sell a company, but it's not at the price. I know I can get,

dylan-williams_1_03-20-2024_120736: 5:23

Yeah,

Track 1: 5:24

it's keep driving this thing forward. And it's fun. This is my dream. I love building this business,

dylan-williams_1_03-20-2024_120736: 5:29

I love it attest to that, to more people I talk with that are investing in everything. The younger crowd goes for the more aggressive, the higher returns. And then I've noticed the, the wealthier, older class has, they're all about preserving their wealth versus making the wealth. So they go for the lower, less risk, guaranteed returns. And that kind of sounds like what you're headed at right now.

Track 1: 5:54

So ticker. Yeah, I'll define the difference here. we guide people into really two different paths. You're either in wealth building mode or wealth protection mode. Wealth building mode is when you're still working. You've got a timeline to achieve financial independence or retirement. Could be 5 years, 10 years, 15, 20 years out. In that case, you want to be an individual stocks. That's where you get those returns. No promises here, but our returns are usually, you can earn between 15 and 50 percent per year. The market average is about six to 8 percent after inflation. So we. You can beat the market pretty easily by using ticker. So if somebody is still working, you want to be an individual stocks, but as you alluded to, as you start getting to a point when you're nearing retirement or financial independence, let's shift your portfolio more to wealth protection mode. And that's when you should be looking at ETFs, index funds, or mutual funds. They're pretty much the same product, except for mutual funds have a higher cost, higher expense ratio. We could talk about that. But those are essentially. A bundle of stocks could be between 100 and a thousand and you're really just going to match the market. Don't split hairs on this. Some people are like, I'm thinking about this ETF and that it's stop it. Like they pretty much generate the same returns.

dylan-williams_1_03-20-2024_120736: 7:07

Yeah.

Track 1: 7:07

that case, your objective is not building your wealth. It's Protecting it. You'll ride up a little bit. You'll ride down a little bit. Don't worry about it because it's just keeping your money safe, but at the same time outpacing inflation. Because I always tell people you want an emergency fund about three to six months in your savings account, but don't put any more in there because you're not doing yourself any favors. Your savings account is not going to go up. Beat inflation. So anything over six months, I'm like, yeah, put it in your investment account. Let it work for you. otherwise, yeah, I see too many people sitting in too much savings. I'm like, yeah, it's become less valuable every day.

dylan-williams_1_03-20-2024_120736: 7:42

Yeah, for sure. How'd you get into investing?

Track 1: 7:44

So I built my first company in the 2000s. It was an agency and we were building websites. Custom software. We even did some video services. This was between 2006 and 2010. I made like no money. It was a very low profit margin model, a service business. I had a lot of employees, payroll taxes, all that kind of good stuff. But then in 2010, we were approached by a larger business. Agency, they offer to, absorb us or pretty much buy us out. In other words, no check written like a million dollar check. Hey, Sean, you just sold your business. It was none of that. It was all debts and liabilities wiped clean. and a lot of your entrepreneurs probably know this service businesses typically have a very low sale multiple, if no multiple at all. It's very hard to sell a service business. And I learned that in my twenties. I'm glad I did not learn that at my sixties. Uh, so after that, I'm like, okay. I got to figure out how do I flip the equation? So I'm not working for money entire life. I get money to work for me. And I immediately gravitated towards investing. And I actually got into more risky investing, which is angel investing, using my money to invest in private companies. very risky because you don't have, a proven business model, product market fit customers, momentum, the whole deal. So I did that for a few years. Then in 2015, that's when I got focused and looked at Warren Buffett and Charlie Munger and said, okay, these guys are doing something, right? They are billionaires. What are they doing? And I knew they were able to beat the market consistently. Yet we know, you and I both know, and your listeners know this too. These are not gambling men. They don't use emotions or feelings and they're not sitting at the casino, right? So that means they're using some sort of logic. Now, my background, so you know, over 20 years now is primarily tech. I've done, not software engineer, but I've been a project manager primarily. and I've worked for some large companies like Kohler and GE great companies. But anyway, I use my, tech background to create an Excel sheet. I gamified it with a point system from zero to a hundred. So I know like definitively is this stock, a good investment like Palantir or Microsoft or Tesla or whatever. I didn't want to be in this waffling area where so many people on Twitter and Reddit and YouTube, I don't know if it's a good stock and like you got to cut through the clutter. So I use that sheet for about. Four years making returns between 15 and 50%. In fact, it was closer to that 50 percent than 2019. I started sharing this Excel sheet with a few people and everybody was like, when are you going to turn this into a software? And my dream was always to create a SAS business. I try to, this is a topic for another day, unless you want to go there. But I had a few failures from 2010 to 2020 that, I kind of side hustled and I learned a lot, but there were always some kind of SAS, but this was it. I'm like, this is it. This is a SAS that can really gain some traction and yeah, it took about a year to build and went live in 2020, took about six months to get the first paying customer, which is a very humbling experience. But I know this is the journey when you create a SAS, you don't want to look for paying customers right away. You want to get people into the platform for free, get fast feedback and put that into play and make the tool what they want because it's not what you want, right? Your software is always gonna evolve to something different. I built enough software by this point, so I knew that. So yeah. then to fast forward from 2020 21 to today, 2024, we just crossed 9,000 customers over about 50 countries. So finally feel like we have momentum, but it was a hell of a journey

dylan-williams_1_03-20-2024_120736: 11:19

Sounds like it. Dang, that's a lot. there's a lot that you touch base on there. back to the investing side real quick before I lose my train of thought. what would you say your favorite investment is?

Track 1: 11:31

I like'cause. I know tech really well, and that's my specialty. I like strong tech stocks with multiple streams of revenue. We have a tool built into ticker called the 4M analysis or 4M confidence booster. I'll keep it really short here. So I won't talk your ear off, but we look at more than just the numbers. You'll see too many people on Wall Street. They'll like, look at market cap and PD ratio and be like, that's a good stock. It's you're missing a few steps here. So we use the four M's. The first M is the margin of safety or the math part of investing. The second M is the meaning that's the business model. How many revenue streams, how scalable are those revenue streams? The third M is the moat. How does the business stack up against other companies in the same sector and industry? And then the last M is the management. That's a track record of the CEO. We'll look at everything. And if you can get a really high four M score on a tech stock, count me in because your returns, you can kick ass, you can beat the market by a long shot, like me at this point in my life. Like I can confidently, we're barely even using ticker, an hour a month, I can get 50%. I believe I can consistently make, I'll put it this way between 25 and 50 percent every year, no problem, just. Just because the tool has increased my confidence enough. And I'm, I just, I know how stocks behave. So it's I could do this all day.

dylan-williams_1_03-20-2024_120736: 12:51

How much involvement is that to gain double digit returns like that on your end?

Track 1: 12:57

Not much at all. like I said, it's, I'll put it this way, going back to that janitor, I mentioned the guy, Ronald Reed, he found a few strong stocks. And they need buy and buy more. See the biggest problem and a question I'm frequently asked is when somebody buys a stock, their very next question is, okay, when do I sell it? And that's the wrong attitude. That's the wrong mindset. You got to be thinking about, okay, so you just found a strong stock. You got to commit to it for the next 10 years. In some cases you will, in some cases you won't, but you have to be buying more. So I see too many people making the mistake of buying and then selling or buying too many stocks. They'll have okay, so we'll get to 15, they'll get to 20, they'll get to 25. What you're essentially doing is creating a fund and the ETF, and you're not going to beat the market. So it's going to be focused portfolio, 10 to 15 stocks. I hold 10. Yeah. Yeah. Cool. And if people are interested, they can see my portfolio when they join Ticker, just so you can see what I'm in, but it's yeah, it's actually really simple. Too many people out there over engineer investing. and it's unfortunate probably in your space too, as real estate, people overcomplicate things and it doesn't have to be that way.

dylan-williams_1_03-20-2024_120736: 14:08

That's so true. As long as you're buying in the red and selling in the green and not the opposite, you're going to make money.

Track 1: 14:14

Seriously, we've got a rule. This is a rule one. This is Warren Buffett's. Rule one, investing rule one, don't lose money. Rule two, don't forget rule one. So the full, the principle there is when stocks go down below your cost basis, you do not sell, you let the market ride them back up, which it usually does a rising tide lifts all ships. I stole that from Motley Fool money. A great show, by the way. and that's the principle, like when stocks go down, don't stress out. They're going to lift back up. And I've done that a few times in my past. And I just wait maybe three months, six months, nine months, and then I'll sell for profit. But I, I refuse. I'll tell you right now. I do not lose money in the stock market because I made that choice. I do not sell for a loss. I only. Solve for a profit.

dylan-williams_1_03-20-2024_120736: 14:58

Absolutely. Can't go broke making a profit.

Track 1: 15:00

Amen.

dylan-williams_1_03-20-2024_120736: 15:02

to that. Are you more so investing every month and putting it like behind you, on auto draft or, and you probably did this as well, but are you looking for those bloody days to go in heavy on a single stock?

Track 1: 15:18

Brilliant question. Okay. So in our onboarding, when people join, they get a series of emails. And of course we show people, you can read them all in one go, but there is, there are a few emails that teaches you this. And what you want to do is this is really important strategy. You want to set up an auto draft from your bank account to your broker. I use TD Ameritrade here in the States. I always do. Say States, cause we've got customers all over the world. So I can always list brokers in other countries, but, auto draft. So it's automatic. You got to treat it like your mortgage or rent or your energy bill, your cell phone bill, you cannot skip, you cannot pause it. You've got to be sending money to your broker every month. And then it's going to sit there in cash. And then what you do is this put 50 percent of that in your broker aside. And you save for what's called stockpile. Stockpiling is the number one, most important strategy an investor can use. That principle is when the market goes down. You want to buy into the dip. You can't time the very bottom. No software or human being can do that, but when the market pulls back like it did in 2022 and part of 23, we had the recession. You want to buy into that usually every five to 10 percent down. So that's stockpiling. You got to wait for those events. You're going to be saving up some cash, which is a good thing, but you want to be ready to attack the other 50 percent you DCA, which is dollar. Cost average every single month. You should be investing into the same stocks you're all already hold until you get to about, 10 to 15 stocks in your portfolio. And then you stop, you don't need more stocks. You need to buy more of that, which you already own. You keep doing that, but yeah, like now we're on a big tear in the market because we are coming out of the recession. Same thing happened in 2009 and 10 after the housing crash. so if you ever hear people talk about, we're going to have a recession in 2024, I'm like, no, we're not like we just went through one. shut up yet in the history and I've done studies over the last hundred years. You don't have back to back recessions. That does not happen. The fear is what happens. And then the news perpetuates that. So people just sit in cash, which is stupid. Now you want to be investing and let that ride up. Now, if we see a small pullback, then you can deploy your capital. And that when it corrects, which it always does, that's when you make the big return. Stockpiling again, that's. That's the big play, but the biggest thing you need like Dylan and your audience, it's not your intelligence and it's not your math skills. You don't need it in that it's your ability to control your emotions because guess what? The market's going down. Everybody's freaking out. Everybody on Twitter or Reddit or YouTube is, Oh my gosh, the sky is falling. You gotta be stoic. You'd be like, Guess what? I'm holding strong businesses, and those businesses are not slowing down. So guess what? I'm going to do buy more when the market corrects. That's when I'm gonna make a lot of money. I'll give you another case study here, and then I'll shut up. I got a buddy of mine. He's a plumber when he was in his younger thirties. He had 100, 000 saved in 2008. Market crash. And there was the big, they're the bailouts of the auto manufacturers, GM and Chrysler. But there's one auto manufacturer that did not ask for a bailout. That was Ford. Guess what he did? He bought into Ford because a balance sheet was that strong. And he turned that a hundred K into about 2. 5 million in about a year and a half. That is stock. That's stockpiling and you won't get those big, you'll get small stockpiling opportunities through the duration of a year. maybe if you're lucky, but the big ones don't happen often. For example, it was 2008 was the big one. Then you fast forward to 2020, the COVID dip. When things went down 30 percent for about three months. And then from after that it was 2022 and 23. So I'm like, I'm putting cash aside. I'm like, I'm still investing, but I'm like, what is the next one going to happen? I don't really care, but when it does, I'm going to be ready. Like I want that market to just tank 30 percent or more and I'm going all in. And that's when I'll make a ton of money.

dylan-williams_1_03-20-2024_120736: 19:18

When do you see, when do you first see that? you just said, that was my next question. I was going to ask what do you see in the markets we just went through, I know we the same, just like you said, we just went through one and we're coming on the other side of that. And our numbers can prove that. I even looked this morning at the market over the last year, we've been, since 2023, if you look back a year, your NASDAQs and everything. I think I saw 32 percent or something over the last year.

Track 1: 19:46

It's. It's incredible. Yeah.

dylan-williams_1_03-20-2024_120736: 19:49

What do you, when do you see the next pullback or correction?

Track 1: 19:55

So you got to look at triggers signs that can cause that. Now, what to go back to 2022, there are 3 definitive causes of this. The big 1 was inflation started taking off and it went up to in 2022 and went as high as 9%. The last time it got that high was in the early 80s. so that was number 1 and what really, accelerated that just happened before that was 2 things. 1 would be. Russia in Ukraine, Russia, Putin talking about invading Ukraine context there when there's rumors of something, the market goes down, but when a definitive decision has been made, for example, 9 11, there was about a two week period after that, where the market went down. But as soon as George W said, we are invading Afghanistan, it was a definitive decision and the market started taking off, to go back even further, JFK assassination, the market went down one day because we caught the guy. we got the guy. So it's like the same thing with the guy that shot, Reagan. Reagan didn't die, but it was like, Oh my gosh, people freaked out. But it's we got the guy. Okay. Market took off. So market went down a day. So just keep that in mind when there's rumors, the market goes down. And that those rumors went on for three months when the market started falling off a cliff a little bit. Then we had the Omicron variants. COVID, and then the third thing was inflation and that's what really took us into the recession. Now fast forward to today, we're at three points on my other monitor here, 3. 1 percent inflation. You want to be sitting between two and three. So we're like, we're in a great spot, like 3 percent is that's pretty good.

21:32

Guys, real clear. Think about this. Share this episode with someone. It could create an ideal and you'd be responsible for that. You never know what opportunities that could create. All right, guys, I'll let y'all get back to it. Thank you.

Track 1: 21:48

So I talked about inflation, you know, we want to look for the signs of like, when were the, when will there be another recession? When will there be a crash? And it's like, all right, so it's not inflation. We're good. They're housing interest rates. They're kind of, you know, they've been flat for a while, but nothing's spiking there. I see, 6. 6, 6. 9, 4 percent as of today. not perfect, but it's like still an improvement. Over, I think it did get up to 7. 3 as I see in the last year. So it's like, all right. So those are good signs. What else could trigger it? I don't really see anything like if another COVID variant comes, we've been there, done that the world was prepared for that. So that's not going to be a shock. It would have to be a rumor of another, like another war, but. That can impact the world like that would be the next thing I can think of, but I don't see some people say, what about the debt in the US? that has never triggered a recession. You just keep printing more money. What happens there is you keep printing more money. You go into more debt. What it does, it can drive up inflation. Now, if that gets out of hand, we could see what happened at the B. end of 2022 beginning at 23. So I don't see any signs when I see these people on wall street, talking about, Hey, we're going to have a recession 24. I'm like, no, we are not, this is going to continue to ride an outfit again, small pullback, take advantage of it, but I don't see any big threats.

dylan-williams_1_03-20-2024_120736: 23:11

Yeah, I honestly feel like we've gotten good at, the triggers and taking the right action. So we don't hit

Track 1: 23:17

Correct.

dylan-williams_1_03-20-2024_120736: 23:18

anymore. I feel like they're actually getting pretty good. I hate to say, with the rate hikes and everything that they've done, actually helped a little bit though. I feel like they're they're figuring this out.

Track 1: 23:28

a hundred percent agree with you. A good example of that is, Jerome Powell, the fed chair did talk about increasing interest rates a little bit to. Continue driving down inflation so we can get it in that two to three range. People freak out about that. I'm like, good, like we're going to see some nice little pullbacks, but it's not going to crash the market. And it puts us in that inflation range. We want to arrive at now you're right. What you said there, we are getting smarter because we went from 2009 to. 2022, 13 years without a recession. That was a long stretch. You take a step back. Australia went over 30 years without a recession. So it's as time goes on, you do get wiser to the signs and you know how to get ahead of them. Or you like to think the right people in charge can get ahead of it. Not always, but they are getting better. So I think we're in a good spot.

dylan-williams_1_03-20-2024_120736: 24:15

If you couldn't invest in stocks anymore, what would be that other investment?

Track 1: 24:21

Entrepreneurship, my, my main investment is actually one stock at this time. It is ticker, the way we're building this. I've worked for a few public companies or large companies. I'm running this. How, like, how would the scrutiny be? If you have to report to a board of directors worth your financial statements or your marketing plan or everything you're doing, you need to be airtight with that information in that language. So I'm running ticker as if I were still working in a public company. Yeah. And people have asked, Hey, would you take ticker public someday? And I would love to, but it takes a lot. It takes a lot of work, and a lot of revenue and a much bigger team to get there, but I'm confident I can get there, but if it does sell at some point, great. But yeah, if, and if I didn't have ticker, to be honest with you, I've got like a list of other business ideas that probably execute on.

dylan-williams_1_03-20-2024_120736: 25:06

we can definitely go. So I'm a big visionary. and right now I'm in that kind of a space of what's the next business I'm going to start or buy. I'd love to talk with you more about that at another day.

Track 1: 25:17

Sure.

dylan-williams_1_03-20-2024_120736: 25:18

what's your top investments right now? Like your top stock picks.

Track 1: 25:24

Yeah, I'll break down a few of my favorites. So I do invest in the usual suspects. I love Microsoft. I'll give you the, like the top 4 or 5 here. So Microsoft, Apple, Google, Palantir I'll give a quick reason why. Microsoft, I consider the perfect business model. Now it has not been the top performing stock compared to Nvidia over the last few years. maybe a few others, but it is the perfect business model. The reason is it has B2B SaaS, B2C SaaS. you've got Microsoft office, which is used by most corporations around the world. And when a company starts talking about cutting budgets, they will never have a conversation. Hey, we should get rid of our Microsoft Office 365 licenses. That will never happen. It's like the stickiest software in the face of the planet because everybody needs it to run. they've got ERP solutions, Dynamics, which gets into more enterprise software, which is more my background. then you've got Xbox, you've got Windows operating system, list goes on. So The number of revenue streams is profound, and I think they've acquired about 200 companies over the last 40 years, which turned into new products or new revenue streams. So that's one, two. I really Apple because again, they've acquired a lot of businesses. They have a lot of revenue streams and a huge brand mode. Like when people move to Apple, Typically don't switch back to PC or Android. I know I was that case. I was a case study of that in the last few years. It's what took me so long to switch to Apple? Finally, Sean got with the program. so I really Apple. They're great financials. Of course, Google, I will say this, cause I've researched, worked in a lot of businesses in the past. the most scalable business out there is probably ad tech. Second to that would be fintech. Third would be SaaS. with ad tech and fintech, you don't have limitations on how much customers pay you. Whereas SaaS is a set fee every month. Yes, very scalable, but think about a company like a retailer doing advertising on Google and YouTube, they can be spending a hundred K this month. They could see results dial that up to 200 K next month, go to 300 K. There is no limit. It's huge revenue. but then FinTech think about payment transactions like PayPal or Square. When you come between the buyer and the seller and create a low friction solution that people barely even notice, but you're taking fees. That is also highly scalable. So I really like Google for that case. Moving on to what I say, Palantir's enterprise software, data analytics, which is very boring, but very much needed. And they serve both military like the U. S. Army, for example, and then they serve large corporations. And then number five, Very few people have heard of Fortinet cybersecurity, same situation as Microsoft. Every company out there needs cybersecurity software and their enterprise level. So when you're enterprise software, you're charging customers hundreds of thousands of dollars and up to millions of dollars per year. It's not some like baby SAS, like ticker where you're charging, a hundred bucks a year would be to see I can make fun of my own company. But when you go to play in the big boys playground with enterprise, it's a whole different ballgame and Fortinet. They're like best in class with cybersecurity. They got a lot of big customers.

dylan-williams_1_03-20-2024_120736: 28:40

So those are the five,

Track 1: 28:42

Those are, yeah, top five. I got a few others, but we can stop there.

dylan-williams_1_03-20-2024_120736: 28:45

ones that you, are you able to see? said you're able to see your picks on ticker, right?

Track 1: 28:52

Correct. Yeah. And you can see my allocation percentages. give me a second here. I can actually. Give you the full list. And then I can let you know what move I'm making here soon. Cause I'm going to be selling and moving into other products. So I do have PayPal. PayPal is not a big, not a big performer for me over the last few years. And when the recession hit, they really took a nosedive, but rule one, don't lose money, rule two, don't forget rule one. So I will not be selling that. I have high conviction for PayPal for the longterm though. They've got a ton of revenue streams in their models. So I really like that. I also hold. square, very small percentage. They're like PayPal. It's been tech transaction fees. I do hold AMD. I like with semiconductor stocks, you get AMD in the top of the class right now. As in everybody's talking about NVIDIA. Both are solid. I do hold Paylocity. They're a HR tech, so payroll tech for large corporations. Then the last one is Atlassian. Atlassian is a tool like Jira and Trello. software engineers use it. Not the best financials in Ticker, but the 4Ms really do collectively check out for me, but I plan on so the audience knows I'll sell. This year, I'm going to sell Atlassian and Paylocity. Reason is competitive. Landscape. It's becoming saturated with both. So I'm thinking ahead, hey, if you got a lot of competitors, just be aware of that. yeah, I'll cut those two positions at some point block as well. I think they could be doing a little better. But anyway. I'll stop there.

dylan-williams_1_03-20-2024_120736: 30:27

Cutting those, are you still getting good returns even on that? Because I know you're not selling that loss.

Track 1: 30:31

Absolutely. I'm in the positive for all three and I'm what I'm doing now is when you're in a position where you want to sell, you can be saying, just wait a little longer. Just wait a little longer. And it's you know what? Opportunity cost, cut your positions, move on to other stocks. And what I'm identifying. I'm looking at a stock called Nova. Nobody's heard of this one, but what they do is they help with the manufacturing process of semiconductor chips. And they've returned about 500 percent over the last five years. huge stock there. And I'm also looking at Intuit, tack it like, for example, in the States, you have to pay your taxes. They've got QuickBooks. They've got, they've got a suite of tools with them, but it's You can't not pay your taxes of the way you're gonna have issues. So I like anytime you have a product that's mandated by law. That's a good place to be like insurance. I don't have any insurance stocks in my portfolio, but I do like insurance. Unfortunately, it's a commodity. But, Insurance like you have in the states. I think it's required in almost every state homeowners in auto. If you don't pay, you got yourself a problem.

dylan-williams_1_03-20-2024_120736: 31:35

Are there any, of those? I know that you're more of a value investor, but are there any of those? And you said you, you also dabbled in angel investing too. So you've probably seen the upside of the smaller companies and getting those, 500 percent return over five years. Do you have, do you allocate money to those kind of younger companies or stock picks that you watch in the background?

Track 1: 31:56

Actually, with our onboarding, we do teach people about penny stocks and IPO stocks. And to answer your question there, I do not like the 1 risky stock I invest in is the auto. Ticker it's my own business. I don't consider a risk cause I'm running it. But if other people were looking at it from the outside coming in and be like, Oh gosh, that's a penny stock. I'm not touching it. unless they get the no me, then they may consider, but, otherwise no, the answer is, and this is really good for your audience to know. We teach people that a penny stock is anything that is 5 or less us dollar. And anything that hits that range, there's a 99. 9 percent chance it will never break out past 5. The reason is large institutions lose. Interest. They lose confidence, they lose interest and they move on to other stocks with a higher market cap. So that's no go territory. Now, anything that's between five and 10, there's a 90 percent chance it will never break out past 10. Same situation, large institutions lose confidence. So we do tell investors wait for stocks to go above 10 to start getting confident. Unfortunately, I see too many people that Kind of like the doja coin situation. We're going to get in at 3 cents and watch it go to 5 bucks. So I'm going to become multi millionaires like that. That never happens, like never happens. So that's penny stocks and IPO stocks, very similar situation. Now with IPOs, a lot of IPOs, there's this whole phrase, just because you can, doesn't mean you should just because you can go public. Doesn't mean you should. Now, a lot of these companies, they typically run and it's not always, but Have to point a finger here, but there are situations where venture capitalists are saying no private equity is Saying now, and even banks are like, nope, we're not going to give you more money. So where do you go to get more money? You go to the stock market. Unfortunately, most retail investors, they don't know the difference between a good company and a bad company. So they buy in based on hype and the company ends up raising a bunch of money. And within about two to three months, They usually fall off a cliff about 90 percent of the time. The reason is companies that go public, they're now playing with the big boys and girls like this is a whole new world and you better have a strong income statement, cash flow statement and balance sheet. And after that first quarterly report, We're going to see the truth and when the truth is revealed, that stock falls off a cliff. So we tell people with IPO stocks, try to wait four consecutive quarters to make sure there's a consistent increase in profits. And of course the scores look good and ticker then go into it, but definitely do not like right now, there's all this talk of Reddit. Like when I invest in Reddit, hell no, they don't have enough revenue streams. They're not diversified enough. and there's people hyping it up like this is going to be the IPO 2024. I'm like, do not lose your money. do not go into that stock. but we see it all the time. There's always hype every year of some new IPO and nope, try to avoid it. A

dylan-williams_1_03-20-2024_120736: 34:52

Yeah. So for somebody who isn't in the stock market, and I'll even say, I'll give myself for an example, cause I know that I need to diversify and do more. I used to get, I was in stocks and I still have money in stocks, but I don't actively do it. I got into real estate and, that was 100 percent of my focus and that's how it built. But I have my, I have cashflow from my holdings company. I have other investments that I've made. So now I'm building up cash that I usually make investments with other real estate investments with, but probably need to invest more in and diversify a little bit. for somebody like me, what would you say would be the best approach? So I'm 32 years old. What would you say would be the best approach? and I think I know where you're going to go with this, but I want you to reassure me, what would you do? And let's just, I'll give you, I have a nest that I'm going to allocate a hundred thousand dollars to this right now that I'm going to play with. What would you do with it?

Track 1: 35:52

hundred percent. I want to take a step back here just to give context and then we can dive in there. I'll, I'm not going to give stock recommendations and advice. I'm not a financial advisor, but we'll get pretty close. so with, to put it in perspective, let's say you look at a, like I'm in the Midwest, I'm in Milwaukee area. Average home price is 250, 000. If you buy a home today, can that home go to 500, 000 in the next year? very likely. Rare chances. However, if you buy a stock for 250 bucks, can that stock go to 500 in the next year? If it's the right stock, it's got the strong, it's got great financials, multiple revenue streams, scalable revenue streams, the right, right CEO, it can most definitely go. And this is night and day. Difference. You can build your wealth significantly faster with stocks than real estate. However, real estate has the advantage, which you're taking advantage of passive income or somewhat passive income. You're creating income every month. Stocks don't have that. It's compound interest building into itself. So diving in, you got 100 K. What I would do is I would, of course, start with ticker. Get educated then of course, 14 day free trial and kind of work your way through the onboarding, start to identify some stocks. The watch list tool helps you get focused with a few stocks and then you run with it from there. But the idea is build up a watch list of about 15 to, I would say 15 to 20 stocks. And then. Start small because it's all about building confidence. And it sounds like you probably, you have a little more momentum than most people because you've been there, done that, and you've bought stocks before. It sounds but we get a lot of people like 80 percent of our audience are complete beginners, which is good. And we teach them. You want to buy one, two or three stocks your first month. And that's it. Your objective is not making money. It's building confidence and then as you become more confident month two or three, then you just pepper in more dollars. So you've got a hundred K I'd say I would probably start with like maybe 1000 to 2, 000 the first month and then the next month maybe ramping up to 5, 000. Then invest 10, 000 that next month and work your way up the ladder from there. But pick those 10 to 15 stocks out of your list of 20, let's say, and that's your limit. Don't buy any more. You want to find 10 and then you want to keep buying more over time. And then what I would do is always keep about, I'd probably keep about 50, 000 set aside as a dry powder. Cash and get ready to attack when that market pulls back. Cause as you, you heard me and I saw your reaction on your face about the guy, a plumber turned a hundred K and a 2. 5 million. Keep that money set aside because the market pulls back. You want to put as much of that into the market and the market crashes. And then you're going to make a ton of money for sure.

dylan-williams_1_03-20-2024_120736: 38:46

Yeah. So when it does, let's just say when it does those indicators, because you're going to have more than one that you're looking at, what are those indicators that you're seeing, or you want to like, Okay. For instance, some stocks are going to drop more than others. Is that kind of the, let's just say you're looking at five stocks, and they're your watch list to dump money into for that day or for that, whenever that happens, what are those indicators you're looking for or numbers or, I guess I would just say numbers that you're looking for to deploy in that one versus the next, the other four.

Track 1: 39:17

Oh, so you're not referring to stockpiling as just like your DCA, your dollar cost average you're buying every month philosophy.

dylan-williams_1_03-20-2024_120736: 39:26

As the ones that, let's just say you're watching five stocks. For your stockpile that you're, your dry powder that you're holding for

Track 1: 39:33

Oh,

dylan-williams_1_03-20-2024_120736: 39:33

you're waiting for the dip. You're waiting for something to happen. What are the indicators that you're looking for? This one just dropped, 20% and the next one dropped 30%. Is there a reason why you wouldn't pick the 30% versus the 25%? I know it's probably based a lot more metrics than that, but is there a rule of thumb that you follow on

Track 1: 39:48

God. The best answer is don't overcomplicate it. I like what we teach in ticker is if a stock goes down 10 percent over 7 days, right? There is a good opportunity. Now, if it's 8 percent or it's 13%, don't split hairs on this. you got yourself a stockpiling opportunity. Get in now, when you have a bigger crash where the market S and P 500 really drops, let's say 10, 20%, your individual stocks are going to drop a lot more. So it's going to be like a heart attack moment, Oh my God, take the wind out of your chest. But you got to realize this is a good thing in these businesses. Like for example, Apple, Microsoft, the stocks I hold, no matter if we have a recession or not, they are not slowing down. They do not care. They're going to keep driving forward. So that's why you got to think about the business, not the stock. so be prepared for those moments. You've got those five stocks, let them drop. They're going to drop 30, 40, 50 percent while the market's dropping 20. And you're going to think, oh my gosh, this is insane. I'm losing so much money, but you do not sell. You buy more at those instances, and if you can train yourself to do that once and do it twice, it becomes a lot easier thereafter.

dylan-williams_1_03-20-2024_120736: 40:55

Yeah, I watched it with, crypto, Bitcoin, over the last I bought, funny enough, I actually bought back in 2010, I wanna say. yeah, when I think I paid, I can't remember. It was in 10 in 2011, but I paid like$34 a coin. I wanna say. I had maybe 200 bucks into it, but sold it a couple of months later, I believe, or something Oh, I know. I know. yeah, exactly. But I think it

Track 1: 41:20

sure,

dylan-williams_1_03-20-2024_120736: 41:21

I think 2020. I dumped some money, bought a few coins, into it. More towards the higher point of the market. right before, it just, it dumped. and I said, I didn't lose money. I'm just, I didn't make money right now and I'm just, I haven't sold since I literally, I

Track 1: 41:37

right?

dylan-williams_1_03-20-2024_120736: 41:37

the, I deleted the app and I haven't looked at it since. So I still have money in there. I don't know how much it is or what it is, but. I don't care. I'm not going to look at it for another 10 years probably. So whatever it does,

Track 1: 41:47

what real quick there? Because I know it can be very tempting for people to look at. Crypto the same as stocks now crypto. We always tell people this is in our education as well. Crypto is not a stock because it's not a business. It does not have an income statement cash flow statement or balance sheet. So you cannot calculate where it's going. We can calculate where stocks are going because we have the data with crypto. You cannot some people will they may argue. you can use volatility. It's It's highly speculative end of the day. So we do tell people, and I know large institutions say this, it's a round number around 5 percent or less of your net worth going to crypto, but be careful. We did see people lose their shirts cause they'd take out a second mortgage on their home and put it all in a crypto. And then it fell off a cliff and it's you just lost a fortune that was stupid.

dylan-williams_1_03-20-2024_120736: 42:31

and as simple as somebody changing their mind, higher ups changing their mind or change, putting regulations in place that could literally

Track 1: 42:37

That's it. A hundred percent. Yeah, you nailed it. that's it with crypto. And then. With pharma stocks too can be highly speculative and speculative because one government regulation can change. You can cut a share price in half overnight. So I tell people be careful with those overpriced, those red stocks in ticker. And a lot of those will contain a lot of pharma. But then of course I was talking with a guy yesterday. It's But this one pharma company, they got a share price around five bucks, but they're working on a new cancer drug. And if that goes, if that becomes approved, it could go to 55. I'm like all speculation. This is high probability of losing money. Avoid it like the plague.

dylan-williams_1_03-20-2024_120736: 43:15

it's hard, I'm sure most people want to hit those big legs, as big hundred, hundred percent returns and stuff, but it's the people who, like you said, Warren Buffett, it's value investing over time is when you get your compound interest in your big bucks. Your big heads.

Track 1: 43:31

Yeah. I'm talking to a guy next week who. Palantir, of course, they were at like seven or eight bucks and now they're over 20 and the guy sold it at 14. And he's he wants to know why he did that. And I want to, I'll be walking through, emotions in that case. Don't listen to the news. Don't listen to the media. Look past all that. Look at the business. but yeah, People are trying to time that entry time, that exits, knock it off that janitor example, I told you again, guys making minimum wage portfolio of 8 million, how did he do it? You buy every month, really boring business. He was holding GE and Johnson. And I think CBS health for the eighties and nineties, it's these are not exciting business, but the discipline of buying every month and letting compound interest do the heavy lifting for you. That's where you make your money. It's not the speculative time, my entry of some. Piece of junk stock. That's going nowhere tomorrow.

dylan-williams_1_03-20-2024_120736: 44:23

No, for sure. But Sean, we're coming up here an hour now. where can people go to learn more? I know we have ticker, of course. where can people go to learn more about you?

Track 1: 44:32

Yeah. Ticker is the number one spot. T Y K R. com. Otherwise go to my LinkedIn. I'm actually quite active on LinkedIn every day. So that's the other place.

dylan-williams_1_03-20-2024_120736: 44:42

Sean, I appreciate you coming on today and

Track 1: 44:45

Really appreciate the invite. Thanks Dylan.

44:48

Hey, if you're still listening, hopefully you got some value out of this or amusement. Either way, I really appreciate you for listening. My goal with this podcast is to build something of value while also showing others that it's possible to do the same. And what I mean by that is, I'm not perfect at this. I fumble, I stutter, and I just want to show that it's okay. If you've been putting something off, This is me telling you to go for it. So I need your help in growing this and there's two main ways a podcast grows. One is through ratings and reviews and two is through word of mouth. So I can only do it with your help. If you can leave me a five star rating and review on Apple Podcasts and Spotify as well as post this to your social and it doesn't grow without you. Thank you. Talk to you all next week.