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Reset Your Portfolio Expectations, Before It's Too Late | Peter Lazaroff - E112

July 23, 2025 / 54:45

This episode covers personal finance strategies, market volatility, and investment expectations with guest Peter Lazerof, chief investment officer at Plan Corp. Topics include managing emotions during market downturns, the importance of diversification, and setting realistic investment goals.

Host Jesse Kramer discusses the significance of understanding market volatility and how it impacts long-term investing. He emphasizes that volatility is a natural part of investing and should be expected.

Peter Lazerof shares insights on the current market situation in 2025, highlighting the difference between short-term market signals and long-term investment strategies. He explains how external factors, such as tariffs and political changes, can affect market perceptions but ultimately do not dictate long-term performance.

The conversation also addresses the importance of having a financial plan that accounts for volatility and the need for investors to manage their emotional responses to market fluctuations. Lazerof suggests that understanding earnings and focusing on long-term goals can help mitigate anxiety during downturns.

Listeners are encouraged to reflect on their investment strategies and consider writing letters to themselves to clarify their financial goals and expectations during turbulent times.

TLDR

Jesse Kramer and Peter Lazerof discuss managing market volatility, setting realistic investment expectations, and the importance of diversification in long-term investing.

Episode

54:45
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Welcome to personal finance for long-term investors, where we believe Benjamin Franklin's advice that an
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investment in knowledge pays the best interest both in finances and in your life. Every episode teaches you personal
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finance and long-term investing in simple terms. Now, here's your host, Jesse Kramer. Hello and welcome to
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episode 112 of Personal Finance for Long-Term Investors. My name is Jesse Kramer. By day, I work for a fiduciary
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wealth management firm helping clients all over the country. For more details, you can go to bestinterest.blog/work
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and the link is in the show notes. And by night, I write a blog called the best interest. And I podcast here on personal
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finance for long-term investors. I help busy professionals and retirees avoid costly mistakes and grow their wealth.
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And I do so by simplifying complex ideas about personal finance from investing to
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taxes to retirement and beyond. And today I'm really excited because Peter Lazerof is back and will be joining me.
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Peter is the chief investment officer at Plan Corp and he's the host of the long-term investor podcast. Peter is
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routinely recognized for simplifying complex investing and planning issues for clients and for listeners. He's been
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repeatedly named a top 100 US financial adviser by Investopedia. He's always a
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great resource for teaching people about investing. And you'll see that today
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simply through the frameworks and explanation that he provides. Peter first joined me back on episode 77 of
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this podcast. Go ahead and listen to that one. And now he's back for round two today. As usual, before Peter joins
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us, I want to do a quick review of the week. A little bit of drama because this is a three-star review, not a five-star
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review. But listen, critical feedback is awesome. So, please bring on the feedback. And if I don't deserve five
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stars, that's okay. There's a chance that MJV92314 might have fat fingered the wrong number
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of stars, or he or she might just be a good critic. So, the three-star review, clear, straightforward personal finance
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info. Thank you, Jesse, for your excellent podcast. I just discovered it and I've listened to about five
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episodes. I appreciate that you don't have chitchat and superfluous dialogue
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about your dog, your breakfast, or anything that's not related to your topic. You have no fake or forced
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laughter during dialogue with your guests. That's a good one. You have no unrelated
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banter with your guests. Your excellent speaking skills. Thank you for not excessively saying like, sort of, or
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kind of. I will say now I'm a little self-conscious about that. And you keep
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it clean. Cursing adds nothing to an informative topic. Iinging agree with you. Your topics are timely,
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informative, and helpful. I appreciate you keeping the conversation focused. Thank you. Well, you're very welcome,
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MJV. And listen, if your stars are precious to you, and you only save your five-star reviews for that one ina
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million podcast, no worries. Your written review was very kind. I'm happily going to send you a super soft
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t-shirt. Drop me an email to jessebinterest.blog and I will get you hooked up with that
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t-shirt. That mother t-shirt. And listeners, if you have questions I can answer, especially for a future AMA
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episode and ask me anything episode, send those questions to Jesse at bestinterest.blog. Before Peter joins
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us, I want to read a couple fun articles to you that are going to be somewhat related to what Peter and I talked
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about. The first one I wrote recently in March, March of 2025, and it's called,
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"Are you not entertained?" Do you know that scene in Gladiator where Russell
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Crow's character Maximus, he yells to the crowd? He says, >> "Are you not entertained?" I'm more
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interested in Maximus's next line, though, cuz he asks, "Is this not why
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you were here?" If you don't remember the movie, maybe you haven't seen it.
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Gladiator. Maximus of Russell Crowe. It's one of his initial forays when he gets thrown into the arena and he has to
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battle as a gladiator for the first time. And the audience certainly came there to see some violence and some
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death. And specifically, the plan was for a bunch of local gladiators, heavily armored, fully armed, to kill off some
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foreign slaves, including Maximus. But because Maximus is the protagonist andor because he's a highly trained Roman
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legionnaire, he turns the tables on the local gladiators, he kills all of them single-handedly. And the crowd is really
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caught off guard cuz they did not come to see that kind of a turnaround. And they go silent and that cues up the
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immortal lines from Maximus, "Are you not entertained? Is this not why you are
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here?" Maximus also throws his sword at the box seats, which is a real power
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move. But the point is, the audience came to see violence and death. They just hadn't expected it could be
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delivered in quite that way. And that frustrates Maximus. Did they expect every slave just to get slaughtered
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without fighting back? What terrible expectations. Does a chef expect a Michelin star without some burns or some
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knife slips? No. Does a traveler expect every eye-opening experience without a single delayed flight? No. And does the
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long-term investor expect their portfolio to compound for decades without times like the tariff tantrum
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that we had here in 2025? I say no. I get it though. Loss aversion is real. It impacts all of us. It's natural to feel
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anxious when markets react to world events, to wars, to politics, to tariffs. But it's crucial to recognize
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that those external shocks have always been part of investing history. We've
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had world wars and pandemics and oil crises and banking explosions, inflation run a muck, etc., etc. And yet, here we
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are. The nature of long-term investing is one of volatility, of ups and downs. And the ups are easy. They are great.
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The downs if we're not careful can be really challenging and you might have felt that challenge here in 2025. That
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volatility though that is a feature not a bug. Again that is a feature not a bug. We want to see volatility. We want
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risk to be involved in our investing at least in some part of our investing endeavor because without that risk there
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is no compensatory reward. There's no point to investing in the first place without risk. Is that not why you are
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here Maximus? Right. having a little bit of risk. That is why we are here. Yet often people get stressed or scared or
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they make drastic changes in their portfolio when faced with volatility. Such a reaction is this glaring red
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light to me that suggests that the investor's expectations were not adequately set. If your monkey brain is
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screaming, get off this roller coaster when you have a little bit of volatility, we need to ask, why did you
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get on that roller coaster in the first place? Were you expecting a smooth ride?
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Such investments do exist perfectly smooth, but there's no real upside to them. There's no real reward. It's hard
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to set new investing expectations in the middle of market chaos. Just as teaching
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fire safety while the smoke alarm is going off, that's pretty hard, too. Instead, we run real fire drills during
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the safe times to ingrain the appropriate reactions in everybody. We don't run fire drills in the middle of a
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fire. We run them during the safe times to ingrain the appropriate reaction and approach. And similarly, we should be
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setting investing expectations during the calm or positive market times to ingrain how we should be reacting. Now,
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I know this episode's going to come out in July and right now I'm speaking to
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you in about mid June, but we've fully recovered from the volatility of April.
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So, if April scared you, I hope you didn't try to reset things in the middle
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of the fire drill of April. But now that things have gotten back to a calm or even a positive market, now might be the
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time to think about how you reacted. And if you reacted in a pretty negative way,
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now that it's calm, you might want to run a fire drill now and determine if you need to reset your investing
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expectations. You don't have that luxury in the middle of a fire drill. If the
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next time you find yourself in a fire drill and and one of the the second article I I read today will be about
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that, but the next time you find yourself in the middle of a fire, I should say, in the middle of volatility,
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in the middle of panic, a few things that I called back in April, I called them the midfire fire drill. A few
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reminders, if you will. The first one, markets don't go up in a straight line.
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They never have, and they never will. Volatility is the price of admission for long-term returns. If you're feeling
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uneasy, you need to remind yourself this is why investors get rewarded over time
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because they endure these kinds of ups and downs. This is why you're here and
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you must endure, too. The second reminder, this is why we diversify. Stocks aren't enough. Bonds play a role.
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International stocks are crushing it this year. Real estate alternatives can have a place in your portfolio, too. The
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third reminder, you need to zoom out. Short-term swings can feel dramatic, but the market has consistently trended
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upward over decades. If you pull up a multi-deade chart of the S&P 500, the former dips, the former crashes, the
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former outright panics now seem kind of small in comparison. Every single one of
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them felt scary at the time. Yet over time, the market has recovered and moved higher. The fourth reminder, focus on
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what you can control. You can control your time horizon. You can control your behavior. The quote that I like, it's
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more of a philosophical quote, is you can't control the waves, but you can learn to swim. and we all need to learn
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how to swim. And the fifth reminder, remember your financial plan. Why did you invest in the first place? What do
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you own and why do you own it? A well-thoughtout investment plan accounts for volatility before it happens. If you
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don't have a plan, now is a great time to create one. Ideally, one that helps
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you stick with it when things feel uncertain. The world is a volatile place, and when things get volatile out
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there, and by there, I mean like outside the markets in the real world, when things get volatile out there, I too
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grow concerned. But when the market gets topsyturvy, I say to my inner maximus, yes, this is why I am here. And the
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second thing I want to read to you today, listeners, inspired by a cool Jason Zwag Wall Street Journal article
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from a few years ago. This is the beginning of 2022 where like the worst of kind of the co not only the co market
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panic, but a lot of the worst of the co pandemic was over with. But 2022 was also the start of this interest rate
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shock and and markets were kind of doing some wild things starting at the beginning of 2022. And so inspired by
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Jason Zwig, I wrote myself a letter for when my portfolio crashes. And the article I called it break glass in case
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of market crash. And literally it's a letter that I wrote to myself. Jesse, you knew what you were getting into. You
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knew this could happen. And it's okay that it did happen. Your goals are big
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and your timeline is long. That's why you signed up for this risk-heavy portfolio. 60% of your assets are in the
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stock market and you knew the stock market could get cut in half. It's dropped like that before and surely it
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will again. You knew the recent market felt pretty frothy, especially after the COVID related stimulus. But you also
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knew that selling your stock position would have been short-sighted. Rather than sell, you've been rebalancing every
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6 months. You've been selling overpriced assets and buying underpriced assets.
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That's the smart thing to do. You knew that bonds were in a tough place to park
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your money. Yields were pretty low. That's why your allocation varied between 10% and 15% in bonds, but you
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also knew that all asset classes eb and flow over years and decades, just like a
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good quilt chart would show us. Your bonds aren't there to make you rich. They provided some diversification and a
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pool from which you can rebalance. You knew cryptocurrency could be a giant bubble, but you also convinced yourself
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that blockchain technology might have something to it. You balanced these opposing views by following John Bogle's
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famous advice to limit your sandbox, to limit your play money to less than 5% of
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your portfolio. You chose a percentage even lower than that. And you split that tiny fraction between Bitcoin and
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Ethereum, which okay, at the time were considered the two powerhouse cryptocurrencies. I guess the idea is if
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you're going to drink moonshine, you should drink the good stuff, but you should definitely take a small sip. And
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quick aside, listeners, if you're paying attention at home and adding up my portfolio percentages, you'll realize
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I'm not even at 80% yet. The difference is because when I wrote this article,
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rather than only focusing on my portfolio, I also added in the value of our primary home as part of our net
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worth, and that's the other 20 to 25%. Okay, back to the letter. You designed
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this portfolio with intention, and this outcome, a crash, was always one potential outcome of that design. And so
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the market crashed and you feel bad. What you shouldn't do is suffer the malady of resultsoriented thinking.
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Saying told you so isn't justified here. You did your research. You followed
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mostly best practices. Maybe cryptocurrency is the outlier there. And you executed a plan that you believed
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in. You made a smart bet with good odds and the dice haven't rolled in your favor recently. Does that mean it was a
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dumb bet? No, it doesn't. As Annie Duke writes in the book, Thinking and Bets,
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thinking in bets starts with recognizing that there are exactly two things that determine how our lives turn out. The
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quality of our decisions and luck. Learning to recognize the difference between the two is what thinking in bets
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is all about. In your case, Jesse, the right choice led to a bad outcome. The next part is painful. You've got to make
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the right choice again, even knowing it didn't work out perfectly the first time. That right next choice is to
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continue learning, to implement lessons learned, to continue rebalancing your portfolio, and most likely to continue
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holding the same asset classes as before. The one exception would be if crypto turns out to be a complete fraud,
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you should probably just stick to more traditional asset classes. In other words, stick to your guns with a small
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aotment for adjustment. Is that insanity? Are you suffering that trope of insanity is repeating the same
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actions while hoping for a different outcome? I say no. When the poker player goes allin with a pair of aces, we don't
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scold her for losing on an unlucky flop. We commend her for making the right decision with the information she had.
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We recognize the role of bad luck in that outcome. This untimely market crash is the same. It sucks. It doesn't feel
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great. But go back and reread Bogle, reread Burton Malke, reread your foundational books. You played your hand
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well. This bad luck was always a potential outcome. As insane as it sounds, you've got to stay the course.
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Good luck, dude. I'm pulling for you, obviously. And that's my letter. And if
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you haven't written a letter to yourself in case of market crash, if you haven't
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explained to yourself why you own what you own, and if you haven't explained to
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yourself what your range of potential outcomes could be, both in the short term, the midterm, and the long term,
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that might be a pretty interesting exercise for you to do. Here's a quick ad, and then we'll get back to the show.
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I love getting your questions and some of you ask me questions about the wealth management firm I work for in Rochester,
00:14:02
New York. Others ask about the Best Interest blog and this podcast, Personal Finance for Long-Term Investors, which
00:14:06
operate without advertising, without pushy sales, and with no payw walls. How can the blog and podcast stay afloat
00:14:12
without me dumping my own money into it? Well, to answer both those questions, I
00:14:15
want to point you to episode 78 of Personal Finance for Long-Term Investors. I intentionally recorded
00:14:20
episode 78 to shine light on those topics and inform you how you are actually helping and can continue
00:14:25
helping these projects carry forward. So if you've ever been curious about the
00:14:29
business of my blog and podcast or if you're curious about my day job in wealth management, please check out
00:14:34
episode 78 and let me know what you think. And now without further ado, I want to welcome Peter Lazro on to the
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podcast. Again, Peter is the chief investment officer at Plan Corp, which is a independent registered investment
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adviser out of uh St. Louis and he's just got a great knack for simplifying the complex investing and financial
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planning issues. I mean, similar to stuff that I talk about. I really look at Peter as a as as a great peer,
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probably a peer who's, you know, 10 years ahead of me career-wise and someone I I aspire to cuz I think what
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he's doing is awesome. Just a great resource for teaching people about investing. And I think you'll see that
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today through the the frameworks and the explanations he provides. So again, here
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is Peter Lazeroth. Peter, you know, it's messy out there, man. Uh, we've had an interesting year
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so far. We're recording in mid June. This will probably publish in mid July.
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We started on some highs. Boom. April hit. We had some lows. Now, maybe we're
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we're back towards highs. But still, uh, you know, one thing I'm struck with is
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there's this big difference between short-term signals and long-term direction when it comes to investing.
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I'd love to maybe start with just how have you felt and what are some of your
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thoughts about how 2025 has been so far? >> Well, first of all, Jesse, thanks for
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having me on the show. And actually, since I know you don't use video, but I
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can see in the background this giant box behind me. You know how 2025 is going? It's going great cuz I'm cleaning out
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old stuff. And there's actually a box of books of making money simple. So, my
00:16:00
first book came out in 2019, making money simple. And I was just telling you before the show that I'm putting the
00:16:06
finishing touches on my next book which is called The Perfect Portfolio. But when I was on last year, your audience
00:16:12
reached out. They were fantastic. And so what I am going to do is if your audience goes to peter
00:16:16
lazar.com/freebook. I'm pausing. I think it's free book, not book. We'll put a link in the show
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notes. I'm going to send you one of those books that's sitting behind me.
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There's a box of them. I think there's like 32 per box. Somebody pulled them
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up. The postage date on them is September of 2020. So they've been sitting in storage. Nobody knows where
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they came from. I didn't tell you that I was going to self-promote and drop that,
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but now that I see it in my camera view, you ask, "How is 2025 going?" Man, think
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about being a long-term investor is that when you go into a year, clients are always talking about a few things. And
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tariffs were certainly on people's mind. you know, the election results have just
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come in and I would say in any presidential election, my experience has been that half of people are very upset
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and half of people are happy. And I think a lot of people who were upset were saying the market is going to
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crash. I don't like some of the policies and things that are being said on the
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campaign trail. And lo and behold, I mean, I wouldn't call a 20% drop a crash, but we had a near 20% pullback.
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And you have people who feel validated. And I can't tell you how many times in
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my career I've put up slides showing that who is president does not impact the stock market or a political party
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does not impact the stock market. So one frustrating part about 2025 is me now realizing in about 3 years when we have
00:17:37
our next election that when I put up those charts people are going to say well what about the tariffs that that
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Trump put out there that did happen. I suppose that validated but as you mentioned we're already back. It's a
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great reminder that the market is going to fall 10% 20% with a pretty surprisingly large frequency and the
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story is always going to be different. But the most important thing that I was talking to clients about and talking to
00:18:04
employees and friends and family is earnings. And like yes, in the case of tariffs, which by the way, by the time
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that this airs, that 90-day pause will be close to expiring. And so there'll
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probably be more headlines related to it. >> Here's the thing is no matter what the
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tariffs are, do you think McDonald's is going to try to sell us cheeseburgers or
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Coca-Cola is going to try to sell us Coke or that Ford's going to try to sell
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us cars? No. They're going to try to sell as much of their product no matter
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what. Will there be more obstacles? Have the rules to the game changed? It's like
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if we got out a board of monopoly and we've been playing by the same rules that monopoly has always existed with
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and suddenly we change some rules, it's going to change your strategy a little
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bit. But when you invest in the stock market, you are betting that CEOs like money and that shareholders will demand
00:18:53
that CEOs maximize their value. So 2025 has been like a full long-term market lesson all wrapped up into six months.
00:19:02
It'll be really interesting to see what goes on with tariffs, what goes on with
00:19:05
the spending bill. Yeah. I mean, that was a really long answer to your question. So, let me let me take a
00:19:10
breath here. What what are you thinking? >> It's a good answer. And in fact, I want
00:19:14
to play devil's advocate here on behalf of the listeners, but also Pete, I mean
00:19:18
on behalf of client conversations that you and I both have. Maybe someone's listening right now and go, okay, we
00:19:23
don't know what'll happen over the next month between when we're recording and
00:19:27
publishing, but let's say the S&P stays about where it is right now, which is
00:19:31
close to all-time highs. Essentially, we we haven't really lost any ground on the
00:19:35
year. But imagine someone says, "I hear what you're saying, Peter. McDonald's
00:19:40
will keep on trying to sell cheeseburgers, but we saw something this year where one politician was able to
00:19:47
push some policy forward and then pull it back and then kind of push it forward and pull it back and just whipssaw the
00:19:53
stock market and that has fundamentally shaken my faith in long-term investing. Is there any merit to that argument or
00:20:01
just what's your response there? >> I think there's merit to that feeling.
00:20:06
The feeling is valid. feeling concerned, feeling worried, feeling uncertain, all
00:20:11
valid, all normal. Nothing wrong with that. When you take a step back and you think about why we invest in the first
00:20:19
place, I always go back to really the first principle level is we invest because we're trying to grow our savings
00:20:26
faster than the rate of inflation without taking undue risk. And so like what is undue risk? Well, yes, there is
00:20:34
risk in that that concern and that feeling that one individual specifically is exerting a lot of influence over the
00:20:42
short-term fluctuations of the market. There is a risk that the market will fall 10% roughly on average every 12
00:20:50
months because that's what it's done historically and fall 20% every 3 to
00:20:54
four years on average because that's historically what it's done and fall 30%
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or more about once a decade on average because again that's historically what
00:21:02
it's done. I generally think that when I'm investing in stocks I'm going to
00:21:06
assume that we're going to have downturns with a similar magnitude and frequency as we have in the past. And so
00:21:13
to me, that's not an undue risk. That is risk. And it is okay to be uncomfortable
00:21:19
with risk. It's okay to be even more than uncomfortable to be afraid. I think
00:21:23
that's why some people hire an adviser. I feel like I operate with robotlike
00:21:29
execution with clients. But even on myself, I don't. And let me give you an example, Jesse. So during this downturn,
00:21:36
>> I don't have a lot of cash. I don't keep a ton of cash on hand. You know, my
00:21:39
biggest asset is the firm that I'm a part owner of, Plan Corp. >> I fund all my retirement accounts. I
00:21:45
fund my health savings account. And so, the best thing I could come up with was directing my entire paycheck to my 401k.
00:21:53
So, basically like speed funding my 401k while the market was down. And typically, I wait to fund my HSA until
00:22:00
December, like when I get my year-end bonus and I have a little bit more cash. But basically, I just took all my
00:22:04
paychecks and just put them right into the market. When you do it in a 401k, as your listeners and you and everybody
00:22:09
probably knows, it goes right into the market. My HSA had to make a couple stops. And Jesse, it's we're recording
00:22:16
this on June 10th. The cash in my HSA is still not invested. I am human like all
00:22:22
of the rest of you. And all of the systems that I have in place for myself that generally mean that money is
00:22:28
getting invested right away don't apply to my HSA. in part because of like the
00:22:33
way the account's set up and in part because it requires me to click a button. Now, is it because I'm afraid?
00:22:39
No. If if I'm being perfectly honest, I saw a little spike and in my head I said, "Well, surely, you know, most bare
00:22:46
markets don't resolve themselves this quickly and here it didn't." Now, what
00:22:50
am I waiting for this? I've not publicly shared this story. I guess by December
00:22:54
when I normally would have made the contribution, I will definitely do it by then. Maybe I'll do it right when we get
00:22:58
off the call. In fact, mark my words, I'm going to do it right when we get off
00:23:03
the call. My 2025 investment will get invested. So, by the time you were listening to this, dear listener in the
00:23:09
audience, um it will be done. But my point kind of going all the way back to your concern was I think it's valid. It
00:23:15
is very human. We all feel it. And when people like you and I are telling you what's best, you know, what we have set
00:23:21
up for both your clients, what we have set up for my clients is to do it without emotion and to do it without
00:23:28
human judgment and follow processes and financial theory because the long term those things turn to work work out
00:23:35
pretty well. But the problem with the long term is that it is an eternity to live through in the moment. And so for
00:23:41
the people who still feel uncertain and shaken about what has happened and what might happen, I will again reiterate for
00:23:49
the third fourth time in the past five minutes totally normal. Just remember why is it that we invest and what is a a
00:23:56
risk that you get compensated for and what's a risk that you don't you don't
00:23:59
get compensated for trying to time the market. You don't get compensated systematically at least for trying to
00:24:05
pick exactly the right security. So, even though I poorly timed the market here, I'm going to go buy the single
00:24:10
fund that I own that's 100% stocks, globally diversified, I will make no choices other than what my predetermined
00:24:17
plan is. And you go forward that way. And it can be one of the crazy things is you look back at every drop and it seems
00:24:24
like an obvious opportunity in hindsight, but it's always seems like a risk in the moment. And so find a way to
00:24:31
turn what feels like a risk into an opportunity. Cuz I can assure you that when you look at one of those long-term
00:24:37
charts that goes up and to the right and has all the headlines, this is just going to be one of those headlines that
00:24:42
shows up on the on the chart of long-term returns despite all of these headlines. This is going to be on that
00:24:48
chart. You just wait it. Give us a year so there's enough room on the chart to
00:24:52
include it and it'll be in every history book like that. >> You touched on a few things there,
00:24:56
Peter. Well, first off, I want to say that your your quote that part of our job and part of any investor's job is to
00:25:02
grow their assets faster than inflation without undue risk. I'll be honest, I've
00:25:07
stolen that one from you before and used it. That is a fantastic explanation of the reason why we're all here in the
00:25:12
first place. It's not to become gajillionaires and die at top the greatest pile of gold that we can. It's
00:25:19
to simply grow our assets faster than rel uh inflation, but also keeping risk in mind, which which is huge. I want to
00:25:25
dive more into behavior because to me when I've seen what's happened so far
00:25:30
this year, one of the biggest risks we all face as individuals is that risk of overreacting. It's that risk of
00:25:37
mistaking volatility for some sort of signal that we need to change our plan. And I'm pretty sure, correct me if I'm
00:25:44
wrong here, I think I listened to a podcast episode that you put out earlier this year where you said something akin
00:25:50
of like there are some times actually where you suffer volatility maybe for the first time as an investor or the
00:25:57
first time as a retiree, your account, your portfolio really takes that first big drop and you learn that maybe your
00:26:04
risk appetite isn't quite what it is and changing your portfolio actually is the
00:26:09
right thing to do. It just so happens that it was also the right thing to do before the volatility hit. You just
00:26:15
didn't realize it. C can you dive into that logic a little bit? >> Yeah, it's interesting and I don't think
00:26:20
it's something that I would have said at the start of my career nearly two decades ago when my only education was
00:26:29
really that from a textbook. In reality, when you're dealing with humans, you
00:26:34
can't take the human nature out of humans. And you know, I think a lot of times as we work with clients, it's not
00:26:41
just to be a robot fact machine. I mean, in many instances, we have the unique privilege to listen like a therapist and
00:26:48
ask questions and dig deeper. What I've come to learn as a result of that is
00:26:54
nobody really has a problem with the volatility itself, with the down market. you we'll sign an investment policy
00:27:01
statement before we invest a client's assets just like any other good adviser
00:27:05
will do and you'll say hey the portfolio the worst 12 months it's had like if you
00:27:10
had a million would you be comfortable losing $360,000 of it or whatever you're
00:27:15
like yeah of course I really think people believe that and that's how we set that stock bond mix but what I've
00:27:21
come to learn is that while people can handle the volatility they can't necessarily handle the narrative and I
00:27:27
think that's a very different piece of the pie that has given me a different
00:27:33
appreciation for what my job is as like your portfolio sherpa. You know, I'm not
00:27:37
just here choosing investments. I'm going to give you the I'm going to think
00:27:40
a lot about the experience of investing. And if that means that we didn't dress
00:27:45
you warm enough for the winter, we're going to get you an extra layer of coats, which in this case, I guess, are
00:27:51
bonds. I don't know, this is off the cuff here. Or if you're too hot, you
00:27:54
know, we get you some swim trunks. In a perfect world, the market's down and you
00:27:59
find out that you're too conservative. That like you're in your 70s and you
00:28:03
have more money than you're going to need and so you're going to more closely
00:28:06
align your portfolio with the time horizon of those who are set to inherit it and you get more aggressive in a
00:28:12
downturn. But if you're approaching retirement or having just entered retirement and you realize that you
00:28:19
can't handle the downturn, yeah, it's not ideal to sell while markets are
00:28:25
down, but it is much better to adjust an allocation a little bit than to go to allcash. There is no doubt that getting
00:28:32
entirely out of the market is the wrong move. Naturally when people want to make
00:28:37
such a move I remember in the years 2007 2008 2009 that was a very common conversation I
00:28:45
want to get out of the market everything is going down everything's going down in
00:28:50
flames and we used to call them jumpers like they're jumping out of the market
00:28:54
not jumping off a bill but call them jumpers and like I was working in an office that had no individual offices we
00:29:00
were in a totally open floor work like all the founders and partners of the firm were dispersed equally among us and
00:29:05
so you could hear all the client calls and that to me was like a very different vibe like trying to make sure you don't
00:29:12
get all the way out of the market whereas if somebody's a 60% stock portfolio and they want to go to 50/50
00:29:18
in the grand scheme of things it's not that big a deal if it will help you sleep at night it's not that big a deal
00:29:23
and I'm going to reluctantly say oh by the way if you really want to make a change that's going to make a real
00:29:28
difference in the long term should probably make a move by more than 10% but I don't know that off that that's
00:29:34
necessarily really what I want to see people do. I just I recognize that 10 percentage point changes aren't going to
00:29:39
really change your trajectory that much. And so, as a result, if it's really
00:29:42
going to help you sleep at night, that's fine. What I like to do in those instances is document it really for the
00:29:49
benefit of the client. So, if you think like the best traders in the world, and we're definitely not traders, but they
00:29:54
keep journals. They have their reasoning why, like what would make them change their mind and just like create an
00:30:00
archive of like, hey, this is what I heard during our conversation and why you want to make this move. And the
00:30:05
reason you do this is because if it fast forward 6 months or 6 years and the sentiment's totally flipped, you we have
00:30:12
to make sure that we have a a clear road map of why we got to where we were for making these changes. You can you're
00:30:18
allowed to make changes with your portfolio. The you know in a perfect world you pick one strategy and one
00:30:24
allocation you stick with it for as long as possible. But at the end of the day if you can afford to make that change
00:30:29
Yeah, you're right. I think I've I've become a little more lenient in my
00:30:33
sentiment around that issue. >> Yeah, you reminded me right there. There's this uh Cliff Asna story that
00:30:39
maybe you've heard before where I think it's his aunt or his great aunt. I think
00:30:43
she like lives in Australia, but she travels back and forth to I believe it's
00:30:47
the USA pretty often. And she knew that. Cliff asked us, if listeners, if you're
00:30:51
not familiar, he's a hedge fund guy, right? And so she would ask Cliff, she's
00:30:55
like, "Hey, I know you do these currency trades or whatever it is you do. When's
00:30:59
the right time in any given year when I need to move my Australian dollars to US
00:31:04
and US to Australian?" And for years and years and years, Cliff was like, "I
00:31:07
can't tell you that. Like, I can't zoom into it this specific day." And she
00:31:12
interpreted that as like you're just withholding information from me. Like you know the answer but you're
00:31:16
withholding from me. And so eventually he said he kind of got this better EQ emotional intelligence. And he'd say
00:31:22
like you know what Aunt Cindy next Wednesday you should do it next Wednesday because she got the narrative
00:31:28
that she wanted which was she was getting expert advice. And Cliff realized it's all just arbitrary anyway.
00:31:34
So telling her next Wednesday isn't any worse than telling her I don't know. And
00:31:39
there's a similar, not maybe exactly the same, but there's a similar idea that
00:31:43
you just described there, Peter, which is, you know what, if someone is 6040 right now, they feel like they have too
00:31:48
much risk and they want to go, you know, going 5545 or 50/50 makes them feel better for the rest of the year. Now,
00:31:57
okay, all else equal, it's probably not a coin flip. I would rather they stay
00:32:00
6040 if that's better for their plan. But if it does help them sleep at night,
00:32:05
it's close to being a coin flip and I'm okay with that change and it's a lot
00:32:09
better than than saying, you know, a month later, screw you, Jesse. You told me I can't change and now I'm going all
00:32:14
cash like sayanara. It's a much better outcome. So, it is there is this interesting gray area. I also wanted to
00:32:20
touch on the narratives idea a little bit more because one hard thing that I find Peter is I'm certainly not a fake
00:32:28
news kind of conspiracy they're all lying to us person but at the same time I do realize that if we consume too much
00:32:36
news whether that's cable news or just reading you know Google algorithm feeding you the news that you're already
00:32:42
reading it is easy to convince yourself that the narratives will start driving your portfolio decisions and So, one of
00:32:49
my struggles or just one of the hard parts I find about answering reader or listener questions or answering client
00:32:55
questions is when they say, "But haven't you been paying attention to the news?
00:32:59
You know, everything is going badly." And that's been the case. It was the
00:33:02
case when President Biden was in office and some people were saying everything is going badly. And now it's the case
00:33:08
when President Trump is in office and everything. And it really is largely narrative driven. So, yeah. again. I
00:33:13
mean, maybe I'm I'm beating a dead horse here, but what do you say to the the
00:33:17
client who's addicted to the news and is telling you that you're wrong about the
00:33:20
world? >> Yeah, I experience those same conversations. And I try my best to
00:33:27
always anytime the conversation comes up with a concern, the first question I ask
00:33:31
is, "How do you think that impacts earnings?" Because at the end of the
00:33:34
day, the stock market tracks earnings so closely, like shockingly closely. I mentioned working on this book. I have a
00:33:42
whole chapter. It's become such an important idea to me that it's almost an
00:33:45
entire chapter and there's some charts in there that you'll be able to see like
00:33:48
how closely it's all tracked. And the economy and the stock market are not the
00:33:53
same thing because the economy, they're real people losing their jobs. Kid businesses, they have access to sell to
00:34:01
the whole world. Now, are things worse because of a set of policies than they would have been otherwise? Perhaps. I
00:34:08
think that's a logical concern. But does that mean that earnings won't continue?
00:34:13
Let me put this a different way. So I own, you know, stake of the business that I'm in. I'm not selling my business
00:34:20
because of the way the world is going. We're trying to figure out as a business
00:34:23
how to earn as much money as possible. All of my clients who are business owners are doing the same thing. You
00:34:28
know, there is no policy. The front end of my career was mostly with doctors. Uh
00:34:32
when I came to Plane Corporate, I introduced a lot of business owners into like the type of people I worked with.
00:34:36
Mhm. >> And I've never ever ever met a business owner who says, "I'm going to just sell
00:34:42
my business because, you know, the economy is terrible. I'm just going to sell my business." What is it that we
00:34:48
all think we're doing in stocks? We own businesses. And that's where it's a
00:34:52
narrative correction. What's so interesting is so many times people give me all these reasons that things are
00:34:57
bad. I'm like that those are all facts, but they're not necessarily relevant.
00:35:02
That actually comes up with the investment case for a lot of things. Like we don't have to go down a huge
00:35:06
rabbit hole, but like one topic that I really struggle with, for example, are private investments. Like maybe they're
00:35:13
useful. If they're free, I'm all in, but I don't think they're necessary. And
00:35:17
like the primary narrative for using them are all facts. >> I'm just not sure they're relevant. When
00:35:23
you come to things on policy or the economy, all facts, all something that I think might impact you in real life. I
00:35:30
think especially in the last six months, you know, the thing I've kind of been
00:35:34
reflecting on is, hey, this is the sort of thing that's going to affect our everyday lives, but it's, you know,
00:35:39
long-term not really going to affect the way that businesses in the sense that they try to make as much money as they
00:35:46
possibly can. If we get to a point where businesses stop trying to make money, that is a massive problem. I don't
00:35:53
really see that happening. If the US consumer, they say, "Well, they have to
00:35:57
sell to the US consumer." If the consumer is worse off, you're like, "Well, they might be worse off, but
00:36:02
maybe they're going to go sell more in a different country." Well, aren't those
00:36:05
earnings less because of all the tariffs? Maybe. Yeah, but they're still going to try to make as much money as
00:36:10
they can. And this is not the first obstacle that businesses have faced. And so, I think kind of going back to like
00:36:17
these narratives of the economy is looking bad. And look to be clear actually the economy is showing some
00:36:22
like mild signs of strain. What does that mean? Nobody really knows because some
00:36:28
economic data doesn't read out the same way it used to. It all goes back to earnings. And that doesn't mean that you
00:36:34
can't have temporary declines in earnings. But generally speaking, as long as you think companies will keep
00:36:40
trying to make money, earnings have historically grown more than inflation. Well, that's because when there's
00:36:46
inflation, the businesses pass on the price increases and then boom, you got higher earnings. Well, then it's a
00:36:52
matter of well, some companies earn more than others because new markets are created. Think of like Nvidia. So, AI
00:36:59
like the chips that are needed to run AI programming, those were a market for the last like 10
00:37:06
years, but boy did they become an important market in the last year or two. And what's pretty crazy about the
00:37:12
stock market is less than like 5% of stocks drive all the returns basically in any given year. And so it's not that
00:37:19
every company is going to do needs to do well. And maybe that's something I should have uh led with. You get me
00:37:25
talking talking long enough. I'll get to the points eventually, but let's just go
00:37:28
strictly with tariffs. There will be winners and there will be losers. >> But the winners might win so big that
00:37:34
the losers it doesn't really matter. you know, they might more than make up the
00:37:38
earnings lost from some of the smaller companies. And oh, by the way, like some of these losers in the total stock
00:37:44
market make up like less than a tenth of a percent of it. So, it's not to say
00:37:47
there won't be winners and losers. It's not to say that there won't be winners
00:37:50
and losers in the real economy. And those are real concerns. And I feel really bad for a lot of people who this
00:37:57
impacts. And I'm going to say this, I hope the audience doesn't take it the
00:38:01
wrong way. I mean, one of the things about the policies recently as well as all of the policies since the great
00:38:06
financial crisis are that if you are an owner of financial assets, you're probably in pretty good position. So,
00:38:14
does that mean it widens the inequality gap? I'm not an expert in this space,
00:38:18
but my intuition would be yes. >> Mhm. >> If you're worried about being able to
00:38:22
meet your own financial goals, I would say that as long as you're a holder, because again, we're just trying to
00:38:27
outpace inflation here. That's the first principle why we're investing. If you
00:38:30
have financial assets, a lot of these things are, you know, maybe your assets won't grow 15% a year like they did for
00:38:36
a while there. That was unusual. That was not normal. But, but yeah, you're probably going to be okay long term.
00:38:43
>> That's always an interesting one to touch on, Peter. I've struggled with it
00:38:46
as a content creator over time, whether it's writing or podcasting, where we do
00:38:50
notice things where we say, "Boy, this particular tax law is probably going to
00:38:55
benefit, you know, it might make wealth inequality worse." Or there are some
00:38:59
things I know in like the financial independence movement where you say like, "Wait, you could retire with
00:39:04
millions of dollars, artificially, show very little income, and get totally free
00:39:08
healthcare." I mean, the answer is yes, you can. It's difficult for us in our
00:39:12
positions to fundamentally change policy. If someone wanted to ask us, we're free to give our opinions there
00:39:19
and say, "Yeah, and these policies aren't necessarily fair." But at the
00:39:21
same time, if our job here is to give the best advice we can to the individuals listening, yeah, there
00:39:27
there's something to be said where people who own incomeroucing assets have tended to benefit from that ownership
00:39:34
potentially to a disproportionate amount. Okay. But still, you're better off owning them than not. Maybe we'll
00:39:40
leave the uh philosophical discussion to a to another podcast or another episode.
00:39:44
Here's a quick ad and then we'll get back to the show. Every week I send a
00:39:48
quick free email to thousands of readers that shares three simple things. One, my
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00:40:01
financial chart that explains some important concept in the news that week. It's a great primer to boost your
00:40:07
financial knowhow. But Jesse, I don't want another email. >> Well, this might not be for you, but I
00:40:13
do hear you, which is why I make it very short, sweet, and full of only the essentials. A whopping 66% of
00:40:20
subscribers read my email at least once a month. They're enjoying it, and maybe
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you will, too. You can subscribe for free on the homepage at bestinterest.blog. Again, that's a free no strings attached
00:40:32
subscription at bestinterest.blog. On the topic of recession, the one thing I wanted to touch on with you, and
00:40:38
again, neither you nor I are PhD economists. You might have you, you must >> No, no, no. Definitely not PhD. I got a
00:40:45
major in economics, but I don't think that even makes me remotely an economist.
00:40:50
>> But at least you >> That makes me a college graduate. Yes. You you can speak to this question
00:40:54
probably better than I can though which is I think some people very through through lucky circumstance last week I
00:41:01
got quoted in the in the Wall Street Journal which was wow big big honor and the article right the article was about
00:41:07
recessions and the fact that millennials might be as you alluded to some of the data is looking a little weak and
00:41:14
millennials might start living through what's our third recession the first one
00:41:18
being the great financial crisis which was like potentially one of the worst recessions the world's ever seen. The
00:41:24
second one being CO which reminded us that right anything can happen and and pandemics are real and now a third one
00:41:30
might might begin. But the question I have for you is does every recession have to be a great financial crisis or
00:41:38
come along with something like a global pandemic or is it possible to have a more vanilla recession?
00:41:44
>> Well, it's a great question. It's one of the reasons that a deep understanding of
00:41:51
history, economic and market and financial history can be so helpful to so many adviserss and even individuals
00:41:58
who have lived through these periods either were at a point in their lives where they had less money and didn't
00:42:03
care or they've forgotten or they never really realized what was happening in
00:42:08
the first place. And so recessions take on all shapes and sizes. And there can also, just for the record, a recession
00:42:16
doesn't mean that there's a bare market in stocks. And a bare market in stocks
00:42:19
doesn't mean that there's a recession. They often a bare market tends to
00:42:23
precede a recession. But like 2022 is a great example. Had a bare market in stocks, no recession alongside with it.
00:42:30
You kind of had this intermittent weakness in different sectors of the economy. There was a really good term
00:42:35
for it that's escaping me at the moment, but that's okay. So, I think a recession
00:42:39
doesn't have to be a crisis. Recession to me I think if you're going to try to
00:42:45
simply categorize it you think job loss. So recession you're typically going to
00:42:50
see a lot of job loss that can bring some real life implications and really shape what your world view is. So if you
00:42:58
are you mentioned a millennial if this is your third recession and you lost your job in each one of them you're
00:43:03
going to be really afraid of recession. If you're a millennial who did not lose
00:43:07
their job in any of the recessions and maybe even got to invest opportunistically, you're also going to
00:43:13
view recessions in a very different light. >> I think when you are thinking about
00:43:18
recessions, to me, it's less about your portfolio and more about your balance
00:43:22
sheet. And I tend to think of the two things differently myself in part because my portfolio is so boring. I
00:43:28
mean, I I already kind of referred to it. I own one fund that's 100% stocks. I
00:43:33
don't have any taxable dollars. is just my business. One day I aspire to have
00:43:37
taxable dollars again. But you know, in general, my balance sheet has different risks in a recession than my portfolio
00:43:43
does. My portfolio is all retirement accounts at this point. So I don't need
00:43:48
the money. I'm 40 years old. Let's say I don't need it for 20 to 30 years. A
00:43:53
recession has zero impact on my portfolio. A recession on my balance sheet is a little different. I have some
00:43:59
leverage tied to the commercial loan for the business that I own. my cash levels
00:44:04
like my business is kind of tied to the stock market. So if the stock market's
00:44:08
down, my income's down and my cash levels are low and like suddenly I have to think about balance sheet management
00:44:13
a little bit more. I'm just kind of talking about my own situation, but if you're listening to this, think about
00:44:19
your balance sheet. Think about the cash that's on it. Think about the long-term
00:44:22
liabilities, whether it's a mortgage or student debt or some kind of commercial
00:44:26
loan. Think about your portfolio, both retirement assets and otherwise, and how would a recession, how would a change in
00:44:33
your income stream impact your balance sheet? And I think, you know, if you're
00:44:37
near retirement, it could a lot. And I think that's a very valid concern. I won't make it sound too draconian, but
00:44:43
like a less than ideal scenario for somebody about to retire is that the first year that they're in retirement,
00:44:48
there's a down market. It's not the best thing to have happen because you have to
00:44:52
withdraw for your portfolio and you do permanently impair the portfolio's earning potential by doing that.
00:44:58
>> So what you might do if you're going into retirement is start building up a
00:45:02
cash reserve so that if there is a recession one, it won't delay your retirement. So I've seen that happen
00:45:08
before where people are like going to retire in a given year and then there's
00:45:12
a recession so they hold off retirement for another 6 to 12 months. Well, like look, you don't get to push out your
00:45:17
life expectancy to 6 12 months. So, I view that as not good financial planning. I view that as a missed
00:45:23
opportunity. And so, like having the cash to live through your first recession without needing to draw
00:45:28
through your portfolio is a really good preparation point. Doesn't have to be
00:45:32
something that's built overnight, but I mean, it could depending on the way that
00:45:35
you retire. If you have pensions, you know, you're a little more recession proof. If you're below the age of 50,
00:45:42
your portfolio is probably recession proof. And when I say recession proof, not that it's immune to losses, but like
00:45:47
you really don't need to worry about it. And so again, kind of going full circle
00:45:50
back to my original statement, I tend to think more about how would a recession imp impact my balance sheet than my
00:45:57
portfolio. And if you are retired, I think the same is true. Like yes, you should have a portfolio that is built
00:46:04
that assumes that you're going to have downturns again with a similar magnitude
00:46:07
and frequency as as you've had in the past. And so you've tested it in a Monte
00:46:11
Carlo analysis that shows yes, I can make this withdrawal in a down market. You should be good. Now it's just a
00:46:17
matter of managing the rest of your life. You don't have to wor about worry about losing your job in retirement
00:46:21
because you don't have a job. Do you have to worry about your kids losing a job and how you might respond if they
00:46:26
do? These are the things that I would be talking about more so than is my stock bond allocation right? Should I have
00:46:32
more international instead of more US? You know, do I need to make changes to where my cash is held, etc. I want to
00:46:39
touch on one of those things you said right there, but real quick, you did mention the sequence of returns risk.
00:46:43
So, listeners, I want to point you to uh back on episode 87, we had a deep dive on the sequence of returns risk that's
00:46:50
worth checking out. But right there, Peter, you just mentioned, you know, one of the questions you might ask is,
00:46:54
should you think about your international versus domestic holdings? The last question I want to pepper you
00:47:00
with today as far as 2025 so far has been this uh interesting at least shortterm maybe it'll stay short-term
00:47:08
change in international versus domestic stock returns. What have you seen out there? What kind of conversations have
00:47:14
have you had? I know I I've had some going back to the the news narratives. I've had some people who especially in
00:47:20
the downturn of April said, "Well, let's just go 100% international now." So, I
00:47:25
thought that was a fun conversation to have. But yeah, what do you see out there? Uh what a reversal from like the
00:47:30
past 15 years. So for context, I started my career in the summer of 2007 and basically every year through the
00:47:37
financial crisis into like 2011 2012 when the US debt was downgraded by S&P for the first time, everyone was
00:47:44
obsessed with owning more China. People did not want to own US. US was the worst. We should own all international,
00:47:51
more international. You know, the past 10, 15 years, people have said why do we own international? we should only own
00:47:58
US. And Jesse, I had my first conversation with a client a few weeks ago saying, I want to shift from the US
00:48:05
to international. So, it's finally happening. We're finally here. I'm
00:48:08
thinking, gosh, I can't wait till international outperforms so that I can stop having this conversation. But silly
00:48:14
me, I forgot that then people just want whatever's outperforming. And I'm not
00:48:17
making fun of anyone listening who feels that way. I mean, it's this is just our
00:48:20
job. It's hard not to laugh at it. And I think in general, let's go to the simple
00:48:26
why do we own international? There can be different reasons. I'll tell you why
00:48:29
I own it, Jesse, is I own it for diversification. I don't own it necessarily for higher returns. What is
00:48:37
good about diversification mathematically is if we have two portfolios with the same return and one
00:48:42
is has lower volatility and one has higher volatility. The one with lower volatility is going to compound at a
00:48:49
better rate and as a result have a higher compound return and that's like your real life money. You want high
00:48:55
compound returns. Your average return that you see you know on morning star of a fund doesn't really matter what did it
00:49:00
compound at. So if the two returns are the same but one is lower volatility, you want the lower volatility one. And
00:49:06
that's what diversification does. Now in reality, you do give up a little bit of
00:49:12
return by owning a global portfolio versus just an all US portfolio, but the corresponding reduction in volatility is
00:49:21
great enough that that compound return is attractive enough to diversify. So today when people are thinking about
00:49:29
like should I switch from one to the other you're kind of remembering why you
00:49:32
do it and the research will show that you get that diversification benefit that reduction in volatility benefit
00:49:40
from owning anywhere between 20 and 50% non- US stocks. The problem with the research is nobody knows what the magic
00:49:47
number is. >> And so I would tell you you pick a number and you just stick with it. Like
00:49:53
if I were a gambling man and I had my gun to a head and I had to bet what's going to have higher returns over the
00:49:58
next 10 years, US or international, I'd say international. But you know what? I
00:50:02
would have said that each of the last like four or five years, too, and been wrong. And so I'm a really big proponent
00:50:08
of pick a percentage and stick with it. Now, let me share one other quick narrative because I know we're running
00:50:13
long and I apologize. I'm a wordy guy. I remember being at my former firm. The
00:50:18
year is 2011 and we're looking at the return data set and from like the Msei
00:50:24
data starts in 1970 and so like 1970 through 2011 the returns of an all US portfolio were identical to the returns
00:50:31
of a global portfolio. And so we increased our international allocation and all the reasons showed that we
00:50:39
should do it at the time. But then you fast forward and wow did we make a bad decision. And actually a friend of mine
00:50:45
who has a similar role at a firm similar size as us did the complete opposite this year. You know they had been
00:50:50
overweight international for so long cuz the valuations suggest much like I just
00:50:54
said that international should outperform. They had been overweight international forever and then they
00:50:59
switched to overweight US at the beginning of this year like the exact wrong timing.
00:51:03
>> So you find a percentage between 20 and 50% of your portfolio and don't change
00:51:09
it. We happen to be at 30%. Why are we at 30%. I'll be honest, Jesse. This firm
00:51:14
was started over 40 years ago. I don't know why we did it, but I'm in charge
00:51:17
and we're not changing it. Is there data that could make me change my mind? Of
00:51:21
course. You give me 200 more years worth of data, which I know I can't have, but
00:51:24
like let's say I somehow magically could. I'm open to changing my mind, but
00:51:29
I think I've now watched too many instances of the timing getting wrong. We already know that we can't predict
00:51:34
the future. Why would this situation be any different? And so if you're sitting
00:51:38
in your globally diversified portfolio thinking that you want to move more intern into international or even go all
00:51:44
international, even if you're right, you're going to have to figure out when to switch back.
00:51:48
And chances are you're going to be wrong. Not because I'm making a prediction, but just because like we are
00:51:53
all terrible at timing the market. >> Peter, you are always a treasure trove
00:51:58
of good investing thoughts and that answer is just another example of that. Two vital questions for you. one being
00:52:05
let's let the listeners know where they can listen to you on a more consistent
00:52:08
basis, but then the second one being remind us a little bit about the timeline and the topic of your book that
00:52:14
you're working on right now. >> Okay. Well, yeah, thanks for the invitation to to share. So, my podcast
00:52:20
is called the long-term investor. So, you can go to the long-term.com or you can search the long-term investor in
00:52:26
your podcast app. I did double check the URL I shared earlier if you would like a
00:52:30
free copy of the book. I don't have unlimited, but I am looking at a box right now of like 30ome. You can go to
00:52:36
peterlazeroff.com/freebook. The new book, oh my god, I'm going to give you another URL. The new book you
00:52:43
can learn about by going to, drum roll, the perfect portfoliobook.com. It is due out, I think, in July of 2026.
00:52:53
But that last URL I shared, if you sign up for that, you are not on my normal email list. You're going to get early
00:52:59
access to chapters. You are going to get some special offers for like signed books. There's going to be some
00:53:04
subscriber only webinars and whatever else my marketing person comes up with between now and then. I'm going to do a
00:53:09
lot of behind the scenes stuff so you can get a sense. I know when you sign up for the newsletter like the outline of
00:53:14
the book is the third like you get three automatic emails over 3 days and then you get on a regular update. But you get
00:53:20
an excerpt from a chapter pretty quickly and you get the outline of the book and
00:53:24
I'm going to share chapters as you know in full when they're truly like publisher approved and done. And so,
00:53:30
yeah, would really appreciate anybody checking that out and follow along. And, you know, just like on this podcast, you
00:53:35
comment, you subscribe, you like, you follow. Those are like what help other people who are passionate about these
00:53:40
topics like you. You're listening to us right now. It means you're passionate
00:53:44
about this. When you review like Jesse's podcast or you review my podcast, it
00:53:49
helps other people like you find us. So, we both appreciate when you do that. >> 100%. That's totally true. Well, Peter,
00:53:55
thank you again for stopping by. Personal Finance for Long-Term Investors. >> Yeah, Jesse, thanks for having me.
00:54:00
>> Thanks for tuning in to this episode of Personal Finance for Long-Term Investors. If you have a question for
00:54:06
Jesse to answer on a future episode, send him an email over at his blog, The Bestinest. His email address is
00:54:12
[email protected]. Again, that's jessevestinterest.blog. Did you enjoy the show? Subscribe, rate,
00:54:21
and review the podcast wherever you listen. This helps others find the show and invest in knowledge themselves, and
00:54:28
we really appreciate it. We'll catch you on the next episode of Personal Finance
00:54:32
for Long-Term Investors. Personal Finance for Long-Term Investors is a personal podcast meant for education and
00:54:38
entertainment. It should not be taken as financial advice and it's not prescriptive of your financial
00:54:43
situation.

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Episode Highlights

  • The Importance of Setting Expectations
    Jesse discusses the need for investors to set realistic expectations during market volatility.
    “If your monkey brain is screaming, get off this roller coaster, we need to ask why.”
    @ 05m 55s
    July 23, 2025
  • Writing a Letter for Market Crashes
    Jesse shares his personal letter to himself for when markets crash, emphasizing the importance of intention in investing.
    “You designed this portfolio with intention, and this outcome was always a potential outcome.”
    @ 11m 41s
    July 23, 2025
  • Market Reactions to Elections
    Half the people are upset, half are happy after election results, leading to market fluctuations.
    “I wouldn’t call a 20% drop a crash, but we had a near 20% pullback.”
    @ 17m 14s
    July 23, 2025
  • Understanding Risk in Investing
    Investing is about growing savings faster than inflation without undue risk, even amidst volatility.
    “We invest because we’re trying to grow our savings faster than the rate of inflation.”
    @ 20m 24s
    July 23, 2025
  • The Importance of Earnings
    The stock market closely tracks earnings, making them a key focus for investors.
    “How do you think that impacts earnings?”
    @ 33m 31s
    July 23, 2025
  • Understanding the Economy vs. Stock Market
    The economy impacts real people, while the stock market reflects business performance. 'The economy and the stock market are not the same thing.'
    @ 33m 51s
    July 23, 2025
  • The Importance of Business Earnings
    As long as businesses strive to earn, earnings will generally grow more than inflation. 'If we get to a point where businesses stop trying to make money, that is a massive problem.'
    @ 35m 50s
    July 23, 2025
  • Financial Goals and Inflation
    Worrying about financial goals? Focus on outpacing inflation for long-term stability. 'If you’re worried about being able to meet your own financial goals, just outpace inflation.'
    @ 38m 24s
    July 23, 2025
  • Recession Insights
    Not all recessions are crises; understanding this can shape financial perspectives. 'A recession doesn’t have to be a crisis.'
    @ 42m 42s
    July 23, 2025
  • The Long-Term Investor Podcast
    Peter shares insights on investing and where to find his podcast.
    “You can search the long-term investor in your podcast app.”
    @ 52m 22s
    July 23, 2025
  • Upcoming Book Release
    Peter discusses his upcoming book and how to get early access.
    “The new book is due out in July of 2026.”
    @ 52m 49s
    July 23, 2025

Episode Quotes

  • Volatility is the price of admission for long-term returns.
    Reset Your Portfolio Expectations, Before It's Too Late | Peter Lazaroff - E112
  • As insane as it sounds, you’ve got to stay the course.
    Reset Your Portfolio Expectations, Before It's Too Late | Peter Lazaroff - E112
  • It's okay to be uncomfortable with risk.
    Reset Your Portfolio Expectations, Before It's Too Late | Peter Lazaroff - E112
  • The economy and the stock market are not the same thing.
    Reset Your Portfolio Expectations, Before It's Too Late | Peter Lazaroff - E112
  • Recessions take on all shapes and sizes.
    Reset Your Portfolio Expectations, Before It's Too Late | Peter Lazaroff - E112
  • I’m open to changing my mind, but...
    Reset Your Portfolio Expectations, Before It's Too Late | Peter Lazaroff - E112

Key Moments

  • Three-Star Review01:27
  • Market Volatility05:01
  • Market Fluctuations17:08
  • Risk Awareness21:19
  • Economic Reality33:51
  • Business Strategy35:50
  • Investment Decisions50:41
  • Market Timing51:53

Tension Over Time

Words per Minute Over Time

Vibes Breakdown