Why I Dislike The "Finance Bro" Culture | How to Be a Good Fund Manager

Boom, people, welcome back. So today I want to talk about a little bit of a rant episode, but just the, the why I very dislike— I just hate the finance bro community, the Wall Street trader bro, Wolf of Wall Street. I just hate that culture that's in this world, and I want to talk about a little bit today, a little bit of a rant and a little bit of apologizing for this industry, this fund world. I'm in the world, but I really dislike a lot of people in this space and world, and I hope we can— our community, our group, if you're listening to this— we can kind of change the culture around finance. You know, you probably know somebody like this already. When I say the finance bros, I think most people can picture somebody right in their mind of somebody they've watched Wolf of Wall Street or The Big Short when they were like 16 years old, or maybe they're 21 or whatever, and they're like, that's gonna be me. Like, I'm gonna be this big-time shot on Wall Street. I'm gonna do cocaine and have strippers and have like the Ferrari and I'm just gonna live this crazy lifestyle and it's gonna be great and blah, blah, blah. And they set out to be just this big jerk. Like, I don't— anyways, I don't get it. But a lot of those kids and a lot of people, and I went to school at Brigham Young University and I love BYU, it's a great school, but the finance program there, and if you go to BYU, you know, and I think most finance programs around the country are like this, that the finance kids have this pride to them. They have this pride that's inside of them like, oh, I'm better than everybody else, I'm smarter, I know how to work with money, I'm gonna make more money than all you guys. It's just this pride that I don't, I mean, it's rooted in money, I guess, and they go work in investment banking jobs, and those jobs are great for those types of people 'cause they work 100 hours a week, and it really breaks their pride and makes them humble a little bit more. And I'm not a victim, by the way. I've definitely been a prideful person, I've been prideful in the past, I'm trying to be better at this and change this finance culture we have because I think a lot of people think to be a good fund manager, you got to be just a jerk on the phone. If you watched any of these old Wall Street shows, they're all yelling at each other and jerks and all these kind of things, which is, you know, a Wall Street mindset. But I know plenty of fund managers, like legit top dog fund managers that are most humble, conservative. I mean, conservative lifestyles, what I mean conservative lifestyle. They don't drive a fancy car, they live in a normal house, Kind of normal house. I mean, they have nice things, but they don't live this lavish lifestyle. They're not doing cocaine. I mean, it's like it's just wild what sometimes the mindset is for a lot of these finance students that are wanting to make it big on investment banking. They're going to be a VP one day and blah blah blah, and and I hope we can change that culture. For example, you look at Warren Buffett and Charlie Munger. I mean, those guys like do not spend any money at all. They're very conservative, and most fund managers that I've actually interviewed on this show. You see their lifestyles. I just had Sid Kromenhoek on here a little bit ago, my dad, right? You see his partners, you see other people we brought on here that live this kind of conservative lifestyle because they understand as a money manager, you actually have to be kind of humble. And it's interesting, and now there are those hedge fund traders, there are those guys that trade and they're just very prideful about it, but I think most alternative asset funds, the fund managers are actually very humble. And I think humility is one of their greatest strengths of understanding I don't know everything. I talk to these fund managers, they go I don't know everything. I find partners who know what things— and it's funny, you talk to those partners who know everything and they have people and teams to help them. They understand their inadequacies and understand their humility of where they— you know, I'm not the smartest guy to ever walk the face of the earth. I need teams, I need systems, I need partners, I need checks and balances because I know I'm going to be wrong. How Half the time. So I want to have good partners and good systems to help me be wrong less. Those are the good attributes of a fund manager. If you're getting out of college right now or getting into college, you watch Wolf of Wall Street and you're like, I'm going to be one of these finance bros that's just a jerk and hates everybody, I would think again because the people at the top, people that I see at least at the top that I've interviewed, been around, been on this show, actually have quite an amazing humility about them. Yes, they're smart. Yes, they'll make decisions. Humility doesn't mean weakness. Humility means understanding your own faults and using as many resources as you can to find the best decision. That's the kind of culture we want to develop and create. And this anti-Wall Street mantra of all these finance bros that, you know, have this crazy lifestyle, they have, you know, I don't want to go into it, all the things they, you know, do to try to live this lifestyle. But a lot of them get burnout. They don't make it to the top. They're not good managers when they do make it to the top because all they do is think about themselves. And I think good fund managers, your responsibility is to your investors. It's your fiduciary responsibility is to manage investors' money. And I think a good fund manager lives conservatively. I had one guy, a little quick story. He talked to me, he's asking about my fund and he wanted to invest in my fund. This wealthy dude. And he asked me straight up, he goes, what kind of What car do you drive? And I go, well, I drive a Subaru. And he goes, perfect, you're a good fund manager. And I was like, what do you mean? He goes, well, if you were driving a BMW or some Mercedes or some really fancy car, I don't know if I'd trust you with my money because you're obviously a poor money manager yourself in your personal finances. But the fact that you drive a Subaru means you're conservative. And I was like, huh. And he's like, yeah, I'd love to write you a check. That was his due diligence checklist, right? He was asking what car I drove. So now you can go out there, if you wanna do the Wall Street life, go for it, be a jerk. Last thing I wanna say with money is money amplifies who you are. A lot of people out there, in my last episode a couple ago, I said I love capitalism, right? Everyone says, oh, you capitalist pigs, all these rich snobs. And it's interesting, when I started to make a little bit of money, I was worried That I was going to become a rich snob and I kind of worried about it a little bit and I finally realized I know plenty of snobs that aren't rich. They're poor snobs and poor jerks and there's rich jerks and there's poor jerks and guess what? There's actually really rich nice people and really poor people that are really mean. It doesn't matter. Money amplifies who you are. If you're the type of person that wants to give back, that wants to go save the whales or help children in Africa, money amplifies your ability to do that. If you're a finance bro and all you want to do is smoke cocaine and hang out with strippers, when you have money, it's going to amplify your ability to do that. Money amplifies who you are. Anyways, this is a quick episode, but I wanted to set that clear, and I apologize for the finance— for other people outside looking at the finance community saying, I hate finance, I hate those capitalist pigs. I'm sorry, it's a It's a small number of us that are just jerks and they're loud, but I think the majority of us are just, I think good fund managers as well are humble. The more, the better they get, the humbler they get and rely on teams. They rely on systems and computers and algorithms to make themselves wrong less. They understand how wrong they are most of the time. So hope you guys enjoy and I'll see you in the next episode. Peace.