Compound Growth

The Future Probably Isn't What You Think It Is

• Compound Growth • Season 2 • Episode 27

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A book about how people picture the future kicks off this one: close your eyes and imagine what's ahead, and it turns out most people picture something quiet and grounded, not the flying cars or dystopia a futurist might expect. From there the show moves into two dramatic single-stock stories, SpaceX down 40% from its highs (called on this show months in advance) and IBM's one-day $70 billion market cap wipeout following a 54% run-up in a matter of weeks that had nothing to do with earnings. That leads into the leveraged ETF boom, from $30 billion in total assets in 2020 to $200 billion today, with single-stock leveraged ETFs alone growing from zero to $30 billion, plus a walkthrough of an autocallable barrier and high income ETF built on a basket of large tech names, and why a 40% barrier paired with a 30% coupon looks safer than it is.

The back half turns to personal finance. The actual math behind mortgage costs, origination fees, broker markups, and third-party charges, adds up to roughly $19,000 out of pocket on a $500,000 loan, and a newer, disintermediated lending model is quoting 50 to 100 basis points below competitive market rates. Then a debate over who really wins the AI buildout, consumers or the companies spending billions to build it, tied to a case for Apple and Siri as the dark horse of how people actually end up interacting with AI. It closes on Tesla: 480,000 vehicles delivered in Q2, well above analyst estimates, a stat on why Teslas rank as both the safest car by crash test and among the most fatal on the road per mile driven, and the ongoing discourse over carsick Tesla Uber rides.

Sources:
FT Vest Autocallable Barrier & High Income ETF (ACYQ), fund summary, First Trust Portfolios
Tesla, Inc., Q2 2026 production and delivery report
Nick Foster, "Could, Should, Might, Don't" (the book anchoring the episode's opening exercise)

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Credits:
Created By: Wheeler Crowley and Colin Walker
Production, Editing and Post-Production: Tori Rothwell

Think that Apple is going to be the winner in all of this I totally agree with you Because I think these LI just said I don't think LLMs are going to be how we interact with AI in the future.I do think that talking to Alexa or Siri or whatever is how people want to interact with AI.I don't think they even want to, like, spend time texting.I think they verbally want to do this, and Apple's the gateway, or what- your- whatever your device of choice is, I think that's the gateway.I would wantI want nothing more than Siri to work.Siri's gonna work, man.Because it's gonna- Have you d-it's gonna be powered by somebody else's AI Have you downloaded the new beta?I have not.It's pretty solid.Welcome to the Compound Growth Podcast with Colin and Wheeler, where we talk all things growth.From financial growth to career growth, personal development to societal progress, we explore how each layer builds on the next, compounding over time to shape who we become.Each week, we break down complex ideas and emerging trends into clear, actionable insights.Because growth isn't just about numbers, it's about understanding the world and our place in it.I actually have an exercise for the 2 of you.Physical?Yes.Okay.Jumping jacks, you're familiar?Yeah.So I've been reading this book called Could, Should, Might, Don't by Nick Foster, and it's basically a book written by a futurist about the future or how to think about the future.Ah, futurists.Okay.Futurist, yeah.Um, this guy is like, uh, he's been working in large corporate atmospheres like Google's, um, Moonshots division, things like that.Yeah.But he, his, his whole job so farHe's not thatHe's, like, my age or a little bit older, so he's not exactly, like, wise from all these decades of experience but- You're wise.Well, maybe not as wise as Nick Foster.Okay.Um, anyways, so in his intro, he asks a que- or he prompts the reader to close their eyes and imagine the future.So Tori, close your eyes, imagine the future.How far into the future?It's yourThat's the whole prompt.Okay.Tori, what did you see when you closed your eyes?Um.The beach.Okay.Very cool.Colin?I saw getting on a plane.Getting on a plane?Yep.So not like a future science fiction, like, speed jet, just plane.Not like a one that's gonna shoot me to the moon and back.Yeah.Yes.Okay.I saw getting on a plane to go on a trip.So short distance future.I guess so.Probably- Tori5 to 6 years out.Would you say a short distance future as well?Yeah, I was, like, 30s, in myOkay.That's what I was imagining.All right.All right.I saw a little bit further.I saw probably in my 70s, um, but I saw- That's, that's significant furtherIt's, it's much further, but, uh, the simplicity, actually.So I think the way people d- In the book, he's like, "You probably saw, like, great gleaming skyscrapers or, uh, a dystopia, or, like, whatever."Um, I think that the way that you guys responded, and actually I think the way that I responded to this, which was me sitting on a porch with my wife in rocking chairs because I'm old- Why?Why is it that-but in Vermont, like, looking out over green hills and stuff.W- whenever someone envisions, like, an old person, they're always on a rocking chair.You know, rocking chairs are really comfortable.Do you have a- They aredo you have a rocking chair?They are.I remember very specifically when I was a child, one of my oldest memories, was sitting in my grandmother's arms on a rocking chair.Okay.Right.Rocking chair.Because they're comfortable.It's true, and you remember the movement.Yeah, and also I think, like, having an elderly mother, it's easier to get a pushup sometimes.So when you rock back and then, like, you- Ahyou know- Never thought about thatit's, it's harder to get up sometimes.Yeah, yeah, yeah.So anyways, I, I'm, I'm not imagining a future where it's hard for me to get up from the chair.But I'm imagining- Hopefully not at 70but I'm imagining something simple, right?Interesting.And I think the problem with the way we think about the future, a lot of people think about the future, is they imagine something complex.They imagine something drastic.They imagine extremes, and that's what this author, Nick Foster, was expecting people to do, and I didn't do it, and I'm like, "Huh, I wonder why?"And then you guys didn't do it, which is cool.So I think we have a very grounded, the 3 of us in this c- podcast room right now- Mm-hmma very grounded approach, and I think that that helps us in ways.There was a, uh, a study that was done, and I don't remember the specifics 'cause it's been years that I read about it, but there was a study that was done that was basically saying you identify with your future self just about as much as you identify with a stranger.Hmm.And it was very difficult for people to put themselves in their own shoes many years out- Yeahand to envision that.And I think specifically with things like tech and robots and whatever it might be, uh, it's difficult for me to imagine that when I haven't experienced it.Yeah.You know what I mean?Like, I don't know what w- what life's gonna be like if we have robots or jet-powered cars and things like that.Yeah.You know?It's just, I don't know how that's gonna change my life necessarily.Well, I think what's interesting is we're, like, in a place and time where people are thinking about this even more and more.Totally.But the robots don't lookLike, the, the Tesla robots basically look like the Will Smith I Am Robot- I, RobotI, Robot movie.Yeah.Like, it'sHave we just limited our imagination to this?You know, Elon Musk is imagining life on Mars.I don't know why, by the way.I'd rather focus on saving this planet than, like, figuring out how to get to another one.Get off of it, yeahUm, but, you know, his imagination of what that looks like is probably very limited visually.Even though he canLike, he has this ability to push forward and find that progress, I'm not sure it looksI saw the Cybertruck.I mean, that looks like a 1980s G.I.Joe mobile, so.Well, yeah, it was literally based on a movie from 40 years ago.Was it?What movie?It was based on, uhHang on, let me pull it up.Pause a second.40 years ago.I'm gonna sayNo, it's '80s.30 years ago, I could see it being Demolition Man.It kind of has Demolition Man vibes.Or it could be Running Man, maybe.Total Recall.The Spy Who Loved Me.Nope.That's not 40 years ago.Is it?It's 50.Yeah.Well, actually, yeah, 49.But it was also mostly taken from the sci-fi classic, Blade Runner.Okay.I like Blade Runner.Yeah.He's mentioned a few movies, but he said the main inspiration from it was Blade- Blade Runner- So-which was 40 years ago.So I think that tells you then what type of future he sees, because Blade Runner is a dystopia, and so now he sees, like, humanoid androids who are possibly committing murder, definitely committing murder, um- I hope not, if he's creating themand pollution has torched the skies, and it rains all the time, and fashion is just out the window.Nobody looks good in that movie.Well, I hope not, 'cause it's an electric car, and hopefully he's not creating robots to destroy the world.Um, no, I didn't know they didn't destroy the world.They were just regular people- Righthumanoid that, were people that- Committed crimes and stuffyou know, humans can be murderers, too, Colin.I don't know if you know that.Well, so far only humans have been murderers.But yes.Yeah.Yeah.So I, I think, bottom line, we are imagining all this massive change, and I think sometimes we're fast-forwarding past just, like, our regular experience here, and that's where we're seeing play out in the market in all these different areas now.It's, it's trying to get to a destination faster so you can bring the future here now.What all I always go back to is I feel as if change in looking forward happens quickly, but looking in the rear view seems slow to me.Seems like we've had cell phones forever- Surebut we haven't.You know?Like, I, I remember, and actually I think my generation is the last generation to remember in the US what life is like without a computer at home.Like, I remember when we got our first computer, I was probably 8 or 9 years old, and I don't remember too much from before when I was 7.Yeah.You know what I mean?But I guess my point is, I know computers and cell phones and all those things, like, it happened super quickly, but it doesn't seem that quick when you're in it.You know what I mean?Right.I think it happens slowly and then all at once.Yeah.And that's what people need to understand.That's the, the typical experience, and when you look at some of the, the market behavior that we're gonna talk about, when you look at just the, the way that people compare themselves to everything around them, they want to get to that point of being whatever they're comparing themselves to, and they don't wanna take time to appreciate how m- how much goes into that.You know?Yeah, for sure.Well, I, I also think that when it comes to the future, um, there are all these assumptions about how things are gonna change, and- Yeahyou know, do you re- I mean, Y2K, the world was coming to an end, and everybody was so worked up about that.I mean, who knows what's actually gonna unfold.Yeah.I think the, Nick writes about the, the idea, and this is a phrase I've heard before, but loose ideas loosely held.Mm.Whatever we think is going to happen in the future, we need to understand that there's a very large chance that won't happen.Yeah.And I think what's interesting is that you and I, in these seats at work or, and in this podcast, are frequently asked to predict what's going to happen next.I know you don't have a crystal ball.Yes.But if you did.Oh, my favorite.Yeah.I'm gonna get a crystal ball one of these days.You should.It's gonna be an 8 ball.It is.With client answers.Should I buy SpaceX?Oh, no.SpaceX.Hey, you brought up SpaceX.I was, uh, I was taking a page out of your book for transitions.Well done.Um, all right.So SpaceX slacked over this chart today.This is as of today, July 22nd.Yes.SpaceX, surprising no 1 Down 40%.Down 40%.Not quite 50, though, so look at that.That's true.It is only downThat's, that's from the highs, right?So on the year, it's, it's down, like, 9%, um, you know, since its IP- since it IPO'd.But this is exactly kind of what we predicted, right?We didn't- Can we say that?Yes, we can pred- I mean, it's on, it's on record.We were recorded saying- That's fairthat this would happen.Yeah.But it is also not exactly how we envisioned it happening, right?We don't know exact- so loosely held, right?Right.We thought, "Hey, this might go down," and then it did.A lot of IPOs typically do shoot up, come down.Right, statistic, history.Yeah, history says- Re- recognizing history.Yes.So that's, that's interesting.Uh, I think- Did you have a lot of clients get into this?I had a couple of clients reach out about getting into it.Oh, wow.They wanted to get into it.Yeah.Yeah.I didn't have anybodyNobody's been brave enough to tell me that they bought SpaceX without me, so I- Maybe.Whether or not people bought it on their own- YeahI don't know, but people reaching out to me directly out of the hundreds of clients we have- YeahYeahfor me.I think SpaceX, SpaceX has a very large market cap, so it's interesting that it's dropped so quickly, not as quickly as IBM dropped in one single day when they lost $70 billion in market cap.Yeah, what are they down, 36% from their highs- So-I believe right nowthat $70 billion drop has never happened- Yeah, it was a one-day-in history.Yeah, that one-day-type thing.Yeah.Large companies like that do not usually fall from the sky.Yeah.That's a very irregular thing to have occur.It's quite the dramatic chart for anyone that's interested in charting.I would encourage you to go look at it because it's crazy.It'sWhat's also interesting when you look at the progress, though, of how IBM got there, you know, IBMActually, hold on.I'm gonna bring up the chart because I should be logged into LiveCharts for these conversations.Well, if I go back to IBM, specifically year-to-date, government contracts.Mm-hmm.Yep, how did they get here?Yeah.Yeah, yeah, yeah.Yeah, so government contracts being one, um, I'll say there was a lot of publicity around that in general, and then AI spend.Yeah.Well, I mean, so they droppedLet's see.So they, they drop that one day, and it brings them back to 2024 valuations essentially.You wanna know what's crazy, though, is all of this occurred, like all this craziness occurred within a manner of, like, 2 months, if you think about it.Because if it wasn't for the blip on, let's just say, beginning of June, still year to date, they would've been down, that's 27%.Like, if you were to go from June to May- Mm-hmmthey were down 30%.Then they jumped with a bunch of news in the- Rightbeginning of June- Yepand they shot up like crazy, and then it just came right back down.Yeah, yeah, and that's the, that's what's kind of worrying me about some of this market behavior.One of the things I had to talk about today was the levered ETFs.We've kind of talked about this.Yeah.So they had in the, in 2020, I went back to 2020 because that's kind of like when, when the investing world really changed into whatever it is today.So 2020, the total AUM across US leveraged ETFs was about $30 1000000000.Okay, and for those people that don't know what a leveraged ETF is, what it is, is it's an ETF or an index fund that inherently has leverage on it, so it's like a 3X or a 2X S&P or whatever the metric is.You know- Rightthose, like, tech ones or whatever index you choose.Yeah, leverage.So they're borrowing to buy more of whatever it is.Correct, to try to enhance the return- Yeahwhich also has a negative effect on the flip side of that.And you can short.You can go the op- the opposite direction, right?You can have a,I, I don't know if that would be called a leveraged ETF at that point, but, yeah, I think you're still using leverage to short, so it still falls into this category.There's still options.Yeah.All right, so 30 billion in 2020.Today, 200 1000000000.All right?So in 6 years, we've gone from $30 billion to 200 1000000000.We now have $30 billion standalone in just single stock leveraged ETFs.Wait, hang on.Repeat that again.So single stock leveraged ETFs have gone from what to what?From 0, because they didn't exist, right?To 30 1000000000.So they are- Aggressive play.Yeah.Yeah, so they're more than 25% of this leveraged market, and it's, it's this enthusiasm.Again, I think fast-forwarding a little bit, right?It, but it's, let'sIt, it started with things like NVIDIA, but NVIDIA's boring now, so now we have leveraged SpaceX.We've always had leveraged Tesla.We'veThere's a lot of volatility in these names already, so this is kind of like the Bitcoin experience.I, I feel like this is not that far away from all the Bitcoin Lambos people saw, and they're like, "Well, I'm gonna get into Bitcoin too and, and chase that, that high," right?That dragon.Yeah.I have a theory- I think that's what's happening with single stocksI have a theory about that, which is there's always a Bitcoin.See, my wonder- I wonder if, I think there w- Maybe Bitcoin's not the right thing, but there's always- Yeahan asset that does this.Do you feel like it's always an asset forever back in history, or in this unique current environment?No, I think if you look back throughout history, there's always been, like, the pump and dump.Hmm.There was, yeah, like penny stocks, things like that.Yeah, like you look at, like, penny stocks.YouI mean, you could go back to tulip bulbs if you really wanted to.But there's, like, there's tulip bulbs.You have penny stocks, then you had Bitcoin.I mean, we saw it a lot with precious metals for a while there.Like, there's always things that get pumped, like Dogecoin is a s- is a great example of this, you know, short squeezes.I just feel like hype matters in a lot of ways because hype does drive a lot of market- Yeahbehavior.But pump and dump is fraud.It's nefarious.It's not the same thing as just, like, FOMO and chasing.Pump and dump is literally, like, driving up the value so you can sell it.Maybe, but c- whatev- whether you wanna call it FOMO or pump and dump, I guess maybe those are 2 separate things.Those are 2I, I feel like it's actually not like we get to choose which one we call it.Okay, FOMO, but they're, but they're, I, I think in some ways they're one in the same because if I look at- Like a lot of those things that ran up, some people are pumping and dumping them, while other people are FOMOing it.Like, if you look at the short squeeze with GameStop- Mm-hmmlike, I feel like when that was going on, there were people that were trying to pump and dump that, while at the same time, other consumers were looking at it like, "I don't wanna miss out on this," the Reddit forum people.I don't know if a lot ofI think what happens with short squeezes overall is that the smart money is betting against the company- Yeahand the dumb money, being retail in that situation, is buying and- Uh, buying forand forcing them to squeeze.So I don't think that, you know, Rainbow Kitty, what was his guy's name?Something.Uh, Roaring Kitty.Roaring Kitty.Yeah.Roaring Kitty.Yeah.I don't think he was in there pumping the stock up.No, I don't think he was.Right?But, well, then if he wasn't, who was?Well, I don't know that specific circumstance, but, I mean, you could say this though withI was watching, um, Below Deck the other day, and one of the guests on Below Deck was a Bitcoin person.Yeah.And the whole time while he was on the yacht, he was on social media being like, "Buy Bitcoin," you know, blah, blah, blah, "If you look at this chart," and- Yeahall this stuff, and he's, like, pumping it, and then- Suresigning up for his master class at the end of it.So there are people out there that do that, but I just feel like whenever there's so much hype around stuff- Yeahit's just ripe for either disruption or corruption.Yes.I think you're right, and there's probably an element of that.But I think there's a very large difference between pushing the value of a company or an asset up ahead of itself, right?So basically driveI think SpaceX will be worth what it IPO'd at someday.Yeah.It's not right now, and I don't think it's going to be immediately.Well, let me ask you- But I think that's different than a Trump coin or a tulip bulb.Neither of those things had a future.I totally, I totally agree.Th- Tulip bulbs don't make any impact on anything.However, if I look at IBM from May 13th to June 2nd being up 54%, that's not because of earnings.That's not because of, I mean, you can say government contracts and things, but that's all based off of assumptions.I think, yeah, there's, it's, again, trying to fast-forward, but the PE ratio is 18.Yeah.It's not, like- It's a reasonably priced thingit's a reasonably priced asset in the middle of an AI build-out.Like, do I think it went up partly because of government support?Sure.So did Tesla.Well, we, we know that it did, you know?And, uh, the thing is though, I guess my whole point with this is I'm not here to say that AI is a bubble, but I guess my point is, is, like, whenever anything AI is brought up with a company- Yeahthere's a pop, and, or it just seems like there is.And it's just a little, to your point, all these leveraged ETFs are trying to, like, boost it quicker.Right.And we're seeing these, like, dramatic moves of 54 in a massive company.Yeah.It's not normal.Well, I wanna be clear that I don't think leveraged ETFs should exist.Right.No.Like, I don't think- Yeah, we're not pro leveraged ETFs.It bothers me when people say that investing is like gambling.It's usually not, unless you're gambling.Yeah.And therefore it's- It doesn't have to be speculationright, we're creating more ways to gamble.I don't think that's a healthy thing.But I do think a lot, what, what frequently hap- what I hate, actually, when it happens is when I'm invested in a company and the value skyrockets too quickly.Yeah.And then I'm like, "I don't wanna sell this co- I wanna own it for the, like, a decade."Mm-hmm.And now I'm, like, in the situation where I know it's way overvalued and I have to sell it to, you know, and pay gains on that, orIt's just, it's unfortunate when it happens.You want it, things just kind of slow and steady go up, and that's never really going to be the case.No, and I guess that's, I mean, when I look at this, I just see this chart and these massive dramatic moves- Yeahand I just think about that type of stuff.Like, I think, like, 54 in a massive Fortune 500 company in a matter of a few days is not normal.In the same way that, you know, a sell-off of 37%, or in a single day, a sell-off of 27% or 25% is not normal either.No, especially for a company that large.Yeah.I totally agree, which means that the value was inflated.But I- at the same time, the company is worth something.So it's- Of courseit's just not the-- I just, I wanna, I wanna be clear, I don't think somebody's pumping and dumping that.I think that people were misguided by their expectations, not by the company.Yeah.But I guess to your point with the leverage ETFs, I do, I do think that we wouldn't see those dramatic of moves if it wasn't for the amount of leverage out, out there.Yeah.I don't know.I, I'm not- It's hard to know.It's, 'cause it's impossible to gauge, but- Right.Whether there was-is it coincidence?a margin squeeze or something like that.Yeah, I mean, a margin call.It could be.I don't think that there's a single levered IBM ETF.I don't know.But I think that that could, that could create a waterfall effect.It's just that they're, while $30 billion sounds like a lot of money for a single stock ETFs, as a, as a, an ability- Yeahto impact the market overall, I think it's fairly small.It's really the, the larger margin out there- It isthat we have to be concerned with.Yeah.I just, this, stuff like this, these massive moves, I think are unfortunately here to stay, and we're probably gonna see more and more of it as it becomes easier to access leverage.Yeah.Well, slow and steady wins the race as long as it's enough, a long enough race.Yeah.I sent you this otherC- could you click on that link right above that chart, the slide show?Yeah, I got it.I got it right here.All right.Uh, this is a product that I became aware of yesterday.I'm not recommending this product, and I'm gonna say what it is.But it's an auto-callable barrier and high income ETF offered by an investment company.What's interesting to me, and we're not gonna get into the, the ins and outs of how something like this works, what they're really doing here is they're taking a select back, if you s- uh, a bucket.You can slow down and see all the 12- Yeahum, 12 companies that they're investing in.But there are companies like in, NVIDIA, AMD, Netflix- MetaCisco, Meta, Amazon, Google.It's like all the ones that are- Most people knowthey're the 12 largest companies.Yeah.Right?The, click over with your, your mouse, your cursor here.Hover over Lam Research, LRCX.Okay.What you're gonna see is there's a barrier level with 40%, what you're also gonna see is a coupon of 30%.So somebody's being paid a 30% coupon, which is basically, let's call it interest.Right.Right?Effective interest rate on a lo- on a, a note tied to this Lam Research stock, right?So now if you go over and you look at Lam Research and how frequently it drops 40%, because your variable is only 40%, you can just look at right now, normalized percent off high, it's down 26% this year.It was down 46% in 2025, right?Wait, I have, uh, I have year-to-date it being up, LRCX.No, off the, off the high.Oh, oh, oh.Off the high.Off the high.Because it's the drop.Yeah, 'cause it's the drop.It's the drop.So it resets at its peak.Yeah.Yeah, yeah, yeah.Okay.Or it, it depends on when the note was issued.But the point is that can a stock like this have a 40% drop?Without question.Very easily.AMD, yes.Netflix.Netflix is off the high right now 47%, so that would've busted through the barrier depending on when the note was issued.We don't need products like this.We don't need to have something that is, is taking on significant risk and covering it up with a really large coupon that they're promising.And it's, for, for somebody to have income from this, that's, that's a very strong income that you're getting from this portfolio, but the risk isn'tThe risk is bigger than they might think.I know.You even look at Meta, it was down 29% off peak-point this year.I, I go back to a financial advisor we used to work with who always used to say, "All you need are stocks and bonds."And I, I still hold that.I think that was very wise, simple advice.The stock market returns, or has returned over the last 20 years, 13 and a half percent year-over-year growth.Yeah.Which I have never sat there with a 13 and a half percent annualized return over a 20-year period wishing I had more.Like, I felt like I really missed out- Yeahbecause I, I tripled my, or I, like, probably 10X'd my money during that time period.I don't know the rule of 72 on that.Sure.But long story short, I don't know the purpose of these, because if you're just a disciplined investor- Mm-hmmyou have a mix of stocks and you have a mix of bonds to align yourself with the proper risk tolerance.I'm not saying alts are bad, but I- Don't need themlike them.Yeah.I think that it'sYou're right.It's been a great run.Mm-hmm.This has been a really, really strong bull market, and it's not over.I'm not suggesting that it's over.Yeah.I also don't think that this is a bubble.I think what you're seeing with something like IBM is a single stock situation, and you can see it with, you know, Micron was down massively before it just jumped up again yesterday.There's volatility in these individual positions, but we're not seeing a lot of bili- volatility in the index.We are seeing this broaden, this market broaden, so that companies that are not named, you know, so-and-so tech or in Silicon Valley are still doing very well.I think that the systematic aspect of this is what people are worried about, like, what if AI doesn't lead to anything, and, you know, what is the ROI on AI, et cetera.And I think that you're probably going to see larger ROI on smaller spend at some point along the way.But companies are profitable.They are making money.Yes, they are.And the, the market itself, the PE, is not overly inflated.So I think it's just, it's not somethingEverybody loves to say bubble, bubble, bubble.I get it.Maybe we should just take a breath and not worry so much about that.I just looked past the last 6 years, and I just, actually just did a quick exercise.If you put $100,000 in the S&P 500 20 years ago, you'd now have $900,000.Really 964,000, but regardless.Let's call it a million.Call it a million.So that worked out pretty well for you.10X.If you go back over the last few years, when we first started this podcast, I think our very first episode we talked about AI.Yep.Which was a year and a few months ago.And if I was to go back before then, you had many other major topics, I remember, like the failing of the banks, you know?Sure, so Silicon Valley Bank.You had Silicon Valley Bank- Yepit went under.Then before that, we had so many talks about interest rates, you know, and the hike of interest rates, and then we had the war in Ukraine, and then we had COVID.Yep.There's, like, always things that come up.And there's always risks of, you know, the market may never recover.You know, bonds are blown up.You know, we have banks, the bank sector's gonna fail.And every year there's always a theme, I feel like, and maybe this theme of AI has been more than a year at this point, and it's probably gonna continue to be more than a year.Does it make it a bubble though?Not necessarily.Well, I think it's been a couple of years since ChatGPT kind ofCouple of, it's been 3 years maybe.It's been, from what I can see, like yeah, two and a half.Yeah.It was basically when we launched our AI- Yeahwas when it really started to become a thing.Yeah.And at that time, you know, the never-do-wells were basically saying, "Well, 2 years from now everybody's gonna be out of work."Right.Exactly.Still hasn't happened.Still hasn't happened, yeah.I have a theory.I think LLMs, what we think of as AI are just LLMs.ChatGPT, Gemini, Claude, whatever it might be.Yeah.I think that's what most people think of.I th- I think most people used to think of messaging as AOL Instant Messenger.Totally.Right?Nobody uses AOL Instant Messenger.The only people who have AOL email addresses are geriatric.And I don't- Uh, whenever I see an AOL email, I'm like, "Oh man, this is crazy."Oh, no.Can this person actually read this?It's like, it's like you just found, like, a vintage find at a flea market.Like, if someone hands you an AOL email.Yeah.I don't think AI is going to mean to us someday what it means to us right now.We, we were at a forum, was it last week?Uh, yeah.Yeah, so last week we were at a forum.Yeah.That wasThey had some interesting points, but one of my favorite ones was it was talking about this AI build-out, and the amount of money that's being spent.Yeah.And how it's not the companies that are necessarily gonna win this, it's the consumers that are gonna win this.Yeah.Because the more money that people spend on AI build-out, it means that Gemini gets better.You know, Claude gets better, ChatGPT.And no one has any loyalties to any of these LLMs.Yeah.Like, we were talking about this the other day.Claude gave me a completely different answer on the same question that ChatGPT did.And then you go to Gemini, and it's different again.So the fact of the matter is, though, is that I'm using 3 or 4 different LLMs at any given point in time.And if Claude went under tomorrow, couldn't care less.You know, I would switch to ChatGPT or Gemini, and they would figure it out.In the same way now for a lot of financial research, like Google Finance is amazing- Yeahwhat it's done.And my point is, I think the AI thing is actually going to be great for consumers.I don't know how it's gonna work out for companies.I actually think it's the other way around.You do?I think, yeah.So you disagree with that guy?Well, I do because the B2B is always an easier business avenue, so people are willing to spend on that, which makes it easier to build out, et cetera.But I, when I talk to clients- Yeahwe went out to lunch yesterday with 2 clients.They shared what their AI experience has been so far.One was self-driving Tesla, which they are blown away by.Yeah.And one, the, the, the, the wife in this couple is fully bought in, wants robots in her house doing all her chores for her, like she's all in on the future.Yeah.But how do they use AI right now?Interior design and silly pictures.Sure, I used it for my patio design, but like- ExactlyI'm not saying that's a bad thing.I'm just saying, like, it's the inter- interaction with it is really limited.I don't think a lot of peopleIt's just basically Google search for the most part at this point, but it does it better.Pretty much, yeah.I don't think a lot of people are conversing with it like we're doing it or doing the deep research orI think how people are acting, reacting or interacting with AI is extremely limited, and I don't know if it will ever be what people think it will be.Well, uh, fair, but then on that point then a business couldn't win because if you don't have mass adoption by consumers, I don't know how sticky it's going to be long term.I do think it's great for businesses.In fact, it's helped our business already in a lot of ways, but we were just talking about this the other day.Our AI note-taker is easily replaceable now by our CRM.Yeah.And- If they, if it has the same quality note-takersame quality, or we don't know that yet.But we got a notification saying, "Hey, your CRM does note-takers, and you don't need to- Rightmove things over between systems."Yeah.And now it's like, oh, well, we have no loyalty to this note-taking company.Right.So why don't we just look at that one?I, I think it's just a very, like, loose landscape in terms of what's gonna stick and what isn't and who the winners and losers are gonna be.There's no moat around these businesses.Totally, no moat.But I do actually think, and again, it's fun to predict the future, right?It's, we can try.It's easy to, to like have a soundbite of like- Yeahhere's, here's what I think is gonna happen, and I'm going to do that now.Because I think that Apple is going to be the winner in all of this.I totally agree with you.Because I think these LI just said I don't think LLMs are going to be how we interact with AI in the future.I do think that talking to Alexa or Siri or whatever is how people want to interact with AI.I don't think they even want to, like, spend time texting.I think they verbally want to do this, and Apple's the gateway or what your, whatever your device of choice is, I think that's the gateway.I would want, I want nothing more than Siri to work.Siri's gonna work, man.Because it's gonna- Have you- It's gonna be powered by somebody else's AI.Have you downloaded the new beta?I have not.It's pretty solid.And Siri is pretty slick when you have great service.Yeah.If you have 2 bars or less, it does not work.But I, what I will say is this beta is awesome.So was in a long thread with my builder, and I was trying to figure out, like, a decision that we had made before in the past about window placement.Yeah.So I said, "Hey, S-I-R-I," I don't wanna say it and activate everyone's phones.Yeah."Go through my chat history with Steve to try to figure out when we put this window in this location."And it was like, "August 25th of 2025.You guys had this conversation.I've pulled it up here."And then I'm like, "Did we talk about it any other time?"And he's, and they were like, "Yeah, you've talked about it here, here, and there."And I was just like, "Great, you know, how could we do the outlet placement on this particular countertop given codes in Rye?"Yeah.And it's like, "This is what you would do with this."So it was actually useful because, I can't remember the exact terminology with this, but the problem with AI right now is it's very, like, one-dimensional.You have an input- Yepand then it responds to that input.Yeah.Versus having Siri be an AI kind of LLM, it now looks through your photos and your conversations and all those types of other things, which is scary to a lot of people.But I'll say it's a great evolution in terms of usefulness because if you're in ChatGPT, ChatGPT can't look to all of your other devices and things- Yeahin a closed loop environment to deliver- Well, and you don't want it toand you don't want it to, but- You don't, you just don't necessarily trust that.I think- Apple can in the new update.Yeah, and I think if anybody's gonna win this because of that trust element, it, Apple- Applehas the most trust of all of these large tech companies.100%.People don't like AI.They don't like AI data centers.They don't like the fear of their jobs being replaced, and I think sometimes they're investing in AI because they're like, "I just gotta buy the robots because they're gonna replace me."Right."So I wanna be invested in my own replacement."Um- And fear sells too, you know?Yeah, totally.Totally, which sucks.People are, people are gonna, you know, hear that robots are gonna replace you, and everyone's gonna be out of the job, and people are gonna-juice that article up.Maybe not so fast.I had a, a few things I wanted to talk about in regards to the, the Tesla and Cybercab and all those types of other things.Long story short, I'll just abbreviate it 'cause I wanna get into another conversation.But robo taxis are now launched in Florida, so you have Miami, Orlando- Okayand Tampa, I believe, in addition to, I think it's Austin, Dallas, and Houston in Texas, and now they're testing in San Francisco as well.The amount of cars sold by them in Q2 was insane.Really?Yeah.I don't know if you saw this, but- I did notyeah, so the company shipped 480,000 vehicles in Q2, which was 74,000 more than what analysts predicted.Really?And the market did not care because the market looks at Tesla as a future growth opportunity.I feel like everybody's looking at Tesla right now for robo taxis and robots.Not cars.Not necessarily cars.Yeah.So the fact that it has an 18% profit margin and blew away sales- Yeahno one cares.Who's buying those cars?Like- The Tesla Model Y is the largest or the, uh, most popular car in the world right now by, like, a significant margin.Right, but I mean, who owns the robo taxis?Oh, I see.Okay.So robo taxis are right now, like, Model Ys mostly- Okaythat have the full self-driving that are in basically a beta mode.I believe most of them If not all are owned by Tesla.I should verify that though Yeah, I'm just curious, like how much of that production number is internal, meaning like did they sell all those or did they produce all those vehicles and then some of them did not go to g- to a consumer?The, uh, delivery of vehicles was pretty incredible, but- Do they just deliver them to themselves though, is what I'm wondering.Do they just drive them around back and say, "Here you go"?I mean, it wouldn't be the first time that there was this circular in- intricacy withinside a, Elon Musk company.There is a lot of discourse online about people hating Tesla Ubers.Like, people want a toggle on for, like not accepting Tesla Ubers- Mmbecause they get carsick in the backseat.Dude, that's- And it's like a very- That's truevery common.It's 'cause the air suspension, it like floats.Have you ever sat in the back of one?Yeah, yeah, for an Uber- Yeahand it was not fun.Yeah.People are like, "When are they going to set this up?I cannot take a Tesla as an Uber."Can you- I get carsick.Yeah.I guess you can always just like reject it, right, when it's, comes up in your phone?Yeah, but I'm wondering how these robotaxis will work- I know.That's a really good pointif people already don't wanna even get into an Uber.Well, people like Waymos.I've- YeahI've, I've always heard good experiences with- Waymo's that Jaguar?Jaguar, yeah.Yeah.Yeah, no I- Which they stopped making, so I don't know what they're gonna move toI was in Paris for, and we had an Uber and it was a EV Jaguar, and that guy did not know how to drive it, and I definitely got carsick in that too, so.That might have been his problem.Yeah.Uh, it was 480,000 delivered to consumers, no internal deliveries.Super.Yeah.So Tori, that's a really good point.What if nobody wants this?Well, I just feel like it's already a very massive topic of discussion of people not enjoying- Yeahthe ride in a Tesla.So they don't want it because they're getting sick in the rear seat?They, they get carsick, yeah.Yeah.Hm.I didn't, I didn't get cars- I, I get thatI didn't get carsick when I was in it most recently, but the first time I rode, I don't know if it was a Tesla, but an electric car in general- YeahI felt carsick because there was like no engine noise, there was no transmission, and it was like an air suspension thing.I think it's often the driver though, and I wonder about that.Because it has the, what's that, um, auto- Regenerative brakingthat's an adjustment.When I go from our Rivian that has it to the BMW where it's turned off, I have to remember how to drive each one when I flip.And it- I have a cr- I have a crazy stat for you- Yeahon that thing you just said.Okay.Okay.So Teslas are pretty much indisputably the safest vehicles on the road today.Okay, yeah.Historically speaking, they always rank the highest in terms of crash tests.The average fatality per billion miles in, like a car is 2.8.Okay?Tesla is 5.6. There are more fatalities in Teslas than any other vehicle, despite it being the safest vehicle.Why?What you just said.It's because it's so much power that people aren't used to, and the speed- Mmand people misusing self-driving and not paying attention- Mmthat leads to all these fatalities.Mm.But to your point, if, uh, if you're coming from a Honda Civic, which is probably right around a $30,000 car now- Yeahand you go and buy a used Model 3 Performance, you're going to a car that is 3 times to 4 times faster than what you're used to, and if you give it to an 18-year-old or a 17-year-old, I was an idiot at 17 when it came to driving.I know most teenagers, I feel like a lot of males in general, are aggressive when it comes to driving as a teenager.Yeah.But you're giving basically someone a sports car that has 500 horsepower.I think it's actually-- So I think that's probably what it comes down to, Tori, is that the people who are driving these Ubers are just not skilled drivers of Teslas.And if we have Cybercabs, theoretically, those should know how to brake and make it a smoother ride.I haven't been in a Tesla 1 Yeahbut I know Waymos are great.Yeah.Yeah.When, when we were in Austin, uh, Kaylee specifically looked for Waymos because she didn't wanna be in a car with a stranger.I know.Michaela really wanted to go in a Waymo, and I let her down.All right, moving on.Moving on.And we don't have a ton of time, but I did think that this was an interesting, interesting thing that I found yesterday.Um, I wanna talk about mortgages.Yeah.Okay.So this was a good refresher for me in regards to how the mortgage industry kind of works in terms of costs and fees.So if you think about getting a mortgage, whether you're a first-time home mortgage buyer or, you know, you've done this a million times, typically there are some fees baked into a mortgage that make the mortgage profitable for banks and lenders.The first one is an origination fee, which is usually around 1% of the loan value.So if you've got a million dollar loan or a $500,000 loan, it's gonna be respectively 10,000 or $5,000, and that rate can vary.But then there's also a broker margin, so a gain on sale.So there's a hidden markup built into, like, the loan in general, which is usually in the form of a higher rate.Mm-hmm.So the rate that you're being quoted oftentimes will have a little bit of a higher percentage baked in there to kick some commission back to, you know, I'll say the guy- Whoever's writing the loanwhoever's writing the mortgage.Then there's application and credit fees, which are usually around $400 depending on the size of the loan.Then you also have the third-party fees.So you have home appraisals, title search, and lender's title insurance.You have government recording fees.Then you have things like escrow, escrow cushions.So for a $500,000 loan, your out-of-pocket costs are around $19,000 for a traditional loan.There are new, I'll say, lending models that are starting to come out that are direct from the actual company originating the loan to the consumer.Because often what, what happens is if you have, from my understanding, an independent mortgage broker, they're getting a, a loan essentially from a bank, and then they're repackaging it and then delivering it to you and then marking it up along the way.Mm-hmm.So there's intermediaries that are making this happen.I saw a presentation from a company called Flourish that basically allows you to bypass all the middle people in between.You still have to pay some origination fees.You're still gonna have to pay, like, title search and lender's insurance and some government recording fees, but the whole purpose of this is to basically eliminate those intermediaries, which when I was looking at the rates, the rates were 50 to 100 basis points less than what I was seeing for very competitive rates in a normal market.I was looking for a client that's doing a million five mortgage, and the rate on a 30-year, now it did have some points in there, was 5.6%.Mm.Which was the lowest I've seen in well over probably a year and a half.So that to me was a very interesting thing, and where this all came about was there was a company out there, I believe it was called Sora, which was an AI debt company that a lot of financial advisors used.And what you could do is you could put a client's home equity line of credit, mortgage, all that stuff in there, and it would track the rate.And if the rate got, I'll say, in the public market lower than what your client was paying and it made sense to refinance, you would get a notification about a refinance opportunity.The negative to it was with Sora in general, the main complaint is, is that once there was an opportunity to refinance, you still had to go find a lender or go to a bank or go find that rate that it told you was available.Okay.So it didn't actually provide you with the loan.It didn't connect the dots.Didn't connect the dots, but now that they've been acquired by a lending company, it does connect the dots.I haven't done this yet, but it's a, it's a new thing that I actually haven't seen done well before because historically speaking, and, you know, I, I love, like, a lot of the independent mortgage brokers we work with.Historically speaking, we source it out, but- Yeah, I mean, you've, if you've been the right person in the right place, you've been able to get favorable rates based on just, you know, deposits at the bank or just the size of your portfolio.Like, it's, the rates that are out there for the average person do have a lot of those markups that you're talking about.Totally.And I think this is, back to our point earlier in the conversation, an example of how AI aids the consumer.Mm-hmm.Right?I think that this is automating in a way that would've made it harder to do at scale profitably, and that's why now we're able to do this at scale at a healthier margin.You can have a company like this exist, which is great, and this could continue to benefit the consumer in the long run.Yeah.I 100% agree because I go back, I mean, we've seen this happen with a bunch of clients and just banks in general.If you have large deposits or large investment accounts at a major bank and you're thinking about leaving, they'll often, like, throw you a teaser rate- Sureon a mortgage or a home equity line of credit to try to keep you there.Yeah.What's funny about that is we've had several clients take the teaser rate and then leave anyway.But they do, you know- But yeahbanks make a lot of money on deposits.Right?No, on deposits.So, like, they can, they can afford to pay you- Oh, sure.Yeah, yeah, yeahyou know, give you this loan at a better rate because you have X number of dollars invested at the bank that they are taking.Mm-hmm.They're not just leaving it in a box for you.Yeah.Right?They're investing that and getting the difference, the spread for themselves.And why not have something like this that's, you know, aiding the consumer?Because it's not about the interest rate.Those banks, these are the, they're large institutions that this company is connecting with, right?It's like who are the, the lenders.Citibank, you've got Bank of America- Right, the larger-and a bunch of othersthe larger lenders- Yeah, yeah, yeahthat are not, like, just- mortgage companies, they're banks Yeah.And to your point too, like a lot of these banks are making spreads on interest rates- Yeahon the deposits.Yeah.So, like, let's just say they offer you a money market account at 3.2%, you know, they're probably going and buying treasuries at, you know, whatever the percentage is at the time, and they're keeping that delta for their own pocket.And it's big money if you think about it.I was just Googling this, Gemining it.And Fidelity is a perfect example, has 18 trillion in total assets under management, and 7.1 trillion in managed assets in general.But right now, currently, just in the 3 biggest money market accounts that they have, which is SPAXX, FDRXX, and then the Fidelity Money Market Fund premium class, which is FZDXS, they hold roughly right now s- $840 1000000000.Yeah.Just- And that's not even including F-Cash.That's not even including F-Cash.Yeah.So just in those 3 money markets, they're almost at a trillion bucks.Yeah.Money to be made, Colin.There is, yeah.I think it's great.Look, itthe winners are gonna win, and oftentimes it's the size and scale that allows them to do that.If you have opportunities as one of the smaller players to find a win in a way that is lower risk than a 3X leveraged SpaceX ETF, then I'm all for it.I agree.Yeah.It's, it's all about the little wins that add up in consistency.Okay.Anything else?No.All right, like, subscribe.Share with a friend.Share with a friend.Thanks everybody.All right.Thanks Wheeler.The information in this material is for general information only, and is not intended to provide specific advice or recommendations for any individual.Investment advice offered through Integrated Partners doing business as CoFi Advisors LLC, a registered investment advisor.Integrated Partners does not provide legal, tax, mortgage advice or services.Please consult your legal tax advisor regarding your specific situation.Past performance is no guarantee f- of future results.All investing involves risk, including loss of principal.No strategy assures success or protects against loss.The economic forecast set forth in this material may not develop as predicted, and there can be no guarantee that the strategies promoted will be successful.Compound growth with Wheeler and Colin.Sponsored byCoFi Advisors.Reach out today.Yay.