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Speaker 1: The following interview with former TD Amerit Trade CEO Joe

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Speaker 1: Ricketts was conducted prior to news that Charles Schwab has

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Speaker 1: agreed to buy t D a Merry Trade. This is

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Speaker 1: Masters in Business with Barry Ridholts on Boomberg Radio. This

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Speaker 1: week on the podcast, I have an extra special guest.

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Speaker 1: His name is Joe Ricketts. He is the founder of

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Speaker 1: t D Amerit Trade at one point three trillion dollar

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Speaker 1: custodian uh. Ricketts is an entrepreneur who has built a

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Speaker 1: business over the course of fifty years and is extremely

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Speaker 1: knowledgeable about what it's like to go through all the

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Speaker 1: growing pains. Ultimately, he the company goes public in ninety

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Speaker 1: seven and has been wildly successful. About a decade ago,

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Speaker 1: Ricketts and his family purchased the Chicago Cubs. We talked

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Speaker 1: about that. We talk about politics, We talk about policy.

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Speaker 1: We talked about all sorts of really really interesting things.

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Speaker 1: If you are at all intis did in go down

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Speaker 1: the list? Online trading, entrepreneurship, building a business, taking chances,

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Speaker 1: embracing risk. I could go on and on, but rather

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Speaker 1: than me, Babel, why don't I just say my conversation

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Speaker 1: with Joe Ricketts this is Masters in Business with Barry

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Speaker 1: Ridholts on Bloomberg Radio. My special guest this week is

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Speaker 1: Joe Ricketts. He is the founder and former CEO of

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Speaker 1: TD Ameritrade, one of the largest retail custodians in America,

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Speaker 1: man with what is it about one point three trillion

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Speaker 1: in assets under custodian ship. He bought the Chicago Cubs

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Speaker 1: in two thousand and nine, and a few years later

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Speaker 1: the team won their first World Series in a hundred

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Speaker 1: and eight years. Joe Ricketts, Welcome to Bloomberg. Thanks very,

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Speaker 1: It's fun to be here. So I was looking forward

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Speaker 1: to having this conversation for a number of reasons. But

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Speaker 1: let's go back to the beginning and start with your

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Speaker 1: career year. You were a credit reporter at Dunnan brad Street.

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Speaker 1: That seems so out of character to everything I know

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Speaker 1: about you. Well, it was critically important to the decisions

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Speaker 1: that governed my direction in life. Um, I really didn't

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Speaker 1: know what I wanted to do for a living, and

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Speaker 1: I had already started a family, so I had to

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Speaker 1: come up with some direction pretty quickly. The time was

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Speaker 1: going by and I you were in college when you

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Speaker 1: already had your first couple of kids, and it's like, yeah,

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Speaker 1: I bet it's not making some money, that's right. And uh,

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Speaker 1: So I took this job with Dunner brad Street where

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Speaker 1: I went out to all the small towns in southeast

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Speaker 1: Nebraska and southwest Iowa to call on the business. So

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Speaker 1: I drive into town and I just go one business

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Speaker 1: after another with the credit report that I had from

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Speaker 1: the previous year and talked to them about updating it.

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Speaker 1: And I got to meet a lot of interesting people,

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Speaker 1: and I got to meet a lot of people that

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Speaker 1: were really making our country go. And the thing that

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Speaker 1: stunned me, or really kind of light that went off

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Speaker 1: when I was in college, I had a professor of

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Speaker 1: social sciences tell us we were such a great country

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Speaker 1: because of our natural resources. And after I got out

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Speaker 1: and into the business world calling on these merchants, I

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Speaker 1: understood the wealth of this country came out of the

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Speaker 1: brains of these people. They took money out of their

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Speaker 1: own pocket, ideas out of their own heads, and they

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Speaker 1: started a business of shoe store or pharmacy or whatever,

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Speaker 1: and they hired people, and they had to satisfy their customers,

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Speaker 1: and so working to satisfy your customer at the same time,

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Speaker 1: being able to create wealth was a wonderful idea for me.

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Speaker 1: So I said, that's what I want to do. I

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Speaker 1: want to have my own business. So you go from

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Speaker 1: Dunham Bradstreet to Dean Winter as a stockbroker in and

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Speaker 1: then the ideas start to just date in your in

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Speaker 1: your head. How did Dean Winter lead to first Omaha

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Speaker 1: in ninety seven years later? Well, Dean Winter was a

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Speaker 1: commission job. All the brokers really in the country worked

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Speaker 1: on commissions and I didn't have any capital to start

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Speaker 1: my own business. So this was as close having my

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Speaker 1: own business as I could get. And we just happened

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Speaker 1: to become registered. I say we my the other guys

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Speaker 1: in the training class at a time when a market

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Speaker 1: was at the top and it went down for the

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Speaker 1: next five years, which was a big surprise because it

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Speaker 1: hadn't done that for a long long time. The DW.

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Speaker 1: Kisses a thousand by down correct And so how did

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Speaker 1: that impact you as a as a broker? It was

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Speaker 1: very difficult to make a living as a broker. We

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Speaker 1: had to work very hard all the time. But we

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Speaker 1: were building a client book that would help us in

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Speaker 1: the future. Just about the time when we thought that

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Speaker 1: client book was going to help us make the type

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Speaker 1: of income that we wanted. The idea of negotiated commissions

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Speaker 1: came into the marketplace the big boom. So the restrictions,

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Speaker 1: the regulations go away, are d deregulated, and you could

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Speaker 1: pretty much charge much, much less than before. So I

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Speaker 1: realized if I called my customer and talked to him

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Speaker 1: about a good idea to invest in, the second conversation

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Speaker 1: was how much are you going to charge? And how

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Speaker 1: little do they want to pay? So we were gonna

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Speaker 1: so it appeared though, as though we were going to

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Speaker 1: have to have twice as much in the way of

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Speaker 1: a client book and worked twice as hard just to

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Speaker 1: be able to make the same living. So my friend,

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Speaker 1: the guy that became a partner with me, Bob Perlman,

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Speaker 1: and I talked about why don't we join him. I

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Speaker 1: gotta tell you, Barry, we had no idea how to

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Speaker 1: start a brokerage firm. We really, we didn't have any

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Speaker 1: idea whatsoever, except there were two ideas that that floated

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Speaker 1: through our minds. Number one was we thought there was

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Speaker 1: a large enough more market of people that wanted to

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Speaker 1: buy or sell a stock without any other conversation. They

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Speaker 1: just wanted to We don't want your recommendation. We don't

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Speaker 1: care what your your best of list is. Just execute

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Speaker 1: the trade as cheaply as possible. That's correct. And there

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Speaker 1: was a market, we didn't know how big, but we

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Speaker 1: thought there was. And and the cost of of trading

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Speaker 1: pre deregulation was a couple hundred bucks. A couple hundred

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Speaker 1: bucks versus twenty five that's really huge, traumatic traumatic. The

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Speaker 1: other idea that was important and that proved to be correct,

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Speaker 1: was that after the Second World War we had the

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Speaker 1: g I Bill and a lot of men and women

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Speaker 1: came back from the war used the g I bi

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Speaker 1: able to become engineers, pharmacists, And these people were educated

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Speaker 1: well enough to be able to do their own financial

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Speaker 1: planning and be able to make their own decisions, and

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Speaker 1: they were making a nice enough living that there's a

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Speaker 1: little investable cash on this correct. So the market turned

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Speaker 1: out to be quite huge. We we just had to

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Speaker 1: find a way to advertise into that market so that

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Speaker 1: we could tell them succinctly what we were doing and

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Speaker 1: make them want to respond to us. So how did

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Speaker 1: first Omaha become eventually a merror trade and then Tedium

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Speaker 1: mer Trade. We UH. It's really a long story, but

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Speaker 1: we thought we would be a local business, and we

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Speaker 1: found out that we could not exist as a local business.

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Speaker 1: So we advertised in the Midwest edition of the Wall

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Speaker 1: Street Journal. There was a favorite spot on the inside

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Speaker 1: of the back page in those times where all the

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Speaker 1: discount brokers advertising, so we advertised in UH that paper

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Speaker 1: with an eight hundred number. Now, something that was unique

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Speaker 1: to us was that Omaha was the location of Strategic

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Speaker 1: Care Command. The federal government, the Air Force pay Northwestern

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Speaker 1: Bill Telephone Company to put in a sophisticated communications system

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Speaker 1: in case there was a hot war. Well obviously there wasn't,

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Speaker 1: so this communication system was not used. So the phone

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Speaker 1: company dropped their rates on what was then a brand

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Speaker 1: new idea eight hundred telephone numbers where the caller did

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Speaker 1: not pay for the telephone call. And so our telephone

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Speaker 1: rates for UH interstate calls long distance calls were anywhere

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Speaker 1: from ten to lower than if we'd been in any

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Speaker 1: other location in the country, and that was one of

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Speaker 1: our major costs. So that that gave us a cost

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Speaker 1: benefit we didn't see when we started as first Omaha,

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Speaker 1: but then we did see after we started advertising in

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Speaker 1: the Midwest edition of the paper. Uh, that was so successful,

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Speaker 1: we went to the national edition and we attracted customers

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Speaker 1: from all over, So then we really kind of changed

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Speaker 1: the name to First National. So so you're marketing to

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Speaker 1: the entire world, or at least the entire country. Where

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Speaker 1: you're located is irrelevant as long as it's nationwide and

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Speaker 1: you're lookating in a place that made your cost structure

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Speaker 1: cheaper than competitors. That was very fortuitous, that is correct,

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Speaker 1: And the problem that we had to overcome was that

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Speaker 1: people were not used to dealing with a broker that

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Speaker 1: they couldn't see touch and field. So they're used walking

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Speaker 1: into an office and meeting a person. So they had

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Speaker 1: to become comfortable with the systems that they were using

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Speaker 1: in order for them to um really do a lot

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Speaker 1: of business with it. So they would generally start out

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Speaker 1: slowly with small trades and then they become to rely

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Speaker 1: on us, and that we got all our business. And

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Speaker 1: you were one of the first that started to allow

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Speaker 1: people to enter the touch tone keys to execute trades.

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Speaker 1: It might do if you allow me to say so,

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Speaker 1: very we were the first, very first were so you

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Speaker 1: could I could call all up First National and punching

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Speaker 1: the stock symbol and punching how many shares and the

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Speaker 1: trade would go off automatically. That's correct. That that sounds

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Speaker 1: pretty innovative. It was very innovative. And Uh, I went

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Speaker 1: out to my customer base to form customer focus groups

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Speaker 1: to ask them how they would enjoy this, and my

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Speaker 1: answer was emphatically no. Really why the customer said, would

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Speaker 1: I use a system based on the TOUCHTNE telephone when

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Speaker 1: I can talk to a broker? And Uh, the answer

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Speaker 1: is because it's cheaper. Well, they didn't want to use

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Speaker 1: the surface, so I said, I have to make it

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Speaker 1: cheaper to attract their attention and I and so I

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Speaker 1: came out with a unique um way of charging for

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Speaker 1: a customer that threepennies to share. And so that was

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Speaker 1: something that got through immediately, and so people would take

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Speaker 1: the five minutes it took to learn how to use

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Speaker 1: the system. Then what I found out was some people

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Speaker 1: placed their trades so fast it would be impossible to

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Speaker 1: move your finger that fast. So I called him up

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Speaker 1: and I said, what are you doing and he said, well,

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Speaker 1: we are using a computer to program the touch tone

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Speaker 1: system with the telephone number and with all the information

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Speaker 1: of a trade. So we're sitting at home watching television

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Speaker 1: and seeing the tape, and when the stock price gets

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Speaker 1: close to what we want, we pressed one button. It

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Speaker 1: goes zip. Oh that's unique. The people loved the power

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Speaker 1: of taking care of themselves. They didn't want a broker

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Speaker 1: once they used the system. They wanted the power of

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Speaker 1: taking everything onto themselves. And really they be the professionals

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Speaker 1: that would call the shots. And so now let's fast

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Speaker 1: forward to a Merritt Trade becomes the first online brokerage.

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Speaker 1: What was that like? Did you have any idea that

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Speaker 1: this new fangled online thing would replace the whole telephone

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Speaker 1: side of things? Because of the story that I just

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Speaker 1: told you, I knew exactly the first time that we

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Speaker 1: got an order, UM, one of our clerks brought us

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Speaker 1: a printed email message which had by three hundred shares

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Speaker 1: of a blue chip stock at the market, and they said,

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Speaker 1: and of course we had their customer's account number and

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Speaker 1: phone number. And the question to me was should we

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Speaker 1: go ahead and place this because we didn't talk to

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Speaker 1: the customer. I have the touchdown, and I said, yeah,

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Speaker 1: go ahead, we'll see what happened. So we we executed

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Speaker 1: that order and went back to the customer by email

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Speaker 1: to report the trade. No voice communications, So it was very,

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Speaker 1: very similar to the touchdown aspect of it. And I said,

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Speaker 1: this is even better because they get a confirm with

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Speaker 1: the price, the date, everything, they can print it out,

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Speaker 1: and because it is on a PC, we can deliver

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Speaker 1: more information, we can deliver our own tape, we can

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Speaker 1: deliver research. And I said, this is going to be

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Speaker 1: much more powerful than the touchdown telephone. Everyone was, that's

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Speaker 1: quite fascinating. Let's talk a little bit about the growth

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Speaker 1: of UM of t D first. This whole time, when

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Speaker 1: you go from phone calls to TOUCHDOWNE to UH to

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Speaker 1: online trading, you're competing with Charles Schwab, which was one

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Speaker 1: of the biggest UM discount brokers at the time. What

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Speaker 1: was that like. Did you end up ever having any

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Speaker 1: sort of relationship with them? Well, him, Zuck Schwab as

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Speaker 1: a friend of mine today, but at the time we

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Speaker 1: were we were competitors. He had the advantage of having

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Speaker 1: California as his customer base, and I think at the

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Speaker 1: time that was the night California by itself was the

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Speaker 1: ninth largest economy in the world. UH in Nebraska, we

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Speaker 1: had about a million and a half people, I mean

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Speaker 1: a huge, huge difference. So I had to go national,

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Speaker 1: whereas he could really start a local I heard about.

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Speaker 1: Although we started in ve I first heard about this

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Speaker 1: West Coast discount broker called Schwab in v seven, So

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Speaker 1: he started, you know, after we got started, but I

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Speaker 1: really didn't know he existed. The ones I did know

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Speaker 1: existed advertised on the inside page of the Wall Street Journal,

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Speaker 1: and they were from New York, and then one was

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Speaker 1: from Chicago. So there was only a couple of people

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Speaker 1: in the business when we got started. Now a couple

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Speaker 1: of years later, very a few years later, we had

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Speaker 1: four competitors. Everybody thought this was simple and easy. It's not.

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Speaker 1: And of course everybody found out that it's not simple

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Speaker 1: and easy, and so competition effort a period of time

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Speaker 1: allowed us and others to buy out our competitors. So today,

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Speaker 1: you know, there's really only three or four brokerage in

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Speaker 1: this Lots of consolidation and that was a lot of

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Speaker 1: fun to go through that. In that consolidation phase, we

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Speaker 1: ran across the company in Manhattan called Offhauser. The I

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Speaker 1: really described in a lot of detail in the book

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Speaker 1: that that was really attractive, and they were advertising doing

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Speaker 1: trades online. Nobody had ever heard of online, nobody knew

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Speaker 1: the internet, nobody knew what this was all about. This

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Speaker 1: is around what year? This is uh, you know seven? Okay,

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Speaker 1: so still a o L is around. But the Internet

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Speaker 1: isn't the Internet yet. Yeah, that's correct. It hadn't evolved

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Speaker 1: to the point where we are today. So um. We

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Speaker 1: talked to them about selling, and he gave us a price,

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Speaker 1: which at the time I thought was incredibly high, and

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Speaker 1: but I brought myself to really say, Okay, I'll pay

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Speaker 1: it just so I could understand the technology. So you

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Speaker 1: acquired them, and what's what's an incredibly high price? Seven

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Speaker 1: and a half million dollars sounds I bet that it

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Speaker 1: turns out to be a fantastic r o y thirty

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Speaker 1: years later, within two years. Incredible. We we really didn't

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Speaker 1: have any understanding. But within a very short period of time,

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Speaker 1: the off Houser folks realized that they had put the

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Speaker 1: price too low, and I had paid a bargain basement price.

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Speaker 1: But the whole industry made fun of us on the

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Speaker 1: day of the trade because they said we were stupid,

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Speaker 1: and that was way too high, as six months later

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Speaker 1: they got it and they understood what happened. So we

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Speaker 1: put the economies of scale in place to be able

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Speaker 1: to increase our profits dramatically. Turned out to be a

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Speaker 1: wonderful thing for us to do. We found out that

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Speaker 1: the technology that off Houser had really wasn't what I

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Speaker 1: understood them to have, and it was more like smoking mirrors.

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Speaker 1: So the customer could use their computer at home to

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Speaker 1: send the trade, but then it printed out at off

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Speaker 1: Houser and they had to have a clerk tear it

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Speaker 1: off and put it back in to go the exchange.

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Speaker 1: It didn't so they didn't have we call those APIs today.

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Speaker 1: There was no application program interface that would automate that,

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Speaker 1: so we had to build all of that, which is

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Speaker 1: good because we learned the hard way, made a lot

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Speaker 1: of mistakes, a lot of software didn't work. Throw it away,

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Speaker 1: you start all over and do it again. But by

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Speaker 1: the time we got all done, a customer could sit

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Speaker 1: at home, on their keypad of their own computer, place

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Speaker 1: a trade and get a report within seconds. So full

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Speaker 1: online trading for real full online trading, and then the

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Speaker 1: exchanges and the over the counter market developed systems of

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Speaker 1: receiving those orders electronically, automatically executing them and reporting back.

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Speaker 1: So it turned out over a period of time and

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Speaker 1: huge investments on the part of everybody in the industry

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Speaker 1: to bring this type of service to the customer, which

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Speaker 1: is absolutely wonderful. So you guys were cutting edge with TOUCHDOWNE,

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Speaker 1: you're cutting edge with online. You very aggressively roll out

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Speaker 1: um a pretty big advertising campaign. What was that like

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Speaker 1: and what were the results? Well, when we started, it

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Speaker 1: was really kind of anxious. It was unsettling until we

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Speaker 1: until we really did it. I was going to take

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Speaker 1: our advertising budget I think from million dollars a year

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Speaker 1: up to a hundred million dollars and by the way,

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Speaker 1: million dollars for relatively small company way back when that's

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Speaker 1: a big chunk of change. It was a big chunk

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Speaker 1: of change. So we attracted advertising firms that were the

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Speaker 1: top advertising firms in the country. So to the size

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Speaker 1: of the million dollar Yeah, that's correct, and I think

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Speaker 1: there was seven or nine of them. Um and UM.

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Speaker 1: I said, I've got to cut through the crowd, guys,

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Speaker 1: We've got to do something new and different. And it

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Speaker 1: seems to me humor is the way to go, and

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Speaker 1: they said, no, that's wrong. People don't think of their

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Speaker 1: money is funny. It's not light at all, and you're

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Speaker 1: just not going to be successful. So they all gave

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Speaker 1: me ads that were dull and boring, just like a bank,

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Speaker 1: and except Ogilvy, Ogilvy. Ogilvy dared to come up with

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Speaker 1: something new and different. And it was a person on

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Speaker 1: the street that said they bought a particular stock, like

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Speaker 1: General Motors for bucks well, General Motors selling for fifty,

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Speaker 1: so that there was the play on the commission as

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Speaker 1: well as on the stock. And then they giggled. They

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Speaker 1: were so happy that they would be able to buy

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Speaker 1: a stock at such a low price. That those ads

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Speaker 1: really set us off in a different direction. But the

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Speaker 1: ad that really made us was an ad with an

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Speaker 1: office boy. His actor name is Michael Maron. If I

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Speaker 1: remember back then, and uh, he instructs his boss on

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Speaker 1: how to place the trade online. I have a very

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Speaker 1: vivid recollection of that add. It stayed with me. It's

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Speaker 1: twenty years ago. There was more. Oh yeah, it's iconic.

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Speaker 1: And he took that ad took over the whole industry.

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Speaker 1: And he made a comment in that ad, let's light

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Speaker 1: this candle and that became a standard quotation in the

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Speaker 1: in the securities industry. But that got us a lot

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Speaker 1: of attention. So using humor to get across the idea

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Speaker 1: that we had a low cost with good executions was

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Speaker 1: something that really permeated the market and really made us grow.

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Speaker 1: Any other ads from that era, this is pre two

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Speaker 1: thousand dot com era, anything else really stand out from you?

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Speaker 1: Those were the two we We did a number of

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Speaker 1: other commercials that had humor in them, playing off of

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Speaker 1: certain things in the culture, but those were the two

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Speaker 1: that were the biggest and the best. Let's light this

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Speaker 1: candle I have, I'll find it on YouTube and posted

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Speaker 1: it you can you can see it on my website.

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Speaker 1: The harder you dot work? Okay, we will definitely uh

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Speaker 1: reference that. Um So, the company goes public in was

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Speaker 1: this pre or post t D acquisition? This was pre so? So?

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Speaker 1: What was the what was the process of I p oing? Like? Well,

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00:20:51,680 --> 00:20:58,719
Speaker 1: it was good and bad, okay. I My dream was

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Speaker 1: to build a business that my children could take over

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Speaker 1: and continue to build, assuming they were interested in online brokerage. Correct,

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Speaker 1: And we had my wife and I had four kids.

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Speaker 1: I thought, you know, one of them is probably gonna

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Speaker 1: want to do this, So that was the dream that

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Speaker 1: I had. But if we went public, that changes. You're

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Speaker 1: you're no longer a private company or a public company,

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Speaker 1: and you're the dynamics of who's going to run it,

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00:21:24,040 --> 00:21:29,400
Speaker 1: and all that changes. But I realized that online trading

365
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Speaker 1: was an inflection point in the history of not only

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Speaker 1: the brokerage business, but in the history of investing for

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Speaker 1: all time. And if I was going to take advantage

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Speaker 1: of it, I was going to have to move and

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Speaker 1: I and I wasn't. Although we were making a large

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Speaker 1: amount of profits, not enough for me to build the

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Speaker 1: technology and advertise. So that's when I said, I have

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Speaker 1: to spend a hundred million on advertising and a hundred

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Speaker 1: million on technology. And those were guesses, but Verry, they

374
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Speaker 1: turned out to be low. Let's talk about that tech

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Speaker 1: analogy a bit, because you describe in the book, Um,

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Speaker 1: you describe just a never ending series of challenges in

377
00:22:09,359 --> 00:22:14,600
Speaker 1: snaff foods and issues. Technology was simultaneously your your friend

378
00:22:14,800 --> 00:22:18,639
Speaker 1: but also, um, I want to call it your enemy.

379
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Speaker 1: But it seemed like you were constantly having to find

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Speaker 1: new ways to work with the technology where it wasn't

381
00:22:25,040 --> 00:22:28,400
Speaker 1: biting you in the backside. That is correct the whole time.

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00:22:28,440 --> 00:22:30,280
Speaker 1: It took a long time for us really come to

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Speaker 1: the conclusion about what we had to do. But let

384
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Speaker 1: me describe what it was like. When we started in,

385
00:22:36,520 --> 00:22:39,760
Speaker 1: we placed and we wrote an order on ticket. Our

386
00:22:40,280 --> 00:22:42,879
Speaker 1: office lady called in the trade to the exchange. We

387
00:22:42,920 --> 00:22:45,239
Speaker 1: got the report back on the ticket, and then she

388
00:22:45,280 --> 00:22:48,600
Speaker 1: would take that copy of the order ticket and write

389
00:22:48,600 --> 00:22:50,919
Speaker 1: it down in a ledger all the trades that we

390
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Speaker 1: did that day, and then she would write it down

391
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Speaker 1: on another piece of paper cardboard for that customer. And

392
00:22:58,119 --> 00:23:01,960
Speaker 1: they were setting a ban. This is like Christmas carols,

393
00:23:02,040 --> 00:23:05,399
Speaker 1: like Charles Dickens. So so one went into the You

394
00:23:05,440 --> 00:23:08,639
Speaker 1: have two bins. One goes into the company ben and

395
00:23:08,680 --> 00:23:11,159
Speaker 1: the other goes into the customer bins, so everybody you

396
00:23:11,240 --> 00:23:14,440
Speaker 1: have duplicates, and everybody well, once our customer files ones

397
00:23:14,480 --> 00:23:16,280
Speaker 1: our company files, and then we at the end of

398
00:23:16,280 --> 00:23:19,439
Speaker 1: the month, we'd have to type out the confirmations and

399
00:23:19,480 --> 00:23:22,119
Speaker 1: the month in statements and send out to customers and

400
00:23:22,160 --> 00:23:26,040
Speaker 1: hopefully everything reconciled. That's correct. And we found out right

401
00:23:26,119 --> 00:23:28,200
Speaker 1: quick if we were going to do very many trades,

402
00:23:28,280 --> 00:23:30,400
Speaker 1: we couldn't do that anymore. So we had to really

403
00:23:30,440 --> 00:23:34,080
Speaker 1: get into the computers. The first computer system that we got,

404
00:23:34,600 --> 00:23:37,240
Speaker 1: uh didn't work very well and and pretty soon our

405
00:23:37,320 --> 00:23:39,399
Speaker 1: volume really didn't allow us to use it. So we

406
00:23:39,440 --> 00:23:41,879
Speaker 1: had to think about getting our own computer. So I

407
00:23:41,960 --> 00:23:43,800
Speaker 1: was one of those people that thought, well, we'll get

408
00:23:43,800 --> 00:23:48,240
Speaker 1: our computer and we'll be okay, Well, it'll last us forever. Uh.

409
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Speaker 1: Somebody said, well you need software, and I'd say, what's software.

410
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Speaker 1: So once we understood what we had to do, David

411
00:23:55,960 --> 00:23:58,840
Speaker 1: Kellogg was a genius that that put it all together

412
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Speaker 1: for us. We fund out pretty soon that we outgrew

413
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Speaker 1: that although we spent you know, a couple of million

414
00:24:04,200 --> 00:24:07,920
Speaker 1: dollars huge budget for us at the time, we had

415
00:24:07,960 --> 00:24:10,120
Speaker 1: to do something new and different. All the way along,

416
00:24:10,640 --> 00:24:14,840
Speaker 1: we discovered there's really three pieces of technology that we

417
00:24:14,880 --> 00:24:16,879
Speaker 1: had to have built in order to make the system

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Speaker 1: work when we got to the middle nineteen nineties. The

419
00:24:20,960 --> 00:24:24,400
Speaker 1: first was our account base and keeping records of all

420
00:24:24,400 --> 00:24:29,160
Speaker 1: the trades in our customer accounts. The second was how

421
00:24:29,200 --> 00:24:33,160
Speaker 1: the customer places their trade from their computer to our system.

422
00:24:33,240 --> 00:24:35,080
Speaker 1: And then we had to have a piece of middleware

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00:24:35,240 --> 00:24:37,879
Speaker 1: which would take that trade, send it to the market,

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00:24:38,000 --> 00:24:40,520
Speaker 1: come back and put on our customer account. All that

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00:24:40,640 --> 00:24:43,080
Speaker 1: software had never been built before, so you guys had

426
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Speaker 1: to design that from scratch. We had to design that

427
00:24:45,240 --> 00:24:49,440
Speaker 1: from scratch, and that's before we started talking about UM account,

428
00:24:49,760 --> 00:24:56,680
Speaker 1: performance reporting and billing and reconciliation. That's a giant, gilliant project.

429
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Speaker 1: That's a giant project. And so this was there wasn't

430
00:24:59,880 --> 00:25:02,800
Speaker 1: a off the shelf software. You guys were the first

431
00:25:02,800 --> 00:25:05,240
Speaker 1: ones pushing this phone. There was nothing you could buy.

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Speaker 1: Nobody would tell you know what he would teach you.

433
00:25:07,240 --> 00:25:09,119
Speaker 1: We had to learn everything the hard way, which meant

434
00:25:10,000 --> 00:25:12,159
Speaker 1: we threw a lot away. We threw away a lot

435
00:25:12,160 --> 00:25:14,800
Speaker 1: of software because we built it and the guys running

436
00:25:15,000 --> 00:25:20,320
Speaker 1: the software building teams really didn't understand exactly what we wanted.

437
00:25:20,359 --> 00:25:22,320
Speaker 1: We tried to tell them as best we could, so

438
00:25:22,400 --> 00:25:24,040
Speaker 1: they did it and we found, well that doesn't work.

439
00:25:24,200 --> 00:25:26,639
Speaker 1: Here's what you have to change. So it was a

440
00:25:26,680 --> 00:25:29,480
Speaker 1: trial in thereror method. But at the same time that

441
00:25:29,600 --> 00:25:36,120
Speaker 1: it was awfully high in anxiety. It was exhilarating because

442
00:25:36,640 --> 00:25:39,920
Speaker 1: it was, you know, just like you, you were conquering

443
00:25:39,920 --> 00:25:42,000
Speaker 1: a new world, and so was a lot of fun

444
00:25:42,040 --> 00:25:44,679
Speaker 1: from that point of view. But the the the anxiety

445
00:25:44,720 --> 00:25:46,680
Speaker 1: came from you just really didn't know what your costs

446
00:25:46,680 --> 00:25:49,399
Speaker 1: were going to be. So we finally got to the

447
00:25:49,440 --> 00:25:51,080
Speaker 1: point where we knew what our costs were going to

448
00:25:51,160 --> 00:25:55,320
Speaker 1: be and it was much more of a easier management job.

449
00:25:55,640 --> 00:25:58,879
Speaker 1: So when did the TD acquisition take place? Well, we

450
00:25:58,920 --> 00:26:05,720
Speaker 1: went public and uh, that was yes. And what we

451
00:26:05,760 --> 00:26:08,120
Speaker 1: had done before and after we were public was by

452
00:26:08,119 --> 00:26:10,600
Speaker 1: other small companies, by a lot of our competitors who

453
00:26:10,640 --> 00:26:13,640
Speaker 1: could not afford and did not know how to put

454
00:26:13,680 --> 00:26:16,920
Speaker 1: in their own clearing operation and their own data processing systems.

455
00:26:18,560 --> 00:26:24,480
Speaker 1: And um Waterhouse was in Manhattan and was a big competitor,

456
00:26:25,080 --> 00:26:28,320
Speaker 1: and we had talked to them about merging or buying them. Uh,

457
00:26:28,480 --> 00:26:32,600
Speaker 1: those talks did not turn out to result in anything happening.

458
00:26:32,880 --> 00:26:36,840
Speaker 1: But what did happen with Waterhouse is Toronto. Dominion Bank

459
00:26:36,920 --> 00:26:43,159
Speaker 1: in Canada bought Waterhouse Securities and as the business continued

460
00:26:43,320 --> 00:26:48,800
Speaker 1: to grow in market size with everybody having more accounts,

461
00:26:49,240 --> 00:26:52,080
Speaker 1: we came to understand that size made a difference and

462
00:26:52,160 --> 00:26:57,199
Speaker 1: so if we could merge or buy a competitor, the

463
00:26:57,200 --> 00:27:00,280
Speaker 1: better off we were. And Waterhouse was one of those

464
00:27:00,280 --> 00:27:04,760
Speaker 1: people that fit into one of our targets. Now it

465
00:27:04,920 --> 00:27:07,080
Speaker 1: was a big change for us because it would now

466
00:27:07,119 --> 00:27:12,200
Speaker 1: take the Ricketts family from owning more than toning less

467
00:27:12,200 --> 00:27:16,080
Speaker 1: than But it was one of those things where we

468
00:27:16,119 --> 00:27:19,560
Speaker 1: didn't have time to accumulate the cache flow to buy

469
00:27:19,680 --> 00:27:22,399
Speaker 1: the accounts through advertising. We had to get them all

470
00:27:22,400 --> 00:27:26,879
Speaker 1: at once. So we merged with the brokerage firm Waterhouse,

471
00:27:28,000 --> 00:27:31,160
Speaker 1: which came with the ownership of Toronto Dominion. So now

472
00:27:31,240 --> 00:27:35,040
Speaker 1: Toronto Dominion Canadian Bank became the largest shareholder of a

473
00:27:35,119 --> 00:27:38,240
Speaker 1: merrit Trade, So that was really a merger, not a

474
00:27:38,400 --> 00:27:42,159
Speaker 1: straight up acquisition, and they became the biggest shareholder of

475
00:27:42,320 --> 00:27:46,680
Speaker 1: Correct Merrior Trade. But now you're a smaller owner, but

476
00:27:46,840 --> 00:27:50,000
Speaker 1: of a much much bigger pie. That's right. So I

477
00:27:50,040 --> 00:27:54,520
Speaker 1: had many more dollars but less ownership. So that's late nineties.

478
00:27:54,920 --> 00:27:58,200
Speaker 1: Now you're running one of the larger online brokerage firms.

479
00:27:58,680 --> 00:28:02,119
Speaker 1: What was the experience of the dot com implosion in

480
00:28:02,240 --> 00:28:09,960
Speaker 1: two thousands, um our volume remained relatively steady. So with

481
00:28:10,200 --> 00:28:14,440
Speaker 1: the technology that we had put in place, we had

482
00:28:14,480 --> 00:28:17,000
Speaker 1: gotten to the point where our volume could come down,

483
00:28:17,000 --> 00:28:19,040
Speaker 1: our revenues could come down, and we can still make

484
00:28:19,080 --> 00:28:21,719
Speaker 1: a profit because you continue to reduce your costs by

485
00:28:21,760 --> 00:28:25,240
Speaker 1: adding more and more technology. Correct you describe in the book,

486
00:28:25,440 --> 00:28:29,080
Speaker 1: some of the really hilarious. I mean it's hilarious in hindsight.

487
00:28:29,480 --> 00:28:33,000
Speaker 1: But in the book, you describe all these bugs and

488
00:28:33,040 --> 00:28:36,280
Speaker 1: snaffoos and issues that keep coming up as you roll

489
00:28:36,320 --> 00:28:39,800
Speaker 1: out more and more technology, and you're the guy who's saying, no, no,

490
00:28:39,840 --> 00:28:42,080
Speaker 1: we need more. We have to get our costs down

491
00:28:42,440 --> 00:28:46,640
Speaker 1: otherwise we're vulnerable to to other discounts from from elsewhere.

492
00:28:47,080 --> 00:28:48,920
Speaker 1: It was either take the risk and try to do that,

493
00:28:49,200 --> 00:28:52,520
Speaker 1: or before you ruin the company. So we took the

494
00:28:52,600 --> 00:28:55,240
Speaker 1: risk and we did it and uh, knock on what

495
00:28:55,560 --> 00:29:00,640
Speaker 1: it all worked and made us thrive. Uh, let's talk

496
00:29:00,680 --> 00:29:04,880
Speaker 1: a little bit about this book. You own the cubs.

497
00:29:05,280 --> 00:29:08,440
Speaker 1: You're successful businessman. You don't need the headache of writing

498
00:29:08,440 --> 00:29:11,640
Speaker 1: a book. Why bother sit down and put all the

499
00:29:11,680 --> 00:29:13,680
Speaker 1: time and effort into writing a book. There's a couple

500
00:29:13,760 --> 00:29:16,720
Speaker 1: of reasons. First of all, I'm concerned that the number

501
00:29:16,960 --> 00:29:20,360
Speaker 1: of new businesses getting started is too low relative to

502
00:29:20,360 --> 00:29:24,080
Speaker 1: our total economy. So I wanted to encourage entrepreneurs to

503
00:29:24,120 --> 00:29:26,840
Speaker 1: go ahead and start their business, and even though they

504
00:29:26,840 --> 00:29:29,680
Speaker 1: didn't know all the answers which I point out in

505
00:29:29,680 --> 00:29:33,440
Speaker 1: a book, and to let them know it's okay. To

506
00:29:33,520 --> 00:29:35,880
Speaker 1: make a mistake. It's good to make a mistake because

507
00:29:35,920 --> 00:29:39,160
Speaker 1: you learn from that mistake and you won't repeat it.

508
00:29:39,760 --> 00:29:43,080
Speaker 1: When we were starting, I told my people, you know,

509
00:29:43,200 --> 00:29:45,120
Speaker 1: all we have to do is be right fifty one

510
00:29:45,160 --> 00:29:47,560
Speaker 1: percent of the time. But as I got more experience,

511
00:29:48,120 --> 00:29:50,240
Speaker 1: I came to understand, no, you could be right only

512
00:29:50,320 --> 00:29:52,920
Speaker 1: five percent of the time or some small amount, as

513
00:29:53,000 --> 00:29:55,360
Speaker 1: long as you get rid of your errors quick. It's

514
00:29:55,400 --> 00:29:59,280
Speaker 1: the magnitude of the mistakes, not necessarily the total number. Right.

515
00:30:00,000 --> 00:30:03,400
Speaker 1: So there's a quote in the book I really like quote.

516
00:30:03,480 --> 00:30:07,160
Speaker 1: Business was an act of creativity and courage. Other people

517
00:30:07,400 --> 00:30:09,400
Speaker 1: didn't seem to see it this way, but to me,

518
00:30:09,960 --> 00:30:14,520
Speaker 1: business was where life came alive. That's true for me. Now,

519
00:30:14,680 --> 00:30:18,560
Speaker 1: that's that might be unique to an entrepreneur, but a

520
00:30:18,640 --> 00:30:22,480
Speaker 1: lot of my time I spent alone just running thoughts

521
00:30:22,480 --> 00:30:25,640
Speaker 1: and ideas through my head and then trying to carry

522
00:30:25,720 --> 00:30:27,600
Speaker 1: him out. What if I did this, where would it go?

523
00:30:27,720 --> 00:30:29,560
Speaker 1: What would happen? And I'd carry it five or six

524
00:30:29,600 --> 00:30:32,200
Speaker 1: steps into the future and then find a problem and

525
00:30:32,240 --> 00:30:34,000
Speaker 1: I have come back and we start all over again.

526
00:30:34,680 --> 00:30:38,640
Speaker 1: That to me was very exhilarating. It's again, like the

527
00:30:38,760 --> 00:30:41,160
Speaker 1: artist you put something on the paper. If you don't

528
00:30:41,200 --> 00:30:44,240
Speaker 1: like that particular color or hue, you kind of change

529
00:30:44,240 --> 00:30:51,360
Speaker 1: it um And then to take it to implementation was

530
00:30:52,000 --> 00:30:55,560
Speaker 1: more exhilarating, and to see it work was heaven. Now,

531
00:30:55,600 --> 00:30:58,800
Speaker 1: a lot of people would not feel those feelings that

532
00:30:58,920 --> 00:31:02,880
Speaker 1: I just described to you, maybe just an entrepreneur, but

533
00:31:03,200 --> 00:31:05,720
Speaker 1: it took me back to my childhood days when I

534
00:31:05,720 --> 00:31:08,960
Speaker 1: saw my dad and all of the people that he

535
00:31:09,040 --> 00:31:11,120
Speaker 1: worked with at electricians and the plumbers that had their

536
00:31:11,120 --> 00:31:14,040
Speaker 1: own business. They were their own people. They were their

537
00:31:14,040 --> 00:31:17,120
Speaker 1: own men that could decide whether they wanted to make

538
00:31:17,160 --> 00:31:20,520
Speaker 1: their business successful or not by the way they deployed themselves.

539
00:31:21,120 --> 00:31:24,440
Speaker 1: And this was a way for me to take different ideas,

540
00:31:24,440 --> 00:31:28,120
Speaker 1: which was even more exciting because we were plowing a newfield,

541
00:31:28,160 --> 00:31:30,800
Speaker 1: we were going into the frontier. It was a lot

542
00:31:30,840 --> 00:31:34,040
Speaker 1: of fun. So early in the book, you described going

543
00:31:34,080 --> 00:31:37,160
Speaker 1: with your father who was building houses at the time,

544
00:31:37,760 --> 00:31:41,680
Speaker 1: and literally, these carpenters have aprons on different nails and

545
00:31:41,800 --> 00:31:45,520
Speaker 1: different envelopes and they're they're building houses and you and

546
00:31:45,720 --> 00:31:49,200
Speaker 1: but it was manual, it was so handsaws and and

547
00:31:49,280 --> 00:31:53,000
Speaker 1: you described the moments, which I thought was really telling

548
00:31:53,080 --> 00:31:57,960
Speaker 1: about what happens later in t D. You described the

549
00:31:58,040 --> 00:32:02,440
Speaker 1: moment when the electrics circular saw comes out and everybody

550
00:32:02,440 --> 00:32:05,240
Speaker 1: gathers around and they show a test to this, and it's, oh,

551
00:32:05,280 --> 00:32:07,560
Speaker 1: my god, this is going to be an immense time saver.

552
00:32:07,680 --> 00:32:10,680
Speaker 1: We'll be able to build things much much more quickly.

553
00:32:11,200 --> 00:32:16,440
Speaker 1: How did that experience impact the way you saw technology

554
00:32:16,480 --> 00:32:20,040
Speaker 1: affecting your business. I think the fact that my father

555
00:32:20,120 --> 00:32:23,480
Speaker 1: knew and understand that it was so important to their

556
00:32:23,600 --> 00:32:26,440
Speaker 1: work that it made an impression on me. How my

557
00:32:26,520 --> 00:32:29,560
Speaker 1: father was reacting to this buzz saw. Now, the idea

558
00:32:29,600 --> 00:32:32,800
Speaker 1: is really quite simple. It's going to save them time

559
00:32:32,880 --> 00:32:36,560
Speaker 1: because I saw the carpenters using their hands and arms

560
00:32:36,600 --> 00:32:38,880
Speaker 1: to saw a piece of wood. Now they could just

561
00:32:39,000 --> 00:32:43,640
Speaker 1: use this electric implement and cut it right away. Uh.

562
00:32:43,680 --> 00:32:46,600
Speaker 1: So it was an easy idea for me to really

563
00:32:46,640 --> 00:32:51,200
Speaker 1: kind of understand. But the appreciation and the happiness of

564
00:32:51,240 --> 00:32:54,800
Speaker 1: my father is the emotions that really made me stick

565
00:32:54,920 --> 00:32:57,760
Speaker 1: that idea. In my mind. Didn't really never forget it.

566
00:32:57,760 --> 00:33:02,840
Speaker 1: It really it really resonated. So you you describe UM

567
00:33:03,040 --> 00:33:07,600
Speaker 1: quote technical challenges were my constant companion computers that would

568
00:33:07,600 --> 00:33:12,240
Speaker 1: backfire with static electricity, UM equipment that constantly needed to

569
00:33:12,240 --> 00:33:14,680
Speaker 1: be upgraded to keep up with the speed of of

570
00:33:14,760 --> 00:33:18,680
Speaker 1: real time trading. And this is long before the quants

571
00:33:18,760 --> 00:33:21,800
Speaker 1: and the algorithms took over trading. This was back in

572
00:33:21,840 --> 00:33:26,200
Speaker 1: the day when your competitors were phone calls and someone

573
00:33:26,280 --> 00:33:30,560
Speaker 1: walking into a brokerage office. What what made the technology

574
00:33:30,720 --> 00:33:34,200
Speaker 1: such a continual challenge because it had never been done before.

575
00:33:34,240 --> 00:33:37,520
Speaker 1: You really didn't know what you needed ahead of time. Yeah,

576
00:33:38,440 --> 00:33:41,760
Speaker 1: you did not know the size of the computer, you

577
00:33:41,800 --> 00:33:45,920
Speaker 1: did not know the size of the storing capacity, You

578
00:33:45,960 --> 00:33:48,400
Speaker 1: did not know what the volume of trades were gonna

579
00:33:48,440 --> 00:33:50,479
Speaker 1: be coming. So you were guessing at a lot of

580
00:33:50,480 --> 00:33:52,800
Speaker 1: this stuff. And that's why a lot of it didn't work.

581
00:33:53,280 --> 00:33:55,880
Speaker 1: But when we did find what it did work, we

582
00:33:55,920 --> 00:33:57,760
Speaker 1: had the basis to correct it and it was easier

583
00:33:57,800 --> 00:34:01,760
Speaker 1: going forward. And you write the break through was figuring

584
00:34:01,800 --> 00:34:06,080
Speaker 1: out how to keep trimming costs by inducing the customers

585
00:34:06,120 --> 00:34:10,040
Speaker 1: to go the least expensive way. Um, so first it

586
00:34:10,120 --> 00:34:12,040
Speaker 1: was a phone call, then it was a touchstone, that

587
00:34:12,239 --> 00:34:17,640
Speaker 1: was email, that it was online. Uh, in hindsight, this

588
00:34:17,719 --> 00:34:23,240
Speaker 1: looks obvious, right, It's well, that's the hindsight of everything

589
00:34:23,280 --> 00:34:27,480
Speaker 1: looks obvious in the rear view mirror. How groundbreaking was

590
00:34:27,520 --> 00:34:30,719
Speaker 1: the idea we have to steer clients to the least

591
00:34:30,760 --> 00:34:34,200
Speaker 1: expensive way to execute. Well, when when we started in,

592
00:34:36,400 --> 00:34:40,239
Speaker 1: everybody thought we were fools. We we talked to the

593
00:34:40,320 --> 00:34:43,120
Speaker 1: regulators who said, why would you want to do this?

594
00:34:43,960 --> 00:34:46,040
Speaker 1: Brokerage firms that have been around for a hundred years

595
00:34:46,120 --> 00:34:48,239
Speaker 1: or going out of business. The market is not good.

596
00:34:48,320 --> 00:34:50,239
Speaker 1: What makes you think you can be better? I mean,

597
00:34:50,400 --> 00:34:53,920
Speaker 1: everybody through cold water on us, and uh, you know.

598
00:34:53,960 --> 00:34:56,719
Speaker 1: The simple idea was that, well, when the big firm

599
00:34:56,719 --> 00:34:59,040
Speaker 1: maryor Enter decided to compete with you, they'll just stomp

600
00:34:59,120 --> 00:35:01,960
Speaker 1: on you. And I said, they can't. They've got too

601
00:35:02,000 --> 00:35:04,920
Speaker 1: much cost infrastructure that they can't change. Nobody understood that,

602
00:35:05,480 --> 00:35:08,160
Speaker 1: so we were kind of ridiculed all the way along

603
00:35:08,440 --> 00:35:12,440
Speaker 1: until we started showing the whole world that we were

604
00:35:12,480 --> 00:35:16,040
Speaker 1: opening accounts so fast that we had captured the imagination

605
00:35:16,080 --> 00:35:18,480
Speaker 1: of the customer to want the ease and convenience on

606
00:35:18,520 --> 00:35:21,319
Speaker 1: the low cost, that we were somebody to contend with.

607
00:35:21,880 --> 00:35:25,000
Speaker 1: You mentioned regulators. You've had some battles with the sec

608
00:35:25,480 --> 00:35:30,719
Speaker 1: over how they supervise and regulate the brokerage firm in

609
00:35:30,760 --> 00:35:33,600
Speaker 1: the execution. Tell us a bit about those experiences you

610
00:35:33,640 --> 00:35:36,360
Speaker 1: wrecked in the book. Some of it's kind of amusing.

611
00:35:36,680 --> 00:35:38,879
Speaker 1: I would not call it a battle so much as

612
00:35:38,920 --> 00:35:43,080
Speaker 1: trying to bridge the gap of understanding. Um, you seem

613
00:35:43,160 --> 00:35:46,279
Speaker 1: frustrated in the book that you understood this and you

614
00:35:46,320 --> 00:35:48,960
Speaker 1: couldn't get these guys in DC to get it. I mean,

615
00:35:48,960 --> 00:35:52,320
Speaker 1: they were just very old school. They were very old school,

616
00:35:52,640 --> 00:36:00,239
Speaker 1: and people really didn't understand that customers wanted to do

617
00:36:00,320 --> 00:36:03,200
Speaker 1: their own things. So even the regulators had this idea

618
00:36:03,840 --> 00:36:07,279
Speaker 1: that the brokerage firm had to give research to the

619
00:36:07,360 --> 00:36:10,799
Speaker 1: customer in order to make the customer, uh, want to

620
00:36:10,800 --> 00:36:13,080
Speaker 1: make a decision, whereas the customer could buy their own

621
00:36:13,120 --> 00:36:15,560
Speaker 1: information and do their own thing. So it was really

622
00:36:15,640 --> 00:36:18,279
Speaker 1: kind of hard to get across now when the regulators

623
00:36:18,280 --> 00:36:23,600
Speaker 1: came into because the first time in we deserved it.

624
00:36:23,640 --> 00:36:25,800
Speaker 1: I'm sure they walked in and said with the idea

625
00:36:25,840 --> 00:36:28,520
Speaker 1: that they were saying to themselves, these people are so stupid,

626
00:36:29,080 --> 00:36:32,839
Speaker 1: we we don't they shouldn't be handling customer money. Well,

627
00:36:32,880 --> 00:36:35,520
Speaker 1: by the way, if that was true, half of finance

628
00:36:35,600 --> 00:36:38,560
Speaker 1: would be out of the jet. I mean, I'm i exaggerating.

629
00:36:38,560 --> 00:36:41,360
Speaker 1: It's it's gone. A lot of it is. People have

630
00:36:41,440 --> 00:36:44,839
Speaker 1: a real specific knowledge in one area and the rest

631
00:36:44,880 --> 00:36:47,520
Speaker 1: of the world they're blind to. That's correct. So so

632
00:36:47,680 --> 00:36:50,600
Speaker 1: they come in and what was that experience like, Uh,

633
00:36:50,680 --> 00:36:54,879
Speaker 1: the I need to give credit to Tim McReynolds who

634
00:36:54,960 --> 00:36:58,000
Speaker 1: was our attorney, and he was a young man that

635
00:36:58,200 --> 00:37:01,520
Speaker 1: had a way, and in his imagination he pulled out

636
00:37:01,560 --> 00:37:04,839
Speaker 1: an idea of how we should approach the Securities Next

637
00:37:04,880 --> 00:37:07,600
Speaker 1: Change Commission. First of all, we didn't fight them. It

638
00:37:07,680 --> 00:37:10,040
Speaker 1: wasn't a battle. We said, you are correct. We were

639
00:37:10,239 --> 00:37:14,760
Speaker 1: we were recording option trades incorrectly. That was a violation

640
00:37:14,800 --> 00:37:18,480
Speaker 1: of regulation which caused our netcap a chain reaction domino effect.

641
00:37:19,120 --> 00:37:22,800
Speaker 1: So we said everything you say is correct. We didn't

642
00:37:22,840 --> 00:37:25,160
Speaker 1: know and they said, well you should have. He said,

643
00:37:25,160 --> 00:37:29,000
Speaker 1: well we know now. They said, okay, instead of shutting

644
00:37:29,040 --> 00:37:31,799
Speaker 1: you down, we'll give you a penalty. So so this

645
00:37:31,920 --> 00:37:35,640
Speaker 1: was really a potentially existential crisis. They would have shut

646
00:37:35,680 --> 00:37:38,120
Speaker 1: you down. They could have. And their idea, I'm sure

647
00:37:38,160 --> 00:37:40,160
Speaker 1: when they came in Barry, was we got to shut

648
00:37:40,200 --> 00:37:42,959
Speaker 1: these people down. They don't know what they're doing. Once

649
00:37:43,000 --> 00:37:45,160
Speaker 1: we proved to them that we were honest, that we're

650
00:37:45,200 --> 00:37:48,080
Speaker 1: not chills, that we were doing something that the customer wanted,

651
00:37:48,400 --> 00:37:50,920
Speaker 1: that the investment of public wanted and that we could

652
00:37:51,000 --> 00:37:53,840
Speaker 1: change this record keeping system so simply and so easily.

653
00:37:54,400 --> 00:37:57,440
Speaker 1: They said, well, we'll just give you a fine. How

654
00:37:57,440 --> 00:38:01,239
Speaker 1: big a fine was that? Um, the dolls were not large.

655
00:38:01,520 --> 00:38:03,279
Speaker 1: I can't remember. It was a small amount because we

656
00:38:03,280 --> 00:38:06,480
Speaker 1: didn't have dollars. But they said, you have to stop advertising.

657
00:38:06,840 --> 00:38:09,080
Speaker 1: You have to stop. You have to close your office

658
00:38:09,120 --> 00:38:15,640
Speaker 1: and Lincoln Nebraska in Chicago, Illinois, and um, you cannot

659
00:38:15,680 --> 00:38:18,520
Speaker 1: advertise for a long time until you get your books

660
00:38:18,520 --> 00:38:21,200
Speaker 1: and records under control. I had to be out of

661
00:38:21,200 --> 00:38:24,480
Speaker 1: the office for I think a month. I could not

662
00:38:24,600 --> 00:38:27,680
Speaker 1: be around to manage things. So they were giving us

663
00:38:27,719 --> 00:38:31,799
Speaker 1: penalties that we had to accept in order to stay

664
00:38:31,800 --> 00:38:36,719
Speaker 1: in business and closed two offices thirty days suspension UM

665
00:38:37,040 --> 00:38:40,080
Speaker 1: and spend advertising for how I mean you guys were

666
00:38:40,480 --> 00:38:44,000
Speaker 1: Eventually we could not they did. They said, you cannot

667
00:38:44,040 --> 00:38:47,120
Speaker 1: start advertising and that was our lifeblood until you get

668
00:38:47,200 --> 00:38:49,040
Speaker 1: some your books and records on. How long did the

669
00:38:49,120 --> 00:38:51,359
Speaker 1: process take to get it? That took months? That took

670
00:38:51,400 --> 00:38:53,680
Speaker 1: maybe two months. Okay, that's I was afraid you canna

671
00:38:53,719 --> 00:38:56,279
Speaker 1: say two years, but it didn't. But still that had

672
00:38:56,320 --> 00:38:59,680
Speaker 1: to be a scary two month period. It was very scary.

673
00:39:00,200 --> 00:39:03,560
Speaker 1: I think the judge that gave us those penalties, I thought,

674
00:39:03,560 --> 00:39:05,719
Speaker 1: this is enough for them to close down, that just

675
00:39:05,800 --> 00:39:08,719
Speaker 1: go away. Really, I think he thought, you know, if

676
00:39:08,719 --> 00:39:11,640
Speaker 1: they can get through this, they deserved to stay in business.

677
00:39:11,680 --> 00:39:15,479
Speaker 1: But we did get through it, and but we came

678
00:39:15,520 --> 00:39:19,279
Speaker 1: out of that as friends with the regulators because they

679
00:39:19,360 --> 00:39:22,080
Speaker 1: understood that we were trying to do something good for

680
00:39:22,120 --> 00:39:25,000
Speaker 1: the industry, which they did not understand when they walked

681
00:39:25,000 --> 00:39:28,279
Speaker 1: in our door the first time. Quite quite fascinating. My

682
00:39:28,400 --> 00:39:31,440
Speaker 1: special guest today is Joe Ricketts. He is the founder

683
00:39:31,440 --> 00:39:35,719
Speaker 1: and former CEO of TD Ameritrade. He is also the

684
00:39:35,760 --> 00:39:38,720
Speaker 1: owner of the Chicago Cubs, although really it's more accurate

685
00:39:38,760 --> 00:39:42,400
Speaker 1: to say your family trust is the owner of the Cubs.

686
00:39:42,560 --> 00:39:45,919
Speaker 1: My kids on the kids on the Cubs. But that's

687
00:39:45,920 --> 00:39:48,040
Speaker 1: a nice presence of the kids. You're the one who

688
00:39:48,080 --> 00:39:52,640
Speaker 1: bought the It was a combination of if I'm doing

689
00:39:52,680 --> 00:39:55,360
Speaker 1: this off the top of my head, nine million and

690
00:39:55,440 --> 00:39:57,520
Speaker 1: oh nine, and the right in the middle of the crisis,

691
00:39:57,640 --> 00:40:00,800
Speaker 1: right right, the kids put up a couple of hundred

692
00:40:00,840 --> 00:40:04,080
Speaker 1: million dollars, You put up the slight majority, is that right?

693
00:40:03,840 --> 00:40:07,479
Speaker 1: My kids put up about two and my wife owned

694
00:40:07,520 --> 00:40:10,560
Speaker 1: them a bunch of money, I think, okay, and everybody

695
00:40:10,600 --> 00:40:14,279
Speaker 1: involved obviously got their money from you. So I say,

696
00:40:14,360 --> 00:40:19,040
Speaker 1: you're the guy who drove the purchase, and I'm the

697
00:40:19,080 --> 00:40:22,520
Speaker 1: one who created the value that my kids could use. Okay,

698
00:40:22,560 --> 00:40:25,440
Speaker 1: that's fair. So my wife and I put stock in

699
00:40:25,760 --> 00:40:28,719
Speaker 1: the names of our kids in the early nineties because

700
00:40:28,719 --> 00:40:31,719
Speaker 1: I can see it coming gotcha and this way that

701
00:40:31,800 --> 00:40:35,160
Speaker 1: they would be responsible for the capital gain and not me.

702
00:40:35,480 --> 00:40:37,920
Speaker 1: So I've been wrong when I'm saying you both the Cubs.

703
00:40:38,160 --> 00:40:41,239
Speaker 1: Really you teed up the structure that allowed your kids

704
00:40:41,280 --> 00:40:43,880
Speaker 1: to buy the cups. That's correct. That's quite interesting, and

705
00:40:43,920 --> 00:40:45,680
Speaker 1: you talk about that in the book. And I keep

706
00:40:45,719 --> 00:40:48,400
Speaker 1: getting it wrong. I keep saying, people send to me

707
00:40:48,400 --> 00:40:50,680
Speaker 1: who you interviewed this week, Joe Ricket see both the

708
00:40:50,760 --> 00:40:53,239
Speaker 1: Chicago Cubs. So let's talk a little bit about the

709
00:40:53,400 --> 00:40:55,239
Speaker 1: we'll come back to the Cubs. Let's talk a little

710
00:40:55,239 --> 00:40:59,040
Speaker 1: bit about the Opportunity Education Foundation and some of the

711
00:40:59,040 --> 00:41:02,000
Speaker 1: other phil the piece you've been involved with. Tell us

712
00:41:02,000 --> 00:41:04,279
Speaker 1: a little bit. What what does that foundation do? Well?

713
00:41:04,320 --> 00:41:08,520
Speaker 1: I I let me take a step back. I you know,

714
00:41:08,560 --> 00:41:11,680
Speaker 1: in my early fifties, I've had done nothing but work

715
00:41:11,719 --> 00:41:13,439
Speaker 1: and I said, well, you know, I'm rich enough now

716
00:41:13,640 --> 00:41:15,840
Speaker 1: and I can afford to travel. And travel was always

717
00:41:15,880 --> 00:41:19,840
Speaker 1: one of my great attractions. I had wonderlust and I

718
00:41:19,880 --> 00:41:23,959
Speaker 1: wanted to go to places like the Serengetti. I wanted

719
00:41:24,000 --> 00:41:28,320
Speaker 1: to go where there was adventure in my travel. And um,

720
00:41:28,360 --> 00:41:33,719
Speaker 1: I was my uh, three kids, my two sons and daughter,

721
00:41:33,760 --> 00:41:36,040
Speaker 1: and I went to climb Kill Him and Jarrow with

722
00:41:36,120 --> 00:41:40,200
Speaker 1: some friends and really go on a week of safari.

723
00:41:40,280 --> 00:41:42,400
Speaker 1: So it was it was two weeks vacation. It was

724
00:41:42,440 --> 00:41:44,279
Speaker 1: a long period of time. So you have you have

725
00:41:44,320 --> 00:41:47,320
Speaker 1: four kids and three of them climb kill Himanjaro with you, correct,

726
00:41:47,360 --> 00:41:50,320
Speaker 1: My my daughter, my son Peter, and my son Todd

727
00:41:50,960 --> 00:41:53,600
Speaker 1: and I and we were with good friends and their

728
00:41:53,640 --> 00:41:56,160
Speaker 1: family and so it was a great time. But in

729
00:41:56,320 --> 00:41:59,319
Speaker 1: climbing Kill Him and jar Oh, we became close to

730
00:41:59,360 --> 00:42:02,600
Speaker 1: our guys because that's not an easy thing to do.

731
00:42:03,640 --> 00:42:07,920
Speaker 1: It's it's so when we came off at Kilimanjaro, we

732
00:42:07,960 --> 00:42:11,120
Speaker 1: had already developed a bond. So now I'm not driving

733
00:42:11,120 --> 00:42:14,680
Speaker 1: down the road in the Serengetti and we don't see

734
00:42:14,719 --> 00:42:17,400
Speaker 1: any animals, and so I'm going to carry a conversation

735
00:42:17,840 --> 00:42:20,960
Speaker 1: with the guy the driver. I said, what do you

736
00:42:21,120 --> 00:42:25,239
Speaker 1: do when you are not on Safari? He said, well,

737
00:42:25,239 --> 00:42:29,080
Speaker 1: I run this school. I started this school. Now I'm

738
00:42:29,200 --> 00:42:33,680
Speaker 1: quite sure this man cannot read or write, but he's bright,

739
00:42:34,080 --> 00:42:36,360
Speaker 1: so he he knows how to do the guide stuff.

740
00:42:36,800 --> 00:42:40,439
Speaker 1: So I'm fascinated that that somebody that was pretty close

741
00:42:40,480 --> 00:42:43,120
Speaker 1: to illiterate starts to school. Said why he said, well,

742
00:42:43,160 --> 00:42:46,200
Speaker 1: I didn't think my kids were getting a good enough education.

743
00:42:47,640 --> 00:42:49,279
Speaker 1: So I said, how many students do you have? He

744
00:42:49,320 --> 00:42:51,040
Speaker 1: said I have twenty three. I said do they pay

745
00:42:51,080 --> 00:42:53,040
Speaker 1: a tuition? He said, oh no, they can't afford it.

746
00:42:53,040 --> 00:42:55,360
Speaker 1: They're poor. So well, how do you support the school?

747
00:42:56,040 --> 00:42:59,040
Speaker 1: And he said, I take my check from the Safari

748
00:42:59,160 --> 00:43:01,680
Speaker 1: company and I put in the bank and I used

749
00:43:01,680 --> 00:43:05,759
Speaker 1: that money to support the school. Now, Burry, I know

750
00:43:05,960 --> 00:43:11,640
Speaker 1: this guy has nothing. I'm impressed by American standards. This

751
00:43:11,680 --> 00:43:16,040
Speaker 1: guy is a huge hero. So I said, what's the

752
00:43:16,120 --> 00:43:20,960
Speaker 1: name of your school? He said, it's UHM Sat and

753
00:43:21,040 --> 00:43:24,640
Speaker 1: it put his name in there. And I and I've

754
00:43:24,680 --> 00:43:27,000
Speaker 1: gone to a Catholic school all my life, and so

755
00:43:27,080 --> 00:43:28,840
Speaker 1: I know all the saints and I've never heard of

756
00:43:28,880 --> 00:43:32,359
Speaker 1: this saint before. I said, who is that saying? He said, oh,

757
00:43:32,360 --> 00:43:35,400
Speaker 1: that's my name, so he got it halfway. The government

758
00:43:35,480 --> 00:43:37,960
Speaker 1: finally made him change the name, take his name off

759
00:43:37,960 --> 00:43:40,000
Speaker 1: of it. He couldn't call himself a saint because he

760
00:43:40,040 --> 00:43:43,319
Speaker 1: started a school. But I said, hey, can we We

761
00:43:43,360 --> 00:43:45,960
Speaker 1: had talked enough about it that I was really fascinated,

762
00:43:46,360 --> 00:43:48,040
Speaker 1: So can we go see your school when we go

763
00:43:48,080 --> 00:43:50,640
Speaker 1: back to Russia before we get on the plane. And

764
00:43:50,680 --> 00:43:52,279
Speaker 1: he said, I'd be happy to have you come. So

765
00:43:52,360 --> 00:43:53,879
Speaker 1: I said, well, let's go back to camp and talk

766
00:43:53,920 --> 00:43:55,360
Speaker 1: to the rest of the people on the trip, and

767
00:43:55,400 --> 00:43:56,839
Speaker 1: they all wanted to go. So we went to see

768
00:43:56,840 --> 00:44:02,279
Speaker 1: a school. Now, the school was a cement platform, a

769
00:44:02,440 --> 00:44:06,839
Speaker 1: concrete brick walls with a tin roof. It's equatorial, so

770
00:44:07,080 --> 00:44:10,279
Speaker 1: they didn't have to worry about cold, no snow, and

771
00:44:10,880 --> 00:44:14,560
Speaker 1: of small rainy season. Just yeah, and and there wasn't

772
00:44:14,600 --> 00:44:16,880
Speaker 1: anything in the room. There were nothing on the walls,

773
00:44:16,880 --> 00:44:18,880
Speaker 1: There was no books, there was no pencils, there was

774
00:44:18,920 --> 00:44:23,160
Speaker 1: no paper. There were three volunteer adults that taught the

775
00:44:23,239 --> 00:44:26,000
Speaker 1: kids A B. C's and poems and things of that sort.

776
00:44:26,600 --> 00:44:30,839
Speaker 1: So they were working really really hard to give their

777
00:44:30,960 --> 00:44:34,719
Speaker 1: kids a little bit of an education. So um, I

778
00:44:35,000 --> 00:44:38,200
Speaker 1: I said to His name was Shanky Wilson. I said, Shanky,

779
00:44:38,239 --> 00:44:40,640
Speaker 1: I'll tell you what I'll do. They had electricity, no

780
00:44:40,760 --> 00:44:44,040
Speaker 1: running water. With the electricity. I'll buy you a TV,

781
00:44:44,719 --> 00:44:47,480
Speaker 1: and when I go back to the United States, I

782
00:44:47,520 --> 00:44:52,560
Speaker 1: will send you DVDs of programs that our kids see

783
00:44:52,560 --> 00:44:55,520
Speaker 1: before they go to school, like Sesame Street and Mr.

784
00:44:55,680 --> 00:44:58,839
Speaker 1: Rogers and things of that sort. So we did that.

785
00:44:59,080 --> 00:45:02,200
Speaker 1: Then I went back a later. Now he's got forty

786
00:45:02,200 --> 00:45:05,120
Speaker 1: seven students and they're all paying it a little bit.

787
00:45:05,760 --> 00:45:08,440
Speaker 1: So one had. When he had that TV and the

788
00:45:08,520 --> 00:45:12,040
Speaker 1: DVD player and showed what happens in America, there was

789
00:45:12,080 --> 00:45:14,919
Speaker 1: a lot more interest from the neighborhood and that really

790
00:45:14,960 --> 00:45:16,960
Speaker 1: kind of grew. The next school wanted it. The next

791
00:45:16,960 --> 00:45:20,200
Speaker 1: school wanted it. So we really started taking on one grade,

792
00:45:20,600 --> 00:45:24,960
Speaker 1: uh every year, and I went back to America. I

793
00:45:25,120 --> 00:45:29,080
Speaker 1: was familiar with making commercials. We hired a studio, I

794
00:45:29,120 --> 00:45:32,280
Speaker 1: put in a teacher in students, and we filmed teachers

795
00:45:32,640 --> 00:45:35,920
Speaker 1: giving educational courses math and science and things, so now

796
00:45:35,960 --> 00:45:38,720
Speaker 1: they can learn how to instruct the kids off of

797
00:45:38,880 --> 00:45:42,319
Speaker 1: the DVDs became very popular. But when we got to

798
00:45:42,840 --> 00:45:48,040
Speaker 1: secondary education the ninth grade, this guy, Steve Jobs came

799
00:45:48,080 --> 00:45:54,000
Speaker 1: along with new ideas of how you use technology. So

800
00:45:54,160 --> 00:45:57,839
Speaker 1: we said we're going to use that new technology and

801
00:45:57,880 --> 00:46:02,279
Speaker 1: in fact, we're gonna up assisting the schools. We're going

802
00:46:02,320 --> 00:46:09,279
Speaker 1: to build the education programs into the iPad and then

803
00:46:09,320 --> 00:46:11,600
Speaker 1: we can give the iPads to the schools and the

804
00:46:11,680 --> 00:46:15,560
Speaker 1: students and they can learn the same way kids in

805
00:46:15,600 --> 00:46:19,200
Speaker 1: the United States learned. So that's how we got started

806
00:46:19,280 --> 00:46:22,600
Speaker 1: off on the education system. And how large has that

807
00:46:22,719 --> 00:46:26,600
Speaker 1: scaled up to be? For primary grades were at about

808
00:46:26,640 --> 00:46:31,360
Speaker 1: sevent and fifty schools with thousands of students. Fifty schools

809
00:46:31,680 --> 00:46:35,960
Speaker 1: schools and that's all in Africa. Is that? Yeah, eleven

810
00:46:36,080 --> 00:46:40,880
Speaker 1: eleven countries. Three of them are in Asia, India, UH

811
00:46:41,040 --> 00:46:47,560
Speaker 1: Sri Lanka, and um Uh Catman, Dow and then the

812
00:46:47,600 --> 00:46:50,360
Speaker 1: rest of them are in the various countries in in Africa.

813
00:46:51,280 --> 00:46:57,480
Speaker 1: But the Education Department of the Government of Tanzania saw

814
00:46:57,520 --> 00:47:00,520
Speaker 1: what we were doing and they loved it. So they

815
00:47:00,600 --> 00:47:03,000
Speaker 1: really kind of have sponsored us to be able to

816
00:47:03,000 --> 00:47:08,040
Speaker 1: expand the secondary education schools in Tanzania and so that's

817
00:47:08,040 --> 00:47:10,240
Speaker 1: what we're concentrating on right now. So we have about

818
00:47:10,960 --> 00:47:13,799
Speaker 1: UH forty high schools in Tanzania and we had more

819
00:47:13,840 --> 00:47:17,960
Speaker 1: every year to our system of education and it is

820
00:47:18,120 --> 00:47:24,040
Speaker 1: changing their life significantly. I can imagine. Now it's worked

821
00:47:24,080 --> 00:47:28,560
Speaker 1: so well in Africa, I said, we had to try

822
00:47:28,640 --> 00:47:31,239
Speaker 1: the United States. So I've got two schools in the

823
00:47:31,280 --> 00:47:33,719
Speaker 1: United States, one in Santa Rosa, California, and the other

824
00:47:33,760 --> 00:47:36,799
Speaker 1: one in Omaha, Nebraska. How did the school survive the

825
00:47:36,800 --> 00:47:39,440
Speaker 1: most recent fire up in Santa Rosa. Oh not well.

826
00:47:39,480 --> 00:47:42,000
Speaker 1: I mean, you know some of the kids, you know,

827
00:47:42,040 --> 00:47:45,440
Speaker 1: their homes were burnt. Uh, they had to relocate, they

828
00:47:45,440 --> 00:47:47,000
Speaker 1: had to be out of school for a long time.

829
00:47:47,320 --> 00:47:50,480
Speaker 1: The fires never got close to our school, but they

830
00:47:50,560 --> 00:47:53,840
Speaker 1: certainly did influence the people that we're concerned with our school,

831
00:47:54,200 --> 00:47:57,400
Speaker 1: both fires last year and this year. So um, it

832
00:47:57,560 --> 00:47:59,680
Speaker 1: is something that we just had to live with and

833
00:47:59,680 --> 00:48:02,160
Speaker 1: get on with. And where's the other school? And the

834
00:48:02,200 --> 00:48:05,040
Speaker 1: other other school is in Omaha, Braska in Bellevue is

835
00:48:05,040 --> 00:48:09,520
Speaker 1: located on Bellevue University campus. And we we learned I

836
00:48:09,560 --> 00:48:12,680
Speaker 1: structured a meach differently, so we learned different lessons. So

837
00:48:12,880 --> 00:48:15,359
Speaker 1: going forward, as we open more schools in the United States,

838
00:48:15,360 --> 00:48:19,000
Speaker 1: will concentrating on putting them on university campus because we

839
00:48:19,560 --> 00:48:22,320
Speaker 1: bring kids out of families who have never gone to college.

840
00:48:22,320 --> 00:48:24,960
Speaker 1: There nobody in their families gone to college, and I

841
00:48:25,080 --> 00:48:30,000
Speaker 1: like to go to disadvantaged neighborhoods and the kids then

842
00:48:30,200 --> 00:48:33,279
Speaker 1: are in high school on campus with college kids and

843
00:48:33,320 --> 00:48:37,799
Speaker 1: it doesn't take them too long. This. Yeah, so it's

844
00:48:37,800 --> 00:48:40,280
Speaker 1: not something foreign to him, and he seems very passionate

845
00:48:40,280 --> 00:48:46,320
Speaker 1: about this. I'm very passionate about it. It's incredibly good feeling.

846
00:48:46,600 --> 00:48:50,279
Speaker 1: Should change people's lives for the better. The people in

847
00:48:50,320 --> 00:48:53,160
Speaker 1: Africa were giving them a chance to live in an

848
00:48:53,239 --> 00:48:55,080
Speaker 1: environment where they don't have to go into the fields.

849
00:48:55,680 --> 00:48:59,600
Speaker 1: In the United States, what we're opening up is an

850
00:48:59,640 --> 00:49:02,880
Speaker 1: idea to students that don't get this at home. And

851
00:49:03,000 --> 00:49:06,440
Speaker 1: uh so it's it's really and of course there's large

852
00:49:06,600 --> 00:49:11,120
Speaker 1: parts of our cities and our country where children need

853
00:49:11,200 --> 00:49:13,320
Speaker 1: to have the opportunity to be able to get ahead,

854
00:49:13,360 --> 00:49:16,239
Speaker 1: to take advantage of the American dream, and then our

855
00:49:16,360 --> 00:49:19,200
Speaker 1: education system. That's what we do. We take the kids

856
00:49:19,239 --> 00:49:22,000
Speaker 1: that are from a poor neighborhood and say, here's what

857
00:49:22,120 --> 00:49:24,600
Speaker 1: you can achieve if you get a good education, and

858
00:49:24,600 --> 00:49:29,080
Speaker 1: we help them all the way through. You have four kids.

859
00:49:29,320 --> 00:49:32,760
Speaker 1: I have four kids. One of your sons governor of Nebraska. Correct.

860
00:49:33,480 --> 00:49:37,240
Speaker 1: Uh The other of your sons is a significant um

861
00:49:37,400 --> 00:49:41,200
Speaker 1: participant in the r NC. Correct, your daughter is very

862
00:49:41,239 --> 00:49:44,520
Speaker 1: well known in the Democratic Party. She's a huge supporter

863
00:49:44,640 --> 00:49:47,680
Speaker 1: of gay rights and has put forward a lot of policies.

864
00:49:47,680 --> 00:49:49,440
Speaker 1: And Um, I don't know if the fourth kid is

865
00:49:49,480 --> 00:49:52,680
Speaker 1: all that politically active. Well, he runs the Cubs, so

866
00:49:52,920 --> 00:49:57,240
Speaker 1: he's he's too busy winning World series to mess around

867
00:49:57,239 --> 00:50:01,960
Speaker 1: with politics. But that's quite a spread of political thought

868
00:50:02,200 --> 00:50:05,919
Speaker 1: from within the Ricketts family. And I've got to say, Barry,

869
00:50:05,960 --> 00:50:08,560
Speaker 1: I don't think it's much different than most families. You

870
00:50:08,640 --> 00:50:11,080
Speaker 1: get a lot of every First of all, my wife

871
00:50:11,080 --> 00:50:14,400
Speaker 1: and I brought our childer up to be independent thinkers,

872
00:50:15,320 --> 00:50:18,560
Speaker 1: and so I we've said to ourselves several times, we

873
00:50:18,680 --> 00:50:22,320
Speaker 1: can't be unhappy if they don't agree with us. Uh So,

874
00:50:22,680 --> 00:50:28,239
Speaker 1: even among the for the three boys that are conservative,

875
00:50:28,280 --> 00:50:31,040
Speaker 1: they don't agree on the individual aspects of concerns. So

876
00:50:31,040 --> 00:50:34,560
Speaker 1: there's a lot of disagreement regardless of which party or

877
00:50:34,640 --> 00:50:37,640
Speaker 1: what ideology you may want to follow. But we all

878
00:50:37,680 --> 00:50:40,560
Speaker 1: love each other, we respect each other, and we get

879
00:50:40,600 --> 00:50:44,480
Speaker 1: along fine. Thanksgivings not too crazy at the Rickett's household. Correct,

880
00:50:45,040 --> 00:50:47,680
Speaker 1: We we might take a jab at another person for

881
00:50:47,760 --> 00:50:50,680
Speaker 1: a particular thought or idea, but we don't get into

882
00:50:51,080 --> 00:50:54,000
Speaker 1: serious talks because it's not going to change anybody's mind.

883
00:50:54,239 --> 00:50:57,200
Speaker 1: No reason to either preach the choir or waste your breath. Correct,

884
00:50:57,440 --> 00:51:00,239
Speaker 1: we have been speaking with Joe Ricketts, founder and former

885
00:51:00,280 --> 00:51:03,280
Speaker 1: CEO of t D Amritrade. His family is the owner

886
00:51:03,280 --> 00:51:06,600
Speaker 1: of the Chicago Cubs. If you enjoy this conversation, be

887
00:51:06,680 --> 00:51:09,040
Speaker 1: sure and come back for the podcast extras, where we

888
00:51:09,160 --> 00:51:13,160
Speaker 1: keep the tape rolling and continue discussing all things UH

889
00:51:13,239 --> 00:51:19,040
Speaker 1: online trading related. You can find that at iTunes, Google podcast, Stitcher, Spotify,

890
00:51:19,080 --> 00:51:22,840
Speaker 1: wherever your finer podcasts are found. We love your comments,

891
00:51:22,880 --> 00:51:27,080
Speaker 1: feedback and suggestions right to us at m IB podcast

892
00:51:27,120 --> 00:51:30,319
Speaker 1: at Bloomberg dot net. Check out my weekly column on

893
00:51:30,400 --> 00:51:33,799
Speaker 1: Bloomberg dot com slash Opinion. Follow me on Twitter at

894
00:51:33,880 --> 00:51:37,120
Speaker 1: rit Holts. I'm Barry Riholts. You're listening to Masters in

895
00:51:37,160 --> 00:51:42,680
Speaker 1: Business on Bloomberg Radio. Welcome to the podcast, Joe. Thank

896
00:51:42,680 --> 00:51:44,680
Speaker 1: you so much for doing this. I've been looking forward

897
00:51:45,040 --> 00:51:49,000
Speaker 1: to having this conversation with you. UM Full disclosure, my

898
00:51:49,200 --> 00:51:53,640
Speaker 1: firm UM manages about a billion two and t D

899
00:51:53,880 --> 00:51:57,799
Speaker 1: is our largest UM holder as a custodian has just

900
00:51:58,000 --> 00:52:01,279
Speaker 1: under a billion dollars of our assets full. UM, so

901
00:52:01,400 --> 00:52:04,080
Speaker 1: we are familiar with your company and what it does

902
00:52:04,760 --> 00:52:08,320
Speaker 1: UH for for quite a while. UM, there's one or

903
00:52:08,320 --> 00:52:10,439
Speaker 1: two questions I wanted to get to and then we'll

904
00:52:10,480 --> 00:52:15,120
Speaker 1: do our speed rounds. I had to ask UM. I

905
00:52:15,120 --> 00:52:18,120
Speaker 1: didn't get a chance to ask about the institutional business

906
00:52:18,440 --> 00:52:24,239
Speaker 1: because you started out primarily as a UM retail custonian

907
00:52:24,280 --> 00:52:27,080
Speaker 1: and brokerage firm. How did the how did the institutional

908
00:52:27,120 --> 00:52:30,440
Speaker 1: side develop? It took years of developing the market for

909
00:52:30,520 --> 00:52:36,080
Speaker 1: the individual investor, and the next segment would be to

910
00:52:36,160 --> 00:52:42,320
Speaker 1: bring in institutions. These would not be the huge institutions

911
00:52:42,360 --> 00:52:45,719
Speaker 1: that that we know of, but financial planners that have

912
00:52:45,800 --> 00:52:50,560
Speaker 1: their own businesses and do the execution and clearing for

913
00:52:50,640 --> 00:52:55,360
Speaker 1: these firms. And UH, that's just something that really didn't

914
00:52:55,560 --> 00:52:58,440
Speaker 1: excite me too much. So I brought another people to

915
00:52:58,480 --> 00:53:01,319
Speaker 1: go down that road. And that's about the time that

916
00:53:01,400 --> 00:53:05,400
Speaker 1: I retired as UH CEO and became chairman of the

917
00:53:05,440 --> 00:53:08,279
Speaker 1: board and figured, this is the time in my life

918
00:53:08,280 --> 00:53:11,760
Speaker 1: when I really kind of deserved to UH do fun things.

919
00:53:12,200 --> 00:53:14,280
Speaker 1: I found out the most fun thing to do is work.

920
00:53:14,560 --> 00:53:20,000
Speaker 1: But anyway, after a while, I UM relentish the chairman position.

921
00:53:20,280 --> 00:53:24,880
Speaker 1: So I saw a lot of my friends start their

922
00:53:24,920 --> 00:53:28,759
Speaker 1: own businesses, become very successful, sell them, and one day

923
00:53:28,840 --> 00:53:31,719
Speaker 1: they're busy and the next day they're not. They turned

924
00:53:31,719 --> 00:53:34,040
Speaker 1: out to be very unhappy. So I kind of paste

925
00:53:34,080 --> 00:53:36,719
Speaker 1: myself to do it in pieces. So I was even

926
00:53:36,760 --> 00:53:40,799
Speaker 1: ready to get off the board when I did. Yes,

927
00:53:41,000 --> 00:53:43,520
Speaker 1: So I I haven't been on the board for you know,

928
00:53:43,560 --> 00:53:46,320
Speaker 1: almost ten years, and I've been out of management for

929
00:53:46,360 --> 00:53:48,799
Speaker 1: almost twenty years. But I but I still own a

930
00:53:48,880 --> 00:53:50,760
Speaker 1: large part of the stock. I think I owned seven

931
00:53:50,800 --> 00:53:54,040
Speaker 1: percent of the stock that's out there. So let's jump

932
00:53:54,040 --> 00:53:55,920
Speaker 1: to our speed round because I know we have to

933
00:53:56,120 --> 00:54:00,120
Speaker 1: uh let you go eventually, um go as long as

934
00:54:00,160 --> 00:54:02,840
Speaker 1: short as you want. With these questions, they're designed to

935
00:54:02,960 --> 00:54:06,400
Speaker 1: kind of fill in some blanks about about your personality.

936
00:54:06,800 --> 00:54:09,680
Speaker 1: Tell us the first car you owned, your making model.

937
00:54:11,120 --> 00:54:13,880
Speaker 1: It was a student baker really. Oh yeah, it was

938
00:54:13,920 --> 00:54:17,520
Speaker 1: the nineteen forties and it was a four door, the

939
00:54:17,640 --> 00:54:19,680
Speaker 1: ugliest car you can I was going to say, they

940
00:54:19,680 --> 00:54:21,840
Speaker 1: are not pretty cars. They are not pretty cars. But

941
00:54:21,880 --> 00:54:24,960
Speaker 1: I think we paid all of eighteen dollars to buy

942
00:54:25,000 --> 00:54:28,200
Speaker 1: that car. Bucks. Yeah, this was this was back in

943
00:54:28,239 --> 00:54:31,040
Speaker 1: the nine Would you would you be insulted if I

944
00:54:31,080 --> 00:54:35,560
Speaker 1: told you you overpaid. I don't think so. I don't

945
00:54:35,560 --> 00:54:38,959
Speaker 1: think so. So what's the most important thing people don't

946
00:54:38,960 --> 00:54:41,600
Speaker 1: know about Joe Ricketts that I don't know what? That

947
00:54:41,719 --> 00:54:46,719
Speaker 1: might be? Kind of an open book, right, very open? Uh? So, Uh,

948
00:54:46,760 --> 00:54:49,960
Speaker 1: there's really no secrets that I know of that I

949
00:54:50,000 --> 00:54:54,000
Speaker 1: can say that people don't know about. Everybody knows. I

950
00:54:54,040 --> 00:54:58,000
Speaker 1: have a website Bear my Soul and and the website

951
00:54:58,160 --> 00:55:01,439
Speaker 1: is the Harder You Work dot Joe Ricketts dot com

952
00:55:01,480 --> 00:55:04,480
Speaker 1: Joe Ricketts dot com. Oh, there's a separate work, separate

953
00:55:04,520 --> 00:55:09,359
Speaker 1: side for the book Joe Ricketts dot com. Um, you

954
00:55:09,400 --> 00:55:12,759
Speaker 1: mentioned your dad. Who else were early mentors to you

955
00:55:12,840 --> 00:55:15,719
Speaker 1: in your career? The A lot of the people in

956
00:55:15,840 --> 00:55:19,520
Speaker 1: Nebraska City seem to take an interest in me. All

957
00:55:19,520 --> 00:55:24,439
Speaker 1: of my former employers, uh, the boy Scout leader, Uh,

958
00:55:24,840 --> 00:55:28,239
Speaker 1: friends of the family, all of those people that I

959
00:55:28,280 --> 00:55:31,880
Speaker 1: saw doing their own thing, having their own business, having

960
00:55:31,880 --> 00:55:34,680
Speaker 1: their own interests. All of those people were important to

961
00:55:34,760 --> 00:55:38,040
Speaker 1: me to let me know that really you determine what

962
00:55:38,120 --> 00:55:40,759
Speaker 1: your life is by what you do and not what

963
00:55:40,840 --> 00:55:43,160
Speaker 1: other people are going to be able to help you with.

964
00:55:43,280 --> 00:55:48,560
Speaker 1: So I learned independence. That's very Midwestern bid Rock values. Well,

965
00:55:49,080 --> 00:55:54,840
Speaker 1: I'd like to say they're very United States values. Um. Anyway,

966
00:55:54,640 --> 00:56:00,000
Speaker 1: I think that formative time seeing all of these successful people, uh,

967
00:56:00,239 --> 00:56:02,520
Speaker 1: is what really put me off in the direction that

968
00:56:02,560 --> 00:56:05,560
Speaker 1: I started to go. I didn't know that I wanted

969
00:56:05,560 --> 00:56:08,040
Speaker 1: to own my own business, and then I did know it,

970
00:56:08,280 --> 00:56:10,120
Speaker 1: and I didn't have any money. So its a matter

971
00:56:10,120 --> 00:56:15,200
Speaker 1: of evolution. So who influenced your approach to thinking about

972
00:56:15,280 --> 00:56:22,760
Speaker 1: investing and trading in brokerage? I I saw an advertisement

973
00:56:23,280 --> 00:56:31,000
Speaker 1: this is about sixty six of a broker and nice suit,

974
00:56:31,280 --> 00:56:34,040
Speaker 1: shiny shoes making a lot of money. Brokers at that

975
00:56:34,120 --> 00:56:37,040
Speaker 1: time were market was good. Brokers are making a lot

976
00:56:37,040 --> 00:56:39,080
Speaker 1: of money. Sure that whole post will wear two run

977
00:56:39,160 --> 00:56:40,960
Speaker 1: up was a great time. And I wanted to make

978
00:56:41,000 --> 00:56:43,439
Speaker 1: a lot of money, so I was willing to work hard.

979
00:56:43,480 --> 00:56:45,160
Speaker 1: So I said, I I think I want to go.

980
00:56:45,360 --> 00:56:47,440
Speaker 1: I learned how to become a broker, So that's what

981
00:56:47,560 --> 00:56:51,080
Speaker 1: set me off on that line. Let's talk about books.

982
00:56:51,120 --> 00:56:53,440
Speaker 1: What do you like to read? What do you historical novels?

983
00:56:53,480 --> 00:56:56,200
Speaker 1: American historical novels give us some names. Well, I just

984
00:56:56,239 --> 00:56:59,359
Speaker 1: finished up that book by Brian kill Me called Sam

985
00:56:59,400 --> 00:57:02,960
Speaker 1: Houston very interesting. There's more to Sam Houston than I

986
00:57:03,040 --> 00:57:05,040
Speaker 1: ever thought. So I'm going to buy He's got three

987
00:57:05,040 --> 00:57:08,200
Speaker 1: more books. And Sam Houston claimed to fame was what?

988
00:57:08,320 --> 00:57:11,319
Speaker 1: But he was the avenger of the Alamo. So he's

989
00:57:11,400 --> 00:57:14,040
Speaker 1: the father of Texas. He's the one that made Texas

990
00:57:14,080 --> 00:57:16,440
Speaker 1: what it is. Or the city of Houston his name

991
00:57:16,520 --> 00:57:18,160
Speaker 1: for him? Is that right? The city of Houston is

992
00:57:18,200 --> 00:57:21,320
Speaker 1: named after him. Yeah, very fascinating story when you get

993
00:57:21,360 --> 00:57:23,400
Speaker 1: into the details. You know, I remember from history the

994
00:57:23,440 --> 00:57:27,400
Speaker 1: high points, but talking about those details is is a

995
00:57:27,400 --> 00:57:33,080
Speaker 1: lot of fun. I enjoyed Undaunted Courage immensely. That's that's

996
00:57:33,080 --> 00:57:38,280
Speaker 1: that's the story of Lewis and Clark. Okay, is that

997
00:57:38,360 --> 00:57:40,920
Speaker 1: the new book? By not new? It's old. Okay, I'm

998
00:57:40,960 --> 00:57:45,200
Speaker 1: thinking a different. In fact, the author passed away Undaunted

999
00:57:45,320 --> 00:57:49,480
Speaker 1: Courage and that you'll have to help me out with

1000
00:57:49,520 --> 00:57:51,439
Speaker 1: the author. I read it a number of years ago.

1001
00:57:51,520 --> 00:57:55,640
Speaker 1: Let's see what the Google machine says. Undaunted Courage by

1002
00:57:55,840 --> 00:58:02,680
Speaker 1: Stephen Ambrose. Stephen Ambrose wrote a lot of historical novels,

1003
00:58:03,760 --> 00:58:06,200
Speaker 1: and he wrote a lot about the Second World War.

1004
00:58:06,840 --> 00:58:10,760
Speaker 1: I see that band of brothers with him. Okay, my

1005
00:58:10,760 --> 00:58:14,120
Speaker 1: my three boys love those Second World War stories. But

1006
00:58:14,280 --> 00:58:16,680
Speaker 1: I was. I'm I'm more interested in what he wrote

1007
00:58:16,680 --> 00:58:23,200
Speaker 1: about American's history. Uh, The Undounded Courage really kind of

1008
00:58:23,280 --> 00:58:27,040
Speaker 1: led me into studying a lot about the beaver trade

1009
00:58:27,440 --> 00:58:30,040
Speaker 1: and how the West was opened and the characters that

1010
00:58:30,080 --> 00:58:35,480
Speaker 1: it took um. So my my interest is uh, really

1011
00:58:36,000 --> 00:58:38,360
Speaker 1: historical novels. I get excited about it. Give me one

1012
00:58:38,400 --> 00:58:40,280
Speaker 1: more and then I'm gonna give a recommendation to you.

1013
00:58:40,320 --> 00:58:43,560
Speaker 1: But you probably read it already. I'm at a loss

1014
00:58:43,720 --> 00:58:45,640
Speaker 1: to give you one more, Okay, So I'm gonna ask

1015
00:58:45,680 --> 00:58:48,200
Speaker 1: have you read The Right Brothers by David McCulloch. I

1016
00:58:48,240 --> 00:58:50,440
Speaker 1: have not, but I love David McCullough. Can I tell

1017
00:58:50,440 --> 00:58:54,200
Speaker 1: you something, Yes, he wrote this book for you. This

1018
00:58:54,280 --> 00:58:58,440
Speaker 1: is about two brothers against everybody telling them how crazy

1019
00:58:58,440 --> 00:59:01,480
Speaker 1: they ought to do with thy do go out Offenial

1020
00:59:01,640 --> 00:59:06,080
Speaker 1: essentially event flight and it's if you like McCullough, it's

1021
00:59:06,160 --> 00:59:09,200
Speaker 1: just a beautiful book. I just read his program The Pioneers,

1022
00:59:09,920 --> 00:59:12,040
Speaker 1: which I finished up maybe about three months ago. I

1023
00:59:12,120 --> 00:59:14,560
Speaker 1: have the book sitting on most night table waiting for

1024
00:59:14,600 --> 00:59:18,840
Speaker 1: my next vacations. So I will get the one about brothers.

1025
00:59:18,840 --> 00:59:22,120
Speaker 1: You're gonna You're gonna plow right through this, UM, tell

1026
00:59:22,200 --> 00:59:24,640
Speaker 1: us about a time you failed and what you learned

1027
00:59:24,680 --> 00:59:29,400
Speaker 1: from the experience. One of the biggest failures financially that

1028
00:59:29,480 --> 00:59:32,160
Speaker 1: I've had I I came up with a system called

1029
00:59:32,360 --> 00:59:36,000
Speaker 1: on Money where a customer could take their brokerage account,

1030
00:59:36,320 --> 00:59:40,840
Speaker 1: their bank account, and their insurance coverage, put it all

1031
00:59:41,000 --> 00:59:46,680
Speaker 1: into one operation, one financial package, run by the software.

1032
00:59:47,680 --> 00:59:50,720
Speaker 1: And when I would talk to people about that, everybody

1033
00:59:50,720 --> 00:59:52,360
Speaker 1: said they wanted it. So I put a huge amount

1034
00:59:52,360 --> 00:59:56,280
Speaker 1: of money hundred million, and UM it never did take off,

1035
00:59:57,000 --> 00:59:59,880
Speaker 1: like a Merrill Lynch wrap account. They all the big brokerage.

1036
01:00:00,040 --> 01:00:03,880
Speaker 1: Today everybody uses it. But at the time I had

1037
01:00:03,920 --> 01:00:07,400
Speaker 1: to pull uh information from different companies and they were

1038
01:00:07,400 --> 01:00:10,680
Speaker 1: not too excited about letting me have their information. And

1039
01:00:11,120 --> 01:00:16,720
Speaker 1: I presented it too independent. Um, customers, really you need

1040
01:00:16,720 --> 01:00:19,360
Speaker 1: a financial planner. So there were two mistakes I made

1041
01:00:19,360 --> 01:00:23,520
Speaker 1: with it. But the thing that is stuck with me

1042
01:00:23,640 --> 01:00:26,680
Speaker 1: is I went too far. I was so convinced I

1043
01:00:26,800 --> 01:00:29,880
Speaker 1: was right that I pushed it two hundred million, and

1044
01:00:29,880 --> 01:00:32,800
Speaker 1: I should have stopped at about twenty or thirty. So

1045
01:00:33,040 --> 01:00:35,920
Speaker 1: I learned there. Once you know that you've got something

1046
01:00:35,960 --> 01:00:38,960
Speaker 1: that's not working, pull the plug that that that's always

1047
01:00:39,000 --> 01:00:41,720
Speaker 1: good advice. You mentioned killing and jar O. What do

1048
01:00:41,760 --> 01:00:45,480
Speaker 1: you do for fun when you're not working? My fun

1049
01:00:45,600 --> 01:00:49,960
Speaker 1: is my work. I have never found anything that was

1050
01:00:50,040 --> 01:00:53,360
Speaker 1: more fun for me to do than work except ride

1051
01:00:53,360 --> 01:00:56,520
Speaker 1: a motorcycle. And I came across that by accident. Are

1052
01:00:56,520 --> 01:00:58,720
Speaker 1: you still Are you still riding about? I've got a

1053
01:00:58,760 --> 01:01:02,160
Speaker 1: motorcycle with four ols now because my balance isn't as

1054
01:01:02,160 --> 01:01:03,760
Speaker 1: good as it used to be when I was younger.

1055
01:01:03,880 --> 01:01:08,200
Speaker 1: You're just not going fast enough. So so I'm a

1056
01:01:08,240 --> 01:01:11,840
Speaker 1: little jealous because I like to ride, and I won't

1057
01:01:11,920 --> 01:01:14,439
Speaker 1: ride around here because it's so dangerous and so much

1058
01:01:14,480 --> 01:01:18,840
Speaker 1: traffic where you are that's made for motorcycles. You can

1059
01:01:18,840 --> 01:01:21,440
Speaker 1: get on a country road two lane highway and you

1060
01:01:21,480 --> 01:01:23,480
Speaker 1: can see for miles and there's not another Are you

1061
01:01:23,560 --> 01:01:26,960
Speaker 1: a Harley guy? You a BMW guy? I'm both. I

1062
01:01:27,000 --> 01:01:29,520
Speaker 1: have a BMW and I have a Harley Harley. I

1063
01:01:29,600 --> 01:01:32,640
Speaker 1: kind of ride in town. The BMW I take on

1064
01:01:32,680 --> 01:01:37,480
Speaker 1: my long trip right, it's their delightful cruises there. Um,

1065
01:01:37,600 --> 01:01:41,320
Speaker 1: let's talk about the industry. What are you most optimistic

1066
01:01:41,320 --> 01:01:45,200
Speaker 1: and most pessimistic about in the world of online trading

1067
01:01:45,240 --> 01:01:50,400
Speaker 1: and brokerage? Well, I'm I'm really not pessimistic about the

1068
01:01:50,440 --> 01:01:55,040
Speaker 1: world of online brokerage. I think the accumulation of data

1069
01:01:55,360 --> 01:01:59,520
Speaker 1: and the accumulation of information on the individual will kind

1070
01:01:59,520 --> 01:02:02,480
Speaker 1: of leave financial planners to be able to custom make

1071
01:02:03,280 --> 01:02:07,400
Speaker 1: software programs of financial planning for the individual customer. And

1072
01:02:07,440 --> 01:02:09,720
Speaker 1: I think that's that's very exciting, And the software is

1073
01:02:09,720 --> 01:02:13,160
Speaker 1: all moving that direction pro and all the other similar

1074
01:02:13,200 --> 01:02:16,000
Speaker 1: software heading in that direction, so the software will be

1075
01:02:16,040 --> 01:02:18,480
Speaker 1: continued to be enhanced and bring more benefits to the

1076
01:02:18,520 --> 01:02:22,720
Speaker 1: individual consumer. Are you at all concerned about free, free trading,

1077
01:02:22,840 --> 01:02:26,160
Speaker 1: free et f s, free everything. I do have a

1078
01:02:26,160 --> 01:02:29,960
Speaker 1: little hesitation. We don't want buying a stock to become

1079
01:02:30,040 --> 01:02:33,439
Speaker 1: similar to, uh, placing a bet on a football game,

1080
01:02:34,040 --> 01:02:36,080
Speaker 1: and that's a risk. I think that's real that we

1081
01:02:36,160 --> 01:02:40,200
Speaker 1: have to be careful of. The reality is the difference

1082
01:02:40,200 --> 01:02:44,040
Speaker 1: between absolutely free and paying five dollars. There's there's no

1083
01:02:44,160 --> 01:02:48,600
Speaker 1: change in utility. It's psychological friction that forces people to

1084
01:02:48,600 --> 01:02:52,919
Speaker 1: think about So if if we can keep people's buying

1085
01:02:52,920 --> 01:02:56,200
Speaker 1: a stocks for free for no commissions off into a

1086
01:02:56,280 --> 01:03:00,360
Speaker 1: professional area so that it doesn't become a loss Vegas

1087
01:03:00,360 --> 01:03:02,920
Speaker 1: gambling space, we're fine, But we don't know that yet.

1088
01:03:02,960 --> 01:03:07,880
Speaker 1: That's got to play out. And our final two questions, Um,

1089
01:03:08,000 --> 01:03:10,320
Speaker 1: what sort of advice would you give to a recent

1090
01:03:10,440 --> 01:03:14,640
Speaker 1: college graduate beginning their career that was interested in pursuing

1091
01:03:14,640 --> 01:03:18,840
Speaker 1: a career in finance. The first thing I do is say,

1092
01:03:19,200 --> 01:03:21,160
Speaker 1: go off by yourself onto the mountain for a couple

1093
01:03:21,160 --> 01:03:24,800
Speaker 1: of days and just be by yourself and think about

1094
01:03:24,840 --> 01:03:27,920
Speaker 1: what you want to do in your heart, in your psyche.

1095
01:03:28,560 --> 01:03:32,880
Speaker 1: What is the thing that makes your life worthwhile. Then

1096
01:03:32,920 --> 01:03:36,320
Speaker 1: after you've come to that answer, see how you can

1097
01:03:36,320 --> 01:03:40,160
Speaker 1: fit it into a money making aspects to allow you

1098
01:03:40,200 --> 01:03:43,320
Speaker 1: to live the lifestyle that you want. And it may

1099
01:03:43,320 --> 01:03:46,160
Speaker 1: not be financed. People may say, well, I want finance

1100
01:03:46,240 --> 01:03:49,360
Speaker 1: because I can make good wages, but they may find out,

1101
01:03:49,680 --> 01:03:52,160
Speaker 1: you know, I'm gonna play the piano. They'll be happier

1102
01:03:52,280 --> 01:03:54,320
Speaker 1: playing the piano, even though they probably won't make as

1103
01:03:54,360 --> 01:03:58,320
Speaker 1: much money. Interesting, And what do you know about the

1104
01:03:58,360 --> 01:04:01,200
Speaker 1: world of trading and invest today that you wish you

1105
01:04:01,280 --> 01:04:04,360
Speaker 1: knew fifty years ago when you were first getting started.

1106
01:04:04,800 --> 01:04:09,800
Speaker 1: I am quite happy with finding a good company and

1107
01:04:09,960 --> 01:04:13,480
Speaker 1: buying it. That's the Graham and Dot idea, and not

1108
01:04:13,600 --> 01:04:17,800
Speaker 1: trading all the time. Um, the thing that you have

1109
01:04:17,880 --> 01:04:20,680
Speaker 1: to be careful with with Graham and dot is is

1110
01:04:21,480 --> 01:04:24,680
Speaker 1: don't become an amor don't become emotionally involved with your

1111
01:04:24,720 --> 01:04:28,600
Speaker 1: investment or the company that you're looking at. Uh. Sometimes

1112
01:04:28,640 --> 01:04:31,360
Speaker 1: you you'll find another company that you think might do better,

1113
01:04:31,360 --> 01:04:33,360
Speaker 1: and you you really got to say, oh, I need

1114
01:04:33,400 --> 01:04:35,240
Speaker 1: to sell this because you've got a limited amount of money,

1115
01:04:35,240 --> 01:04:37,760
Speaker 1: no matter how much you have, and put it over

1116
01:04:37,800 --> 01:04:41,720
Speaker 1: someplace else. So you got to really cause yourself to

1117
01:04:41,760 --> 01:04:47,680
Speaker 1: think deeply. Quite quite interesting, we have been speaking with

1118
01:04:47,760 --> 01:04:50,040
Speaker 1: Joe Ricketts. He is the founder of t D, a

1119
01:04:50,120 --> 01:04:52,560
Speaker 1: merrit trade and the author of a new book, The

1120
01:04:52,640 --> 01:04:55,360
Speaker 1: Heart of That You Work, The Luckier You Get and

1121
01:04:55,440 --> 01:05:00,160
Speaker 1: an entrepreneur's memoir. If you enjoy this conversation, well look

1122
01:05:00,240 --> 01:05:02,640
Speaker 1: Up an Inch or Down an Inch on Apple iTunes

1123
01:05:02,680 --> 01:05:05,760
Speaker 1: and you could see any of the nearly three hundred

1124
01:05:05,800 --> 01:05:09,120
Speaker 1: such conversations we've had over the past five years. We

1125
01:05:09,320 --> 01:05:13,160
Speaker 1: love your comments, feedback and suggestions right to us at

1126
01:05:13,400 --> 01:05:16,560
Speaker 1: m IB podcast at Bloomberg dot net. Since you're already

1127
01:05:16,640 --> 01:05:18,920
Speaker 1: looking Up an Inch or Down an Inch and Apple iTunes,

1128
01:05:19,160 --> 01:05:22,160
Speaker 1: please give us a review. UH. You can check out

1129
01:05:22,320 --> 01:05:25,040
Speaker 1: my daily column at rit Halts dot com. You can

1130
01:05:25,040 --> 01:05:27,720
Speaker 1: sign up there for our daily reads. Check out my

1131
01:05:27,880 --> 01:05:31,240
Speaker 1: weekly column on Bloomberg dot com. Follow me on Twitter

1132
01:05:31,320 --> 01:05:34,600
Speaker 1: at rit Halts. I would be remiss if I did

1133
01:05:34,600 --> 01:05:37,600
Speaker 1: not thank the crack staff that helps put these conversations

1134
01:05:37,600 --> 01:05:41,400
Speaker 1: together each week. Carolin O'Brien is my audio engineer. Michael

1135
01:05:41,400 --> 01:05:46,000
Speaker 1: Boyle is my producer. Attica val Broun is our project manager.

1136
01:05:46,480 --> 01:05:50,640
Speaker 1: Michael Batnick is my head of research. I'm Barry Rit Halts.

1137
01:05:50,880 --> 01:05:54,360
Speaker 1: You've been listening to Masters in Business on Bloomberg Radio