Why Build the Investment Calculator At Golden Door, we built the Investment Calculator as an internal valuation tool. When I started on Wall Street, I remembered every investor had the HP 12C Financial Calculator on their desk. It was a powerful, handheld device. Of course, when investing there are only a few important variables worth noting: present value, payments, interest rates and future value. When you sit on a trading floor, accuracy of these 3-4 variables are essential when investing....
6 days ago • 2 min read
Here are a few Nasdaq updates I’ve observed in software this year. Earlier in 2024, I was initially focused on cybersecurity threats in financial services. ISMG has several great events and roundtables if you want to learn more about the industry. It’s the best way to learn the latest security threats and how executives are handling them. But since June, I’ve had to focus more on A.I. technologies since the applications have ramped up. Personally I don’t have time to master the hardware and...
9 days ago • 2 min read
How to Invest in Fintech for 2025 With the new year, it’s time to reposition your portfolio for growth. For the past two years, Fintech has been dead. But now with the Trump Administration, two things will happen in 2025: 1) IPO activity will pick up, and 2) deregulation will make fintech very attractive. To get started, here are a few recent posts I published this month: The State of Fintech: I wrote a short breakdown on the industry, some threats and opportunities. My Thoughts on the...
10 days ago • 1 min read
Blockchain and Crypto Primer At its core blockchain technology has solved the double-entry problem in accounting. If you think about money, it’s a giant database of informational units. It tells everybody where specific units reside (debits or credits) and how to account for them. The current financial system has been living in the Web 2.0 era of the internet. Think MySpace instead of Meta/Facebook. At the moment, it seems all financial systems are equal but that’s only on the application...
11 days ago • 1 min read
The Nasdaq Update for Semiconductor Stocks Today let’s continue the Nasdaq-100 updates with Semiconductor stocks. Right now I’m listening to the new BG2 podcast interview with Dylan Patel, the founder of Semianalysis. Since launching a few years ago, Dylan now produces one of the best semiconductor research content in the world. In this interview, Dylan explains the competitive advantages of Nvidia, one of the best performing stocks in the Nasdaq-100 index. First, I was surprised to learn...
11 days ago • 3 min read
The Nasdaq Update for Semiconductor & A.I. stocks Investors use indices to benchmark relative and absolute performance over time. The goal is to understand how different investments perform overtime. Now the reality is that most investors are better off investing in the broad market index than buying individual stocks. Let me explain why. Investing is a competitive sport. Everyone is chasing the same few ideas across the board. Those same investors are reading the same press releases for the...
14 days ago • 4 min read
Why Invest in the Nasdaq-100 Index When it comes to the markets, investors have thousands of ideas to choose from. For example, ETFs were invented in 1990 and became popular in the early 2000s. When compared to mutual funds, ETFs have more liquidity and lower fees for more exposure. This is why so much money has been invested in the S&P 500. It’s the most effective way to be invested in the market. Now I’m a man of the market and have been studying these trends for years. First it was the Dow...
16 days ago • 4 min read
The State of Fintech - December 2024 Right now the industry is preparing for a massive take off for the next two years. In late October, I wrote about my recent thoughts on the Fintech industry. Many of those graphs were from FT Partners, which produces excellent fintech industry content. I recommend checking out their site. Today I will provide a deeper dive into specific fintech verticals. I’m not an expert in each category but I do want to begin tracking my investment thoughts over time....
17 days ago • 6 min read
How to Start Investing in Stocks There's a lot happening in the capital markets. While I spend most of my time writing investment ideas, reviewing the fundamentals is an essential part of my checklist process. Every investor has some type of checklist. Some are qualitative, some quantitative, some both. However you slice, everyone has their own methodology. So I thought it would be a good idea to publish my own research process over time. Below you will find a breakdown of how I analyze...
17 days ago • 4 min read