The Liquidity Event Podcast: Episode 72

 

Episode 72: It's Always Wire Fraud or Mail Fraud

It's confirmed, dear listeners: FTX is worse than Enron. Join AJ and John as they talk about the joys of watching criminals being brought to justice. They also cover topics including why you shouldn't invest your retirement funds in crypto, how joint bank accounts are basically saving relationships, and the implications of BNPL (buy now, pay later). Ahh, don’t ya love the smell of commercialism in the morning?

Read the Full Transcript:

Speaker:

This podcast is for informational purposes only, and should not be considered tax or investment advice.

Welcome to The Liquidity Event, a show about all things personal finance, with a laser focus on equity compensation. Hosted by AJ and Shane of Brooklyn Fi, each episode will take you through the week's news on Fintech, IPOs, SPACs, founder wins and fails, crypto, and whatever else these nerds think is interesting. Learn more, and subscribe today at brooklynfi.com.

AJ:

Hello, and welcome to The Liquidity Event. We're your hosts, AJ-

John:

And John.

AJ:

This is episode 72 being recorded on Tuesday, December 13th, airing on Friday, December 16th. It's good to be back. How're you doing, John?

John:

It's good to have you here, AJ. It's been a few weeks. I've been carrying the team here on the podcast for a little while here.

AJ:

You have. You have.

John:

Glad to have you back.

AJ:

Yeah, I've been hearing some great reviews, some unsolicited, great John Owens reviews from clients, from friends, from acquaintances, from strangers even.

John:

From strangers?

AJ:

No, not from strangers.

John:

Wow. Are any of them interested in opening up a joint bank account with me? We'll get to that article here soon.

AJ:

Oh boy. We'll get to that later, along with the FTX collapse, some updates in that story with our good friend over there. Taylor Swift is also involved in the cryptocurrency kerfuffle. We've got, as John mentioned, why it might be financially responsible to open a joint bank account with your spouse. We've got a Bitcoin ETF, or lack thereof, and some commentary on buy now, pay later, as we are in the midst of the present holiday buying season.

John:

Holiday shopping season is underway. The holiday season's underway, I'm sticking with the ugly sweater theme, if you couldn't tell.

AJ:

Yes, I see that. Are those ostriches or emus?

John:

It's an ostrich, of course.

AJ:

Of course, yes.

John:

Obviously.

AJ:

Is there a reference I'm missing, or just generally ostrich [inaudible 00:01:56]?

John:

Just generally an ugly sweater. Any sweater can be an ugly sweater on the right person though, I think.

AJ:

True. I have a great Lacoste Christmas sweater. It's not even a Christmas sweater, it's just a regular Lacoste sweater. It's red and white with an alligator on it. It's one of my favorite sweaters ever, that I actually got on Black Friday, many years ago. Are you reading or watching anything good these days?

John:

Well I watched the finale of The White Lotus last night, and it did not disappoint.

AJ:

I agree. We are not going to do any spoilers, because this episode is airing on Friday, December 16th and according to AJ's rule of statute of limitations on spoilers, you have one full weekend to watch a show before someone may spoil it. Because it is Friday folks, you still have two more days to watch The White Lotus, before I will start tweeting spoilers at you.

John:

Yes.

AJ:

Great show.

John:

Wow.

AJ:

Wow.

John:

Great show, I hope there's a season three. There's just so many places they could take it, I'm excited. It's been great. It was a great show.

AJ:

Speaking of luxurious islands where rich people live and frequent, any news coming out of The Bahamas this morning?

John:

Pretty quiet. Remember, we're recording this on Tuesday. Last night, Monday night, Sam Bankman-Fried was arrested in The Bahamas. There's a sealed order that we're going to find out more about today, from the Southern District of New York, for a bunch of types of fraud. This is just a matter of time.

AJ:

What kind of fraud was it? Was it freaking wire fraud?

John:

Wire fraud.

AJ:

It's always wire fraud.

John:

It's always wire fraud or mail fraud. Think about the mafia, it's one of those things. Sam Bankman-Fried's arrested, this isn't shocking to me. I'm surprised it honestly took this long. He was scheduled to testify in front of, I believe, the House Financial Services Committee this morning. Now, they're just going to have the new CEO of FTX testifying, John Ray, who was the guy who took over Enron, and oversaw liquidation there.

AJ:

Who said FTX fraud was way worse than Enron. He's like, "I've seen it all with Enron, but this is an 11."

John:

Yeah, very interesting. Sam Bankman-Fried's been talking for the last couple of weeks, and doing some interviews. I don't know what lawyer made him think that was a good idea. It's going to be very interesting to see what the next twist and turn is in this.

AJ:

It's always wire fraud. As the great poet Lizzo once said, "It's about damn time." This should have happened a month ago and this guy's been doing Twitter interviews from the comfort of his Bahamian mansion-

John:

That FTX bought.

AJ:

That FTX bought for him at some point, with investor money that was propped up by tokens, that were then propped up by a whole bag of air. When someone is arrested by the U.S. government in a foreign country, they have to work with the local authority. There's been some speculation as to what the Bahamian government and authorities are trying to get out of this, maybe that was part of the delay but we are glad that someone who has defrauded so many investors is potentially on their way to some deserved retribution and punishment.

John:

Yes, and he'll be extradited to the U.S. here soon, and then, we're going to see what's in the sealed indictment, or affidavit, whatever it is, I'm not a lawyer. I'm very curious to see what the details are and what they list out, because it's just been fascinating to watch.

AJ:

You were saying he was supposed to testify, and he basically said in an interview, "Actually, I'm not going to testify. My schedule is full."

John:

Maxine Waters is the chair of the House Financial Services Committee currently. She won't be in January, because Republicans took control of the house. Basically, had said something along the lines of, "I just need to get some more information." The comments back from Congress, which I can appreciate, for how dysfunctional Congress is, "It seems like you've been doing a lot of talking to begin with so I think you can come to us, if you can talk to Andrew Ross Sorkin on CNBC, and a few other folks."

AJ:

One of my favorite things to come out of this FTX collapse... we're making light of it because we love to watch criminals be brought to justice, and this was a series of crimes which will be elucidated.

John:

Bad boys, bad boys, what are you going to do?

AJ:

Exactly. It's juicy. It's not surprising that we are all obsessed with the story. My favorite tidbit to come out of this was a headline from Financial Times, "FTX Held Talks with Taylor Swift Over a $100 Million Sponsorship Deal," but Taylor had pulled out. We actually don't know why she pulled out, but apparently, Sam Bankman-Fried and someone high up in his organization were big Tay Tay fans. For those not in the know, those are called Swifties and they really wanted to be close to Taylor Swift, and she said, "No." Say what you want about Taylor Swift, she's got good instincts.

John:

It sounds like everybody at FTX that understood how business operated was like, "Hey, this is a $100 million endorsement deal. This is crazy. We can't afford this." One of the things that has come out, which is concerning when we think about just leadership in general, is that when Sam Bankman-Fried didn't hear things that he wanted to hear from people, he just ghosted them, and ignored them, which is not really what you're looking for in a CEO and executive leader there. I just have to imagine that the folks at Caroline Ellison, Sam Bankman-Fried, have been listening to Anti-Hero on repeat, being like, "I'm the problem, it's me," for the last month or so. That's just my guess as to what's happening here.

AJ:

You're saying their covert narcissism was disguised as altruism.

John:

Disguised as altruism, which is kind of funny, given Sam Bankman-Fried-

AJ:

All the shit he said about altruism?

John:

Yeah, exactly. His charitable, what is the name of that? [inaudible 00:08:18] I forget the name of the term. No, no, no, no, no. The type of charitable gift that he advocates for.

AJ:

Yes. That he was doing, yeah. It's the title of the next title of Taylor Swift's next record coming in June of 2023.

John:

Yeah, probably. Although, I don't know if you saw the Bosstones mashup of Tay Swift, Antihero which was great because Scott and Taylor Swift together is a win-win. But, yeah just crazy. I think the funny thing is that I watched a lot of baseball this post-season because the Phillies were in Lancaster, PA and one of the advertising-

AJ:

Sorry, I just fell asleep for a second. What'd you say?

John:

Okay. Anyway, one of the advertising things FTX is doing was that they had the FTX logo on all the umpire's jerseys. And so that was one of their advertising, and it's like if the whole notion of FTX is that like, hey, this was a huge fraud, isn't it ironic that the people that are supposed to be calling balls and strikes in baseball and the objective are being advertised on by this? I think it's just the irony is kind of crazy.

AJ:

And also the hilarious, ironic thing is the Larry David Super Bowl commercial for it. Was it for FTX or was it for crypto? It was for FTX, right? Yeah. Or was it crypto.com? I don't remember. But basically Larry David described it as a safe and easy way to get into crypto. The whole premise of the commercial is like Larry David throughout history has been quote unquote wrong about things. It's like a caveman. It's like, here's a wheel. And he's like, "Eh, not interested." And then he literally says, "We think crypto's a good idea." And he goes, "I don't think so, and I'm never wrong about this stuff." Cut to [inaudible 00:09:56].

John:

So I mean, a huge Curve fan. The irony is that if you actually listened to Larry, then maybe you wouldn't have touched it.

AJ:

Right.

John:

But the irony was that he's been wrong about so many things.

AJ:

I was right. You should have listened to me.

John:

I'm just honestly most excited about two things with related to this FTX. Let's be very clear. This is terrible. This guy belongs in jail. He's obviously entitled to a trial, but this is incredibly messed up. This is fraud. I have no tolerance for that.

AJ:

However, asterisk.

John:

That being said, I am looking forward to the Michael Lewis book and the Big Short version of the movie.

AJ:

I was just going to say that, yes.

John:

Okay. I know those are probably coming. Apparently Michael Lewis has been falling Sam Bankman-Fried around for the last few months. And then I'm also very excited to see how Kirby, your enthusiasm works this into the next season, because I'm sure they will deal with it. It is totally something that they will find a way to work into the series.

AJ:

Absolutely. In fact, the whole series, I hope it takes place in The Bahamas.

John:

Oh, that would be interesting. I think they're filming it already, to be honest with you. I think we're looking at another season here in 2023.

AJ:

Yeah, apologies, audience, if you can hear some banging and drilling in the background, they're renovating the apartment above me and apparently do it during business hours in right above my office. So apologies for the banging. That's Brooklyn baby.

John:

I can't really hear it on mine.

AJ:

Oh, great.

John:

Yeah. So we're doing okay.

AJ:

Great, great, great.

John:

Yeah, I mean, I don't know. No sense beating a dead horse to water, as you would say, AJ, but yeah, I mean, there's just going to be more stuff that comes out here and in the days ahead of the months ahead in the years ahead until this all gets sorted out. Will people get their money back? How much will they get back?

AJ:

I mean this guy is really sitting between a rock and an uphill battle and it's going to be a long way for him.

John:

Yeah. And I just hope that these people, the thing scares the hell out of me is that there are people who put their life savings in this. And there are people that put a lot of money in it, and I don't encourage that. You know what I mean? And would've never told them to do that as an advisor or anything. But there are people that did it. And it is terrible, it is awful.

AJ:

What's terrifying is sure, you're a retail investor, the SEC tries to protect you from fraud. And then we have things like 401ks, which have even more protections and more restrictions because in exchange for the tax break you get for contributing to your 401k, you abide by certain restrictions and you get a lot of rewards. The fact that we're seeing all these crypto companies trying to move into the 401K space that scares the out of me. Fine. You want to do whatever with your leftover money, your retirement funds, putting in something this volatile is terrifying. And I hope the SEC steps in.

John:

And so yeah, they want to be able to put crypto in 401ks and all that. And I think one of the things as a 401K plan administrator, Brooklyn advisor 401k, there's a plan administrator here, fiduciary responsibility to the people that are in the plant. And I think it's going to be hard for plant fiduciaries to say, it is in the best interest of my clients that have access to this incredibly speculative asset such as crypto.

AJ:

And I said that I don't understand and they don't understand either says the 70 year old fiduciary of the plan, no offense to the 70 year old fiduciary.

John:

Yeah, yeah. No. So one of our next articles here is about Grayscale getting to sued. And so Grayscale has a Bitcoin investment fund, GBTC, and-

AJ:

It's a mutual fund though, it's not an ETF, right?

John:

Correct. Yeah. Because they can't do spot trading with it. And they want to do an ETF. The SEC hasn't let them do an ETF yet. But as of the other day, GBTC was trading at a 43% discount to the value of Bitcoin. So you get your teeth kicked in Bitcoin, and then you have this in your portfolio, you're actually getting hurt even worse because of this discount. And the reason why has to do with concerns about whether the underlying Bitcoin below this mutual fund is actually there. And being able to prove that, especially given everything that's happened with FTX. And I believe GBTC custody is with Coinbase. And so there's thought about like there is more reconciliation proof of reserves behind this than what had happened at FTX. But this reminds me a lot, AJ, we talked about this in the summer with Twitter, an arbitrage opportunity and like, hey, in theory, this is an inefficiency in the market because if Bitcoin is what it's allegedly worth, then they should be trading very closely to that.

And that's not the case. And it was a very similar thing with Twitter where it wasn't trading at the price that Elon said he was going to buy it at because so many people thought the deal wasn't going to go through. Now we don't know where this ends for GBTC or anything like that, but it's still one of those things where people are concerned and questioning the value of this. And there's not the trust in the crypto space that I think that people thought that was going to be in terms of the blockchain and how this all works.

AJ:

Do you think this is the first, well, it's not the first big scandal. Do you think this is a death nail for cryptocurrency in general, or do you think this is a good wake up call and the industry will correct itself?

John:

I think it's probably more so the latter. And I think Crypto 2.0 or 3, whatever version of crypto the next one will look, will be more regulated.

AJ:

Yeah.

John:

Will be subject to more scrutiny. I'm hopeful that this will get a bunch of the crap out of the space.

AJ:

The tokens-

John:

Exactly, breathe their on point that's meaningless.

AJ:

But you haven't bought into the liquidity event tokens? You earned-

John:

I haven't bought any token.

AJ:

You earned five liquidity event tokens every time you're a co-host on the show. So currently you're the third largest shareholder of the liquidity event token.

John:

Wow.

AJ:

And you just financed my Bahamian mansion.

John:

Oh yeah. Yeah. Great, great. What AJ didn't tell you about the construction is that this is the expansion for-

AJ:

It's actually in The Bahamas.

John:

Yeah, yeah, yeah. She's in The Bahamas, she's actually in a country that doesn't have an extradition treaty.

AJ:

Yeah. Actually I was able to buy the apartment above mine. Actually I was able to buy the whole building with all of your money John.

John:

Yeah, I mean I'm going to be vulnerable here. I've never owned a Bitcoin. I've never owned a fraction of Bitcoin. I've never owned any of it. And I'm okay with that. I sleep very well at night with my loomer like tendencies there.

AJ:

Yeah. I think, as I said many times on this podcast, I think we are in such the, I am so interested in the technology of the possibility of crypto and the technology available through the blockchain and the idea of a decentralized, not deregulated way to exchange money and value and store information. However, I think we're in year five of a 2000 year history of, I mean, not think I know we are of what this thing could be. Right? We're still figuring our shit out. And this is what the SEC is seeing this now, and they're like, oh, shit we got caught with our pants down basically. We did not regulate this fast enough. We didn't step in and a lot of regular investors, uneducated investors, got hurt. Right? By people who were making a fuck ton of money.

John:

Yeah. Yeah, I think-

AJ:

A lot of people made a lot of money through legitimate means. This is one case of fraud. I'm sure there are other cases of fraud that will come out, but there is a lot of really smart people who created intricate systems of exchanging value. And I commend them for that.

John:

Yeah. And I mean, my skepticism of crypto from the beginning has been, I just don't think that this one small group of people that are in this crypto space are going to control everything someday. You know what I mean? And I think there were times where I think people kind of laughed and were like yes, they will in a year and a half ago, two years ago, that was the thought. Crypto also has been that hedge against inflation. I'm repeating myself here, but, and then the leverage-

AJ:

Arrogance is expensive.

John:

And the SEC has now come out with guidance saying that if you're a public company and you have exposure to all these crypto bankruptcies, you should disclose that in your public filings. And so that was some recent stuff that we saw here, because that's on their radar. And so I think it's be very interesting as we head into the next round of public filings for many companies. Next earning reports, which will be coming out here in about a month or so, month and a half, mid-January through end of February, basically, who is going to get caught with their pants down.

AJ:

Who has got FTX? Yep. Yep.

John:

Exactly.

AJ:

Second time we've heard that on the show today, folks. Yeah. I mean, one of the most fascinating things was looking at, there was a spreadsheet published by the Financial Times that was literally all the investments that FTX had made. And it's like, I see some great FinTech companies on there that I respect and that I think are cool products that I hope they already got their money because that's not available.

John:

Well, and I think there's a question. Yeah. And that's the thing. It's like if FTX did put some of that money in some of these startups, that might be worth something. What's going to happen is because they're in bankruptcy, a bunch of stuff will go into receivership and the people who are going to try to get their money back almost want to hope that some of those venture investments that FTX has made are successful and then they're going to the money back. But it's like, we've heard this, we've occasionally had somebody come through the door here that had touched Madoff, you know what I mean? That had family invested money with Madoff or something like that. And it is a long road to take your money out.

AJ:

To get your money out. Yeah. I mean there was an investment in Figma that was strategic that made a bunch of money because we saw the sale of Figma just a couple months ago. That might save FTX whole right out. Not quite what the-

John:

But they might have already spent it.

AJ:

Right. Exactly. Yeah. They've already invested on the houses.

John:

We got some more beachfront property in The Bahamas here.

AJ:

But I mean, this SEC guidance it's too little too late. And they realize the error of their ways. But also, it's really hard to go after these people. I mean, we joke about it's always wire fraud, but it's really hard to do the forensics required to figure out what's going on. Especially when you have someone who's come forth and said, oh, I miscategorized everything. There was all this smoke and mirrors around what was actually going on there. How is the SEC even going to get a foot in the door? There's a lot going on.

John:

Yeah. I mean, you look at the Madoff stuff and all the stuff he got away with and that guy that was off on Madoff for years and Markopolos, I think his name was.

AJ:

Okay.

John:

And nobody would believe him.

AJ:

Yeah. And they were like, you're a loser and you should just invest with him because I just bought another piece of beachfront property.

John:

Yeah. That's kind of funny. Anyway, moving on from-

AJ:

Speaking of financial failures, a new-

John:

Let's hear this segue.

AJ:

A new study published by Cornell University and the University of Colorado in conjunction, I love to see universities working together. A new study found that couples who have joint bank accounts often have happier relationships. The study found 60-

John:

I read this article-

AJ:

Wait, wait, wait, let me finish.

John:

All right. Go ahead.

AJ:

The study found that 62% of couples who had a joint account also spent money in the same way further, the benefits of pooling money together was particularly strong among couples with scarce financial resources.

John:

Okay. First of all, one of the most ironic things about this article was that the professor involved was named Joe Gladstone.

AJ:

Oh boy, here we go.

John:

Was that not Joey from full house? Was that not his name?

AJ:

Oh, I don't remember.

John:

Talk about pooling financial resources. There were three grown men living together with their kids. Anyway, but-

AJ:

They definitely had a joint bank account and they were all really happy.

John:

So there you go. But yeah, there's some irony there. But yeah, I mean this is really helpful because had I read this article sooner it probably has now explained why all my prior relationships have failed. And this could've saved me a few thousand dollars in therapy cost AJ.

AJ:

Because you didn't have a joint bank account.

John:

All I needed was a joint bank account. What was I thinking?

AJ:

Yep. Yep. So according to divorce.com, a website that I've never been to until this moment, [inaudible 00:22:03], if you're listening, love you. 36.7% of divorced couples cite financial issues as the thing that led to the divorce. My parents had a messy ass divorce for 12 years over financial issues. So this is a topic that is very true to my heart and I agree with this. I think you should have a joint bank account. I don't think every single thing needs to be together. And that's not what we mean by this. We don't mean, no every single transaction and every credit card is joined and everything is pulled together.

It's that you have a shared bank account where you can buy things together. We talk about this a lot with our clients, John. I talk about it like a spectrum. On one end, you keep everything totally separate. No one has any idea what's going on. On the other end, it's only joint accounts. You have nothing in your own name except your IRAs and 401ks. Most people fall somewhere in the middle. So most people have maybe separate credit cards, maybe separate checking accounts. But we've got a joint savings account, a joint emergency fund for the family. It's just a gesture of trust. And I know that there are lots of successful relationships where everything is separate and there is a lot of trust. But for most people just, it's a gesture almost.

John:

I mean, I just like the simplicity of the concept, and I say in particular for folks that are married where things are combined. I don't love joint accounts, people that aren't married or aren't engaged. I'm not trying to sound like some judgmental grandma here. I'm just saying that it's harder to untangle-

AJ:

To unwind. Yeah.

John:

Yeah. If things don't work out. But think about the simplicity of like you got a joint credit card, you've got a joint bank account, you go out to dinner, it's the joint account, it's the two of you going out to dinner. You go on a vacation. It's that. I think it makes things simpler. I mean, dating for example, it's hard because who's paying? It's my turn. I like to think I'm a gentleman and it's one of those things where do you want to deal with that for 30 years of-

AJ:

Forever? Until death do its part.

John:

Exactly. Whose turn is it? No, it's the joint account because it's the two of us going out to dinner and that's it. I don't know. I understand why people have shied away from this. I'm very thankful my parents never got divorced. Growing up in generation where lost of my friends' parents did get divorced and I feel like we're growing up for that divorce generation. Because I feel like our grandparents didn't, but a lot of our people's parents did that I feel like there's a lot of anxiety about combining finances, about opening up joint accounts, about intertwining things, and maybe that's holding people back. I don't know. It's interesting. I'm wondering if it's also a correlation causation thing here. Is it, they have strong relations where they have a joint account as opposed to the opposite working first.

AJ:

Exactly. I was thinking about that. Yeah. If you're already in a place in your relationship where it's a no-brainer and both of you are on board with the joint account, you're already more set up for success. Another thing that comes to mind is just this idea of, it's not all or nothing. I feel like a lot of the financial news and financial headlines are like, it has to be this one thing. If you have credit card debt, you're a loser. If you have student loans, you're a loser. If you invest in Bitcoin, you lost all your money. It's like, no, we're talking about very small pieces of a much bigger, more complex financial picture. I was reading this article and I was like, this is nice, but I'm kind of rolling my eyes because people are going to read this and be like, oh, we can fix our marriage by opening a joint bank account. It's like, no.

John:

No. That's not necessarily, let's be very clear here.

AJ:

No, you can fix your marriage through great couples therapy with a probably financial therapist as well, who knows each of your histories with money to start to come to some kind of understanding and place of trust. Right?

John:

Yeah. And I think it's about the context of having a joint account with joint visibility. It just opens up the lines of communication. Even if you don't talk about it opens up the lines of communication more. If you don't have joint accounts, everything's separate, then your spouse might not know that your $12,000 in gambling debt, you know what I mean? I hate to go to a dark example.

AJ:

Sure. We have clients who didn't know about that. We have clients who we've had to file innocent spouse relief on their tax returns because they didn't know about unpaid taxes for years because they just said, honey, sure. Sign the form for me. And now they owe the IRS a $100,000. This is a true story. And other spouse is long gone and they're stuck with this IRS debt and it's messy. It's complicated. It can ruin your life.

John:

Yeah. Talk about money with your significant others and maybe get a joint account.

AJ:

Yeah. As part of it. Speaking of spending too much money, we've got an article here from payments.com that shoppers go deep on BNPL and e-commerce as holiday shopping ramps up. BNPL being buy now, pay later aka layaway, aka credit cards, aka people have been doing this since the history of time. What is new about this?

John:

It's not a new thing, it's just there's been new companies.

AJ:

Affirm, which is what? Trading 90% off its IPO price right now.

John:

Not good. Don't look.

AJ:

Okay, I'm not going to look. Yeah. Affirm, Afterpay, Klarna, we've got all these companies. I see my little icon when I go to buy my, whatever I'm buying, skincare-

John:

Your olive oil. Your fancy olive oil.

AJ:

Yeah, my fancy Brightland olive oil, hashtag love Brightland. It's a credit card. I mean, I guess it's a slightly lower interest rate than a credit card. So the big bagged evil credit card companies are going to charge you 20% and Afterpay is going to charge you what, 10% after six months? I hate this, I hate this, I hate this.

John:

Yeah. And I think the takeaway is like, don't spend money you don't have on things you don't need. Right. But that's easier said than done.

AJ:

Yeah. Sure. But that goes back to the joint account thing and talking about money. If the money's not there and you have, let's call it a spending problem, because that's what it is. We're spending more than we're making, we have a problem.

John:

Yeah.

AJ:

Right? We're going to either end up in debt that will make it harder to do things that we want to do later in life, like buy a house if we have credit card debt in our early twenties. These are things that you got to unpack. Right. This whole episode is basically an advertisement for going to therapy if you have money.

John:

Yes. It seems like.

AJ:

But this article is interesting because it's like, so according to this limited study, that about 10% of holiday shoppers on Black Friday used a buy now pay later service, which is not a large amount, but it's up a 100% from last year. So last year was 5%, now it's 10%. That's a big scary number to me.

John:

But I think the question is that people moving from using a credit card, using buy now, pay later, or is it using CAT? You know what I mean? Because I would venture to guess that 85% of Black Friday shopping happens on a credit card and we just don't know when it gets paid off.

AJ:

Right. That's true.

John:

I mean, I do all my holiday shopping on the credit card because I get the points right.

AJ:

That is true.

John:

But yeah, I mean, we got to wrap this one up here, AJ. But it's been a pleasure.

AJ:

I was having so much fun. You want to read us out, Mr. Owens?

John:

I will read us out. Thank you for joining us on The Liquidity Event. You can email us at liquidityevent@brooklynfi.com, leave us a voicemail and we'll play it on the air. You can check out the show notes at brooklynfi.com/episode72. Brooklyn Fi stans can leave us a review if you want to be weird about it. I'm John Owens.

AJ:

I'm-

John:

She's AJ Ayers.

AJ:

Yep. Thank you. Forgot my name for a second.

John:

And that'll do it.

AJ:

See you guys next week. Goodbye.

Speaker:

Thanks for listening to The Liquidity Event, hosted by AJ and Shane of Brooklyn Fi. Head on over to brooklynfi.com where you can subscribe to the podcast or YouTube channel, or if you want to learn about their full service, financial planning, tax and investment firm specializing in tech professionals and creatives on the path to financial independence. We'll see you next time on The Liquidity event.