Step 2: Be an investment banker and have access to lots of capital that lets you make repeated risky bets.
Step 3: Benefit from bailouts when many of those risky bets fail.
So, his story is not in any way replicable by normal people and isn't even replicable by most of his peers or new entrants into his own industry today.
Lots of people lose big, personally my biggest loss was $WISH wow I got hammered there. Had it been an index fund that incorporated WISH I would have been more protected… then again my direct purchase of NVDA more than paid that back
Obviously 70k into 264M is insane and either is like one in a billion luck or the result of insider information
Anyone knows how to see and buy publicly traded bonds?
I pay a metric shit ton of taxes to fund the exotic lifestyles of federally elected officials and to fund wars overseas. And before you go “oh who is paying for the fire department” that is less than .02% of my taxes, a reasonable amount.
I applaud people that found a way around the utter bullshit. I’m working for free, under threat of arrest, for 3-4 months every year. Unbelievable.
1) Asset allocation: Basically, how much you want in stocks, how much in bonds. Those are the two major asset classes. Go way heavier on stocks early in life and maybe trend toward 50-50 later in life when you have less time to ride out dips.
2) Diversification: What specific entities you invest in. Suggestion: Total US stock market index, total world non-US stock market index, total US bond market index. This way you don't have to pick winners. You just buy everything. Let the bad stuff drop off along the way, and let the good stuff do its thing.
3) Rebalancing: Like once a year, or every time your chosen asset allocation gets at least 5% off. Whatever feels good, but keep your asset allocation under your own conscious control.
As a note, Ric Edelman, when he had a radio show, went over the IRA to Roth conversion. Several times. According to him, it's a wash. Pay tax before you invest or when you withdraw, but either way the net effect is almost identical.
I like silexia's comment. There is a lot of information not included in the story, and, if you think about it, this whole story is one data point. One guy did some things/had some things happen at a particular time in history. Don't expect to cut and paste into your own life and get rich by next week.
Important points:
1) Start as early as you can.
2) Be religious about regular investing without fail.
3) Never break into the piggy bank to buy a house or a fancy car, or for any other reason short of a dire medical emergency.
4) Take advantage of every break you can find, and any employer matches.
5) Wait.
There is a huge amount of information at Bogleheads Investing Advice and Info ( https://www.bogleheads.org/ )