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I don't feel old, uh, but I guess at 51, having done this industry, been in this business for almost 30 years, I I guess I'm the old guy or one of them. Uh, and I know that because when I'm at conferences and I'm doing speaking sessions, mostly the breakout sessions, if you've ever been to any kind of a conference, um, you know, you've got the big, the big um hallways of of uh auditoriums, and then you've got the kind of smaller rooms. And the smaller rooms are typically, let's say, 50 people, you know, something like that, 20 to 50 people. And so it's more intimate. You can ask more questions. Um, and uh I do a lot of speaking around investing um in how we build portfolios and and what what we do and what we don't do for our clients and and how that all works. And this this is again to advisors, generally speaking. As time has gone on, I get more and more questions from younger advisors around a lot of different things. Like, you know, how did you choose your staff? How did you choose to build your business this way? What why did you why this? Why that? You know, all these kinds of things that I asked when I was 23 and 30 years old. Um, but I'm starting to get more and more questions and conversations around how did you come to this investment philosophy? Uh, and where that comes from is because actually, after I speak about how we invest our clients' money, advisors, their interest has peaked. Um, and they'll ask questions like, where can I go read about this? You know, what what what what podcast can I listen to? And the last time that I was asked this question was actually yesterday, and I just I had no filter, and I'm like, man, I, you know, I hate that question. I just hate it because there's no there's no good answer. Um, there's no good answer because there aren't that many people who actually do it this way. Uh, and that got me thinking, uh, you know, another topic I talked to is uh to advisors about is well, where did this come from? Obviously, I didn't invent the way that we invest our clients' money. I am just, I'm just not a Nobel Prize winning scientist. So I think the story is important. You know, how did I, how did Joe, how did your advisor, if I'm if I'm your advisor, how did I come to this philosophy? You know, did I did I graduate University of Maryland on day one, start using uh, you know, the four-factor model of investing and the the work of Eugene Fama and Ken French from University of Chicago? No, I didn't. So I think this is good. This is a good story for you to hear because it it really took me a long time. And I'm trying to help younger advisors maybe, maybe um reduce that time frame, you know, compressed time is what I like to call it. So I graduated college in 1998 from the University of Maryland and I had a communication degree. I I had no background in finance at all. Uh I didn't want to be in finance, I didn't think, you know, I didn't, it didn't occur to me as something I wanted to do. Um, and so as but as I was graduating from college, uh I didn't really have an idea as to what career I was going to do or where what direction that was gonna uh lead me. And I met somebody at an insurance company, a very large, well-known insurance company. And they said, look, we we do these internships and and I needed an internship, so I took it. And that was like my foot in the door of the financial industry, just you know, generally speaking. And this was 1998. And so what I was taught in this uh insurance company was that I mean, they they obviously taught insurance and they taught some planning. Um, on the investing side, looking back on it, I don't think they did a very good job at all. But at the time, what they were teaching was active management. And they were saying things like, uh, you know, it's my job as the advisor at 23, with no background, by the way. It was my job to go out and pick which funds these clients should be in. And you know, if the funds didn't do well, just move them to a different fund. And that's kind of you know what we were being taught. The other thing we were being taught was that there was this this concept or this phrase is that we were in a new economy. And and you guys listening, you all remember, I mean, this was like this was the dot-com era. And what I was being taught was that, well, the economy is different, and this time is different, and um, stocks just weren't gonna go down anymore, you know, not to any large degree because the the internet was gonna change everything. It was gonna change the economy, it was gonna change everything, the world. And they were right. I mean, look, the the internet obviously changed the world, but not in the ways that everyone thought it was going to, and certainly not in the individual companies that they thought were gonna be the winners, and certainly not those funds that were so that were very heavy in those individual companies. So, what I saw was clients of this firm lose a lot of money because from 2000 to 2002, still young in my career, the Nasdaq, which was very heavy, it was all tech stocks back then, all internet, all dot com, all tech stocks, the Nasdaq lost about 75% of its value. And it took 15 years, I think, to get to get back to even uh in the NASDAQ. And so I, you know, as a young person, I'm looking at that, I'm like, man, that that did not feel good. You know, from 2000 to 2002, basically double-digit negative returns all three years, essentially. Um, and all of a sudden nobody wanted to talk stock investing, and nobody wanted anything to do with it. And so I was obviously a little gun shy. Um, I switched firms. I was at a new firm in 2000. This is in Washington, D.C., and they did a little better job. I thought they did a lot better job on the planning side, you know, taxation and debt pay down and savings rates and um insurance, and really actually that that firm taught me a lot of what I use still today. Very, very solid. On the investing side, though, they really weren't. They were kind of like, oh yeah, and and then we invest money. There was no philosophy. Um, it was kind of like, well, you you could use this product or you could use that product, and they weren't really dictating who we used or or why. Um, and so then as I kind of got back into the investment world, it it seemed very disjointed. And then 2008 hit, and everyone lost everything again. It was, you know, the SP 500, I think, was down, I don't know, 38% or something like that. Um, and I'm I'm sitting here now. At that time, I'm 10 years into this business, and so I'm like early 30s, and I'm thinking, I'm never doing this again. I want nothing to do with investments, I don't want anything to do with it. Um, it's a total casino. There's it doesn't this makes no sense to me at all. Everyone's got great stories, but like the numbers never actually pan out. And that was 2008. I would say 09, maybe 2010. Uh, I had a colleague who said, you know, you really need to treat investing um not like a story, but that it's like math, because that's what it is. And that caught my attention. So I decided I'm gonna go find that. Like, there's gotta be something that would explain how portfolio should be built, not on gut instinct, not on speculating or gambling, but on math. Like, go figure. Now it's probably gonna be super boring, not very sexy, but if I was gonna do investments for my clients as a um certified financial planner, I wanted it, I didn't want it to be sexy and exciting. I wanted it to be based on something that was math, mathematically based, you know, science, something I could I could tether to. So I went out and I found uh Eugene Fama and Ken French, their work from the University of Chicago and Harry Markowitz and the Efficient Frontier. And uh, and and by the way, a lot of these people that who I stand on the shoulders of, I mean, these giants of our industry, I studied their work when I was taking the series seven and the series 63 and all these different exams you have to pass. I studied their work, but it never dawned on me like you could apply that work to retail clients and investing, but you could, is what I found. And so I spent the next about four years, I'm just gonna say I'm gonna round it, you know, 2009 to 2012 or 13, just studying, just just reading and studying, literally reading their books, reading their white papers, like what is factor investing? What does it mean? Um, and it's not as complicated as you would make it out to be if you're my client, you've heard it. Um, you know, a single factor I'll just say today, which everyone will say, well, yeah, that makes sense, is one factor is if you're looking for return, stocks tend to outperform bonds. I think everyone knows that. Well, that's a factor. That's a factor of investing. And um Professor Fama and French took it, you know, multiple steps beyond that. They say, well, there's also size, right? Size matters, and also um book to value matters and profitability matters. There's all these factors on investing, and they can distill it down to the math and they can say whether or not a factor is random or whether there's actually something to it. In other words, if you look over long periods of time, a hundred plus years, we know it's not random that stocks beat bonds. It's not random, it's not luck. It's there's actually a statistical analysis analysis that can say the odds of that being just random or luck is less than significantly less than 1%. That's the work that they've done. Um, and so I adopted that. And so I took that to my clients. And so, really, the last uh 15 years or so, I have never deviated from that. Um, it's become my principles, it's become my philosophy. There's no need to deviate from it. It really helps me stand in the gap with you, my client, uh, between really bad decisions or gut instinct or what you think might be happening, or this time is different. I can stand in the gap between that and what the math says, which is really what you want. Um, and the final thing I'll say is this I really did learn this too. Just understanding the math is not enough. Uh, you really have to understand human beings, you have to understand behavior. And the best way I can describe this is that you listening or watching, whether you're a client or you're a prospective client, you are emotional about your money because you're not a robot, okay? You are emotional. And guess what? I am emotional about my money, it's just a fact, and those emotions can damage and and cause you to misbehave with your money no matter what the math says. The trick is I am not emotional about your money. You pay me not to be. I have zero emotion around it. I care about you, the client, and for that reason, I am going to be unemotional about it. And I'm just gonna teach you and I'm gonna educate you, and to the extent that you even care and want to know, that's great. Some some of my clients will love it and they go read up on this stuff too, and they and they kind of get into it, and others just say, you know what, that's for you to deal with and not me. No matter where you are on that spectrum, though, I think it's important for you to just hear like there's been an evolution of this for me over the last 30 years. I wasn't lucky enough to come out of college as a 23-year-old uh, you know, communication major into this industry and know exactly how to build a portfolio based off of statistical science. I didn't know. Um, that took a long time. More importantly, once I found it, I never deviated from it. And I'll commit to you, I never will. Um, this time is never different for me. Uh, it's all based on math. And then it's just my ability to explain it to you and get you to kind of understand it. You know, how do we measure risk is another way. That's it's a whole nother conversation. But how do we do that? How do we measure risk? What is risk? Again, that's not a feeling, that's a number. There's a there's there's math behind that number. So that's been the evolution. I would expect, you know, look, if I get to do this another 20 plus odd years, uh I'm gonna say the same stuff. AI is not gonna make me change my opinion on math. Um, whatever comes after AI, the robots with AI in them isn't gonna get my my attention swayed any other way. Uh, because I know two things will be true. One is math will be math, and two, humans will always have the behavioral, you know, kind of direction that we have. And so again, it's my job is to navigate those two things with you, not to pick a better product, not to tie markets or speculate or have some great sexy story. That's not what we're here to do. Um, we are here to build a plan, and the point of the portfolio is to fully fund that plan, and that plan is gonna hold all your hopes, dreams, desires, and legacies in it. And that's my job is to make sure that that happens with you.

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Joseph Delesey is a registered representative and financial advisor of Park Avenue Securities, LLC, OSJ 5280, Carol Canyon Road, 300 San Diego, California, 92121-619-6486400. Securities, products, and advisory services offered through PAS, Member FENRE, SIPC, financial representative of the Guardian Life Insurance Company of America, Guardian, New York, New York. PAS is a wholly owned subsidiary of Guardian. West PeckWell Partners LLC is not an affiliate or subsidiary of PAS or Guardian. Insurance products offered through West Peckwell Partners and Insurance Services LLC, a DBA of West Peck Wealth Partners LLC. CA Insurance License No. 0D34103. This podcast is for informational purposes only and is not to be construed as tax legal or investment advice. Although the information has been gathered from sources believed to be reliable, please note that individual situations can vary. Therefore, the information should be relied upon only when coordinated with individual professional advice. Guardian and subsidiaries, agents, and employees do not provide tax legal or accounting advice. Guardian and its subsidiaries do not issue or advice with regard to mortgages, property and casualty insurance, andor car insurance. Consult your tax legal or accounting professional regarding your individual situation. All investments and investment strategies contain risk and may lose value. Diversification does not guarantee profit or protect against market loss. Equities may decline in value due to both real and prestige general market economic and industry conditions. Investing in securities of smaller companies tends to be more volatile and less liquid than securities of larger companies. Investing in the bond market is subject to certain risks, including market interest rate is short, credit, and inflation risk. This material is intended for general use. By providing this content, Park Evening Securities LLC and your financial representative are not undertaking to provide investment advice or make a recommendation for a specific individual or situation, or to otherwise act in a fiduciary capacity. Past performance is not a guarantee of future results. Indeeds are unmanaged and one cannot invest directly in an index.