Experts

While I am the Chief Investment Strategist for The Oxford Club and Liberty Through Wealth today, I retired from Wall Street at the ripe old age of 43.

After 16 years as an investment advisor, research analyst and portfolio manager, I had gone from a net worth of approximately zero to financial independence.

That meant I was free to do whatever I wanted, wherever I wanted, with whomever I wanted.

It’s called total financial freedom. And I can tell you from experience, it’s a great feeling.

Since retiring from the securities industry, I’ve been busy living what I call “the second half of my life.”

I write about the financial markets for The Oxford Club, the world’s largest financial fellowship with more than 110,000 Members, and Liberty Through Wealth (formerly Investment U), a free daily e-letter with close to 300,000 subscribers.

I’m also in charge of three fast-paced trading services: The Momentum Alert, The Insider Alert and The True Value Alert.

And I’ve authored four national bestsellers: The Gone Fishin’ Portfolio, The Secret of Shelter Island, Beyond Wealth, and An Embarrassment of Riches.

Working as a writer instead of as a licensed investment advisor suits me well. I can give advice freely, and no one who heeds it has to wonder whether my real motive is to earn fees or commissions or “capture their assets.”

I can write what I want about the market – and the world – without a compliance officer scrutinizing my words. And readers don’t have to worry about the objectivity of my analysis.

I have no business relationships with the companies I cover, no investment banking colleagues seeking customers for new bond issues and secondary offerings, no reason to tell anything but the plain truth as I see it.

Many of these truths I’ve learned the hard way. You can save yourself a lot of trouble – not to mention a boatload of money – by learning from my personal experience.

(I made the dumb mistakes early in my career, so you don’t have to.)

In my Liberty Through Wealth columns, you’ll learn how to successfully manage your money yourself, using simple yet highly sophisticated strategies to increase your returns, reduce your risk, avoid Wall Street’s mountain of fees and keep the taxman at bay.

No one cares more about your money than you do. You should manage it yourself.

With Liberty Through Wealth, you can – and enjoy the total financial freedom that comes with it.

Articles by Alex

• Is Capitalism Really in Crisis? December 6, 2019-
  Politicians claim that capitalism is in crisis and must be fixed, but our system is working exactly as it should, and people are living richer lives than ever.
• John Templeton’s Advice on How to Give Thanks December 2, 2019-
  One day of thanks is not enough. John Templeton recommends practicing an attitude of perpetual gratitude, or thanksliving.
• How to Become Wealthier… Instantly November 28, 2019-
  Many of us wait for an opportunity like Thanksgiving to express gratitude. But if you’re hoping to achieve a rich life, consider making it a daily habit.
• The Man Who Teaches Your Kids to Hate Capitalism November 25, 2019-
  Socialism won in a recent debate versus capitalism, but how? Our free market system provides endless opportunities where socialism continually fails.
• A Young Audience… an Angry Old Man… and a Sad Outcome November 22, 2019-
  On Monday, Alex discussed a recent debate of socialism versus capitalism. Now we take a deeper look at some of the socialist arguments and why they’re invalid.
• NYC Cheered This Marxist Economist November 18, 2019-
  Our free market system is a blessing that provides mutual benefit to businesses and consumers. So why are so many people in favor of socialism these days?
• The Worst Trade I Ever Made… and How You Can Benefit November 15, 2019-
  As 2019 nears its end, it’s tempting to sell off losing stocks for the tax break. This strategy can help you navigate the wash-sale rule and capitalize on coming rallies.
• Why First Impressions Matter November 13, 2019-
  When Alex met The Oxford Club’s newest strategist in 2007, he was skeptical. But it turns out they share a common strategy and interest: biotech stocks.
• The World Really Isn’t Going to Hell… Here’s Why November 11, 2019-
  A clear-eyed view of our nation and the world is essential for building wealth and a rich life, but that can seem impossible with constant media negativity.
• Why the Anti-Capitalists Are Dead Wrong November 8, 2019-
  Anti-capitalists argue that current economic inequality shows that capitalism is “broken.” But no system provides more opportunities to build wealth.

More articles by Alex >>

Based in Europe, Nicholas is a widely recognized expert on exchange-traded funds and an accomplished investment expert. Nicholas has been a regular commentator on CNN International and Fox Business Network. He has also been cited in The Wall Street Journal, Newsweek, Fox Business News, CBS MarketWatch, Yahoo Finance and MSN Money Central.

Here’s a little more about the journey that led him to you…

Growing up in Pittsburgh, Nicholas earned spending money by selling flavored ice cubes at Little League baseball games, delivering the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette at 5:00 a.m. and shoveling snow during the harsh Pennsylvania winters.

For a kid from the Rust Belt who was a big Pittsburgh Pirates and Steelers fan, he also lived a double life. He spent his summers studying in West Germany (before unification), France, Italy and communist Hungary on scholarships he diligently applied for while in high school.

I was lucky. My parents made me aware of opportunities other kids couldn’t even dream about. Every summer, I had the chance to dip into a completely different language, reality and culture. During the bad old days of the Cold War, not a lot of kids from the United States were spending their summers in Europe, let alone behind the Iron Curtain. It was as if I got to visit another planet each summer. And then I spent the school year back on planet earth.

Luckily, this was the kind of unusual background that top colleges were looking for.

Nicholas earned a B.A. in both economics and history and an M.A. in history in less than four years from Stanford University.

There, he discovered the work of free market economist Friedrich Hayek and wrote two theses on his work.

That work put him on track to win a Fulbright scholarship to the Karl Marx University of Economics in Budapest, making him one of the first Fulbright scholars to study behind the Iron Curtain.

Assuming his academic interests in the Soviet Union and centrally planned economies was a professional dead-end, he turned down an economics Ph.D scholarship to Oxford University and went on to attend Harvard Law School instead.

Truth be told, he wasn’t a big fan of the law. Compared with the exciting world of clashing economic ideals, law seemed pedestrian and boring. Harvard proved better fit for his classmates, including future president Barack Obama and good friend, now Supreme Court justice, Neil Gorsuch.

As luck would have it, the Berlin Wall came tumbling down before he graduated. Suddenly, Eastern Europe and Russia were open for business.

After Harvard, he joined the world’s largest law firm, which had just opened offices in Eastern Europe. His mission – as he put it then – was to “help dismantle centrally planned economies.”

For nearly four years, he worked on the privatizations of some of the leading banks, oil companies and telecom companies in the region, listing them on regional stock exchanges. It’s this work that first exposed him to the fascinating world of investing.

Nicholas then set out to learn all he could about finance and embarked on a successful and varied business career, including launching several investment funds in Europe, founding a London-based roundtable of leading investment experts like Steve Forbes and Nassim Taleb, and writing for Eagle Publishing’s The Global Guru for 12 years alongside four other investment advisory newsletters.

In January 2018, Nicholas became The Oxford Club’s first and only ETF strategist, writing for the daily Liberty Through Wealth e-letter (formerly Investment U) and our flagship newsletter, The Oxford Communiqué. He is also the Editor of the new ETF trading service, Oxford Wealth Accelerator.

Outside of work, Nicholas focuses on managing his personal investments and his growing family.

Articles by Nicholas

• Charlie Munger’s Checklist for Investing December 5, 2019-
  Billionaire Charlie Munger is a compelling character with a lot to teach investors. Learn how to grow your wealth with his investment checklist.
• Is Traditional Wall Street Research Useless? December 3, 2019-
  In the 1990s, investment recommendations were made based on “kicking the tires.” A lot has changed since then. Here’s what it means for your ETF portfolio.
• Don’t Be an Investment Turkey November 29, 2019-
  Situations change - in an instant, sometimes - and what was working like a well-oiled machine can suddenly become a ticking time bomb.
• The Greatest Investor in History November 26, 2019-
  Who is the greatest? He probably doesn’t come to mind, but this lesser-known investor ignored modern theory and created the best-performing quant fund ever.
• Should You Bother Investing in Emerging Markets? November 21, 2019-
  In the 1990s, emerging markets earned top returns, but the picture looks a lot different today. Should emerging markets be part of your ETF portfolio?
• Don’t Buy Into the Decline of America November 19, 2019-
  Conventional wisdom is that the U.S. empire is on the skids, but is that really the case? Let’s examine America’s unique history of self-deprecation.
• Should You Bet Big on the Latest Red-Hot IPO? November 14, 2019-
  IPO is a phrase that conjures magical ideas of untold wealth for investors. Are these red-hot opportunities a good strategy, or should investors steer clear?
• Remembering the Fall of the Berlin Wall November 12, 2019-
  The Berlin Wall came down 30 years ago, signifying the end of the Soviet Union. Today, we reflect on its significance and lasting impact on global wealth.
• Two Simple Rules to Win the Prediction Game November 7, 2019-
  Humans have tried every method imaginable to predict the future, from reading tea leaves to performing complex analysis. But here’s what you should do to build wealth.
• Why the Doom-and-Gloomers Are Always Wrong November 5, 2019-
  Doom-and-gloomers are always predicting the “next big crisis,” from ice ages to droughts, famine to overpopulation. But have they ever gotten it right?

More articles by Nicholas >>

Mark Morgan Ford is a lifelong practitioner of writing, teaching, entrepreneurship, martial arts and philanthropy.

He has been writing and publishing since 1962 when, at age 12, he sold an underground booklet titled Excuses for the Amateur to his fifth-grade peers. Since then, he has written more than two dozen books on business, entrepreneurship and wealth building (several of which were New York Times and Wall Street Journal bestsellers), as well as half a dozen books on rhetoric and three books of poetry. He has also written and produced four feature-length movies.

From 2000 to 2010, he posted more than 3,000 essays on his Early to Rise blog, which, at one time, had a circulation of nearly a million readers. From 2010 to 2015, he retired from all but one of his business concerns and created an educational curriculum on wealth building. He donated the curriculum – which consisted of thousands of pages of advice and instruction – to the Wealth Science Institute, a non-profit organization whose goal is to encourage industry, entrepreneurship and prudent financial management for the “not yet wealthy.”

As an entrepreneur, he has been involved in dozens of multimillion-dollar businesses, including one whose revenues exceeded $100 million and another that broke the billion-dollar mark. His current business interests include the Agora companies (a large international publishing group), Ford Fine Art (a broker of Latin American and contemporary fine art in Miami, Nicaragua and Delray Beach), AWAI (a company that teaches writing and graphic arts), Lion’s Kill (a movie production business) and Palimi (a business consulting company).

As a real estate investor, he has been involved in more than a hundred projects and developments, from single-family homes to apartment buildings, office buildings and resort communities. Travel & Leisure magazine recently voted the hotel facility in one of these resort communities – Rancho Santana on the Pacific coast of Nicaragua – “one of the 100 best in the world.”

A student of martial arts since 1998, Ford has won three Naga championships. He received his black belt from Marcel Ferreira in 2015.

His charitable activities include FunLimon, a community development facility across the street from Rancho Santana that provides a range of services, including an athletic program, a microlending program, a trade school and a literacy school.

He has attempted to retire four times in his career, never successfully. His current goal is to give away 90% of his wealth in the next decade.

Articles by Mark

• Making Friends in High Places: A 5-Step Program to Boost Your Career December 4, 2019-
  A successful career is a key aspect of achieving a rich life, and this method…
• The Little Things That Make Life Meaningful November 27, 2019-
  To appreciate the biggest things in life, like our health and wealth, it is sometimes important to first focus on the little things that make us happy.
• How Successful People Use Their Spare Time November 20, 2019-
  An hour of time may not seem like much in the short term, but how you spend your spare time over the years really adds up on the journey to a rich life.
• Do More With Less: Ending Boring Meetings November 6, 2019-
  Meetings are a necessary evil, but they have to be productive and efficient. Here’s a definitive guide on setting a purpose and conducting a successful meeting.
• Making Meetings Great Again: Bringing a Business Mindset to Political Meetings October 16, 2019-
  One way to wealth that we often discuss is starting your own business, but how you run that business is also key. Are your meetings productive or wasteful?
• Do You Have the Mindset of a Champion? October 9, 2019-
  In order to achieve a rich life, it may seem like you need to have natural talent and the mindset of a champion. But there is another door you can use to find success.
• Make 3 People Smile Today October 2, 2019-
  Charisma is an important skill for achieving success and a rich life. It doesn’t come naturally to everyone, but luckily there’s a simple way to be charming.
• How to Be an Information User, Not an Information Junkie September 4, 2019-
  Information junkies get a rush from buying into the newest books and training courses. But how they actually use the information is the key to a rich life.
• So You’re Old… That Doesn’t Mean You’re Done July 31, 2019-
  Hitting 60 can be a tough milestone, especially if you’re not happy with your finances. Mark Ford explains what to do to get healthy and create wealth.
• Retirement: Don’t Make This Common but Very Costly Mistake July 17, 2019-
  Retirement planning can be complicated, and many retirees make one common mistake. Mark Ford explains how to avoid it and plan for a happy retirement.

More articles by Mark >>

Liberty Through Wealth Advisory Panelist Mark Skousen relates to Benjamin Franklin in more ways than one.

Like Franklin, Mark has a rags-to-riches story. He grew up in Portland, Oregon, in a family of 10 children. And after finishing school, he became a successful entrepreneur and publisher.

Like Franklin, Mark has a doctorate (in economics and monetary history), which he earned from George Washington University. In addition to having taught economics and finance at Columbia Business School, Mark is currently the Benjamin Franklin Presidential Professor at Chapman University in California.

Franklin published the Pennsylvania Gazette and Poor Richard’s Almanac. Since 1980, Mark has been the editor-in-chief of the award-winning investment newsletter Forecasts & Strategies.

Franklin was a diplomat and secret negotiator with the French and other allies. Mark was an economic analyst for the CIA in the early ’70s.

Like Franklin, Mark is a successful author and publisher of books, including The Maxims of Wall Street and Investing in One Lesson. In 2006, upon the 300th anniversary of Franklin’s birth, he and his wife completed Franklin’s famously unfinished autobiography under the title, The Compleated Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin (Volume Two: 1757-1790).

Like Franklin, Mark is a true believer in reason, self-determination, hard work and liberty. He is the founder of FreedomFest, an annual gathering in Las Vegas of the freedom movement from around the world.

And finally, like Franklin, Mark is married with five children and five grandchildren. He’s also lived abroad in eight countries and visited more than 77.

With all these uncanny comparisons, it shouldn’t surprise you to learn that not only does Mark relate to our revered founding father but he is, in fact, an eighth-generation direct descendant of Franklin himself.

From 2005 to 2007, Mark was the Chairman of Investment U, the predecessor of Liberty Through Wealth. It’s given that lineage that he continues to write for it today as a monthly contributor.

Articles by Mark

• Invest in Stocks or Start a Business? Talk to Chuck! October 23, 2019-
  What’s the secret of wealth, starting your own business or investing in stocks? Contributor Mark Skousen sat down with Charles Schwab himself to find out.
• Warren Buffett’s Success Is Due to Skill, Talent and Experience September 25, 2019-
  Although some people believe Warren Buffett’s luck may be running out, others feel that his investment strategies will stand the test of time.
• Gold Finally Makes a Comeback… For Good? August 28, 2019-
  It’s been a long time since gold has seen the spotlight. Is it finally here to stay? Maybe not, but investors can access future profits with a gold ETF.
• Kevin O’Leary on the “Cold Hard Truth” About Money and Investing July 24, 2019-
  At this year’s FreedomFest, Kevin O’Leary shared his “cold hard truth.” Mark Skousen discusses which of O’Leary’s ideas resonate for building wealth.
• Is the No. 1 Goal to Maximize the Stock Price? June 27, 2019-
  Some business leaders feel it should be all about making money for the shareholders, while others seek a higher purpose. Which approach is best?
• The Inside Story From Two Billionaire Entrepreneurs May 24, 2019-
  Two of the world’s most creative billionaire entrepreneurs have some interesting advice to share about entrepreneurship and building wealth.
• Should You Invest on a Hunch? April 24, 2019-
  Sometimes taking a gamble on a sports bet pays off, but can you trust your gut instincts when it comes to investing? Many Wall Street veterans offer similar advice...
• Bull Markets Are Lasting Longer and Getting Stronger March 13, 2019-
  Ten years ago marked the beginning of the longest bull market on record.
• Will China Survive Its Crisis? An Interview With the Legendary Mark Mobius February 20, 2019-
  Mark Mobius has survived and prospered in the toughest place to invest in the world: emerging markets.
• The Strong Case for Dividend Stocks January 23, 2019-
  The general belief is companies that have publicly announced a high and growing dividend policy are likely to work hard to continue their income policy.

More articles by Mark >>