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Welcome back to another week with Renaissance. The newsletter equivalent of a trading congressman that gives out investing tips like candy on Halloween.

Today at a Glance:

Master Your Investing Mindset In 10 Steps

US CPI Figures And How To Play It

Lessons From Rockefeller

But before we get stuck, this week we’re brought to you by Masterworks.

A million dollar Banksy got investors 32% returns?

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● Outpaced the S&P 500 by 131% over the last 26 years

● Have the lowest correlation to equities of any asset class

● Remained stable through the dot-com bubble and ’08 crisis

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The Renaissance Over-Under

Business, Money Markets & Financial News

Master Your Investing Mindset In 10 Steps…..🧠

If you master the 5 D’s no amount of balls on earth can hit youuuuuu….

That’s right, it’s gourd season and we’re here to make the last 100 days of the year COUNT. 😎🎃🎃🎃 Do you remember setting those goals in January? Where did they go? That’s right - you fucked it.

But you have 100 days left to start the business, take your side hustle seriously, make investments and trades… get your gains locked in for the year and hold onto your gourdsssss. 💥 So without further ado……let’s get your mind locked in!

1/ Get Rich Slowly: Successful investing is like waiting on your favorite girl to become single again - it requires patience, timing the market, cunning and then you strike! 💡

Investing isn't a total sprint - but slow and steady 7% gains only wins the financial race if you’d like to die with your money👀. And leave the "get rich quick" schemes to the crypto section!

MY POINT - my point is that you get rich slowly because

1) It takes a long time to create or emulate someone’s winning strategy that resonates with you personally. Investing really is a personality quiz and soul searching at its core.

2) And once you’ve found how you like to play the game, then you treat investing as a series of sprints just as you would in tech - your entry/exit/selection/thesis iterates and you tweak it. Sprints ain’t slow and boring, but they do take time to compound! But if you’re doing your job right it’s a lot more than 7%! So don’t confuse slow with sitting on your ass. 👀

2/ Four Fears in Trading: Understand the fears - being wrong, losing money, FOMO, and leaving money on the table. Some fear being wrong so much they’ll drive 2 hours in the wrong direction before they ask for directions. Know what bullshit traits you have that hold you back, be honest!

Trading fears are irrational and scarier than a haunted house filled with IRS agents asking about your tax returns *shudders.👻 But remember, everyone makes mistakes, everyone loses money now and again (I mean not Renaissance but hey you’re still learning!).

⚡ 9/10 times there’s a root emotional issue as to why you lost money or left it on the table. It’s the inefficiency of emotion that can ruin a solid investing strategy. Reflect on your trades, how you felt and your behaviour, i.e. did you shit yourself and panic sell, did you think you were too right and held too long etc.

⚡ There will be 1 emotion and feeling of the big 4 that you have more than the others and you have to be aware! For most people it’s number 2, simply losing money, and that’s the easiest to fix with a refined strategy you’re confident in instead of hearing this guy in your head……

3/ Emotions and Financial Decisions: Emotions and personal experiences shape your financial decisions. Scarcity mindsets or past poverty can lead to stick or twist tendencies - i.e. either frugality and not investing enough, hoarding cash and not using it, or even worse - impulsive shopping sprees if you can’t handle having money. 💸🛍️

⚡There’s 1 question to ask that tells me all I need to know about who you are - if I gave you $100K today, would you have more next year or less? 👀……mic drop, truth hurts don’t it.

Make a budget of spending vs investing before it’s too late okay!

4/ Price vs. Psychology: Price isn't everything. Psychology plays a crucial role in how we perceive asset value. Don't get attached; focus on fundamentals. 💰🧠

Think of asset prices like your crush's Instagram likes - they can be deceiving. Instead, focus on what really matters, like the substance behind the assets.

5/ Information Overload: Avoid the scatterbrain syndrome. Researching too many assets can lead to inefficiency and poor decision-making. Less is often more. 📚🧐

Ever been buried under a pile of books? Too much research can make your brain feel like a library on fire. Keep it simple, Sherlock. Decision fatigue to invest or not invest, your conviction doesn’t rise proportional to the amount of research you do.

⚡ I’ll give some advice here that Renaissance uses that actually seems counterproductive - oftentimes the signals you’re looking for is in a single stat, or a single graph and that’s the whole story. But are you reading it right? History and spotting repeating patterns is what serves you best of all. When you make your next investment - do you see a stat/graph that’s telling you all you need to know?

6/ Diverse Views: There's no one right way to invest. Many paths lead to success; embrace diversity in strategies. 🌟

Investing isn't a buffet with only one dish. It's a smorgasbord of options. Choose the strategy that suits your taste, not what everyone else is piling on their plate.

Little bit of index funds, little bit of crypto big cap, some small cap alt cryptos (what we like the most at Renaissance, our preference), ETFs, tech stocks…bonds! Split your money up the way that makes you feel safe at night and not sweating through your Dora the Explorer PJs.

7/ Group Identity: Beware of echo chambers. Group identity can lead to biased thinking and ignoring opposing viewpoints. 🤝🔒

Group identity can turn your brain into a locked room with no windows. Break out of the echo chamber, or you might end up talking to yourself.

⚡ For this, the best advice is to make a doc/list of good Telegram/Discord/Twitter groups with all different viewpoints on the same asset class and form a macro opinion that helps form the whole narrative - this is what really moves markets.

⚡ You have to have signals for sources of truth that confirm your investment thesis, and also sources that help you call bullshit - amazinggggg examples of this are ‘inverse Cramer’, you know you’re doing the opposite of what he says and it works every time. 💰 Or Nancy Pelosi / any congress member, safe to say they know what’s happening!

8/ FOMO (Fear of Missing Out): Avoid chasing the next big thing. FOMO-driven decisions often result in poor timing and losses. 🏃‍♂️💨

FOMO is like trying to catch a bus that's already left the station. Don't sprint after trends; you might trip and fall.

9/ Confirmation Bias: Seek balanced perspectives. Confirmation bias can lead to selective information consumption, reinforcing existing beliefs. 🔄🤖

Confirmation bias is like wearing a blindfold to a Stevie Wonder concert, yeah we’re all in it together but no one knows what the fuck is going on!

10/ Happiness and Wealth: Understand the correlation between money and happiness. It's not about amassing vast wealth, but everyone has a number…you should set an aspirational goal!😊🌈

Money can't buy you happiness, but it can buy you a Lamborghini and 2 Russian girlfriends, which is kind of the same thing. Remember, it's the quality of life that truly counts - and quality always has a price tag.

LITTLE BITS 😎

At Renaissance we personally watch this clip at least 3 times a day for inspiration 🤣👏👏

Sometimes you just gotta flex in weird ways to make yourself feel better! Harsh but we like the energy 🔑

American express CEO shows off his 17hr days and routine - we love a good crazy routine! It’s like a freak show hahah https://www.businessinsider.com/american-express-ceo-works-17-hours-days-amex-steve-squeri-2023-9?r=US&IR=T 

NOSTALGIA OF THE DAY

Crypto Market & NFT News

US CPI Lands Higher Than Expectations At 3.7% 📈 Federal Reserve Keeps Rates Unchanged At 5.50%

And just like that with a few financial stats and a single graph - it’s obvious that Bitcoin was going to break its bearish downtrend.

If it can push past $28K then we would say it’s a “go long” market, but in reality, for speculative assets with big market caps we’ll be moving sideways in this market……

At least until this stalled ETF gets approved……and for that watch those inflation numbers. 😉

Simple stats. Change your life!

Ghost Finance | $GFI

Super low market cap at $200k but really interesting. Alows for mixing of tokens anonymously and is powering some elements with ChatGPT (bullshit, but AI headlines move prices) - an interesting play if you’re feeling like a low cap alt weekend. 👀🔥

ADD launched, it’s a sub $500k market cap and is essentially a crypto-first polymarket which is reallyyyyy successful at gambling on market predictions and outcomes, a really interesting play…..

Wealth Building, Personal Finance Hacks & FAT FIRE

Renaissance is all about building a community of those who aspire for more. More in their businesses, more independence, more freedom, more confidence in their lives so that they can do what they want, when they want.

But building wealth and what it takes to get ahead aren’t lessons they teach you in school. They don’t even teach you how to do taxes fs. 🤦‍♂️ But all the information is out there to learn from the best. From those who have already paved the road, making it easier for the rest of us to follow in their footsteps.

Today we’re taking lessons from someone who’s empire and wealth building reputation precedes him, a man who’s name is just synonymous with money💸, John D. Rockefeller.

The world’s first billionaire. It’s estimated today Rockefeller would’ve been worth around $318.3 billion. In 2021, he would’ve almost been worth Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos combined.

But he came from humble beginnings, how did he achieve this meteoric rise and what can we learn? 🌠

For one he was ruthlessly persistent. He had a goal and he went about achieving that goal regardless of how many failed attempts and setbacks he faced. His mastery in being completed undeterred of whatever was in front of him is aspirational. His discipline was second to none.

“I would rather be my own tyrant than have some one else tyrannize me.” - John D. Rockefeller

To be the boss, you have to be the boss of yourself. 😎

He didn’t excel in school. He was considered slow, but he went about his work with persistence. This is something we can all learn from and is absolutely key to succeed. Here’s a little story that we love, just to illustrate what separates the best from the rest.

At 16 he decided he wanted a job and moved away from home. He wanted one with the greatest possibility for learning and advancement, making a list of all the potential roles in his town.

Each day he woke up, put on his suit, shaved, shined his shoes, and hit the road. Ron Chernow (who wrote his autobiography Titan) writes: “At each firm he asked to speak to the top man — who was usually unavailable — then got straight to the point with an assistant: ‘I understand bookkeeping, and I’d like to get work.’”

Rockefeller recalls that the economy wasn’t great, not many businesses were hiring, and the responses weren’t encouraging: “No one wanted a boy, and very few showed any overwhelming anxiety to talk with me on the subject.”

Yet he stayed persistent. He went through his whole list of companies without an offer. But then what did he do? He simply started at the top, and visited every place again, sometimes dropping into the same business three times!

Young J.D. walking out of his house again after 58 days of straight no’s…..

He treated his job search just like his job: “I was working every day at my business — the business of looking for work. I put in my full time at this every day.”

For six days a week, for six weeks, walking until his feet ached he continued to search for a job. Finally, he heard the words he’d been waiting for: “We’ll give you a chance.” A small firm, Hewitt & Tuttle, agreed to take him on and he stated right away.

For the rest of his life Rockefeller referred to this date as “Job Day” and celebrated its anniversary more than his own birthday. As this was Day 1, the day he started out to grow and build his empire. 🏗

By age 31 he had become the world’s largest oil refiner. By age 38 he commanded 90% of the oil refined in the U.S.

I don’t know about you, but we find this level of persistence and singular focus aspirational. We could all be more single-minded and focused on achieving what we want. To be the best, we will learn from the best. Another quote from J.D we like:

“Do not many of us who fail to achieve big things … fail because we lack concentration — the art of concentrating the mind on the thing to be done at the proper time and to the exclusion of everything else?”

Meme of the Day

That’s a wrap for this week! Meet us on Twitter to talk all about it. Where we’ll send you jokes, tips, and all important news from the world of money, business and crypto and more! (@RenaissanceDly)

“Net Return" refers to the annualized internal rate of return net of all fees and costs, calculated from the offering closing date to the date the sale is consummated. IRR may not be indicative of Masterworks paintings not yet sold and past performance is not indicative of future results. See important Regulation A disclosures at masterworks.com/cd.