#100 Master MONEY MAKING In 60 Minutes: Everything They Never Taught You | Jenny Just

28:03It's not that common. Right. Like, does it still feel weird for you to talk about, like when, when people call you a billionaire, are you like, ah, it feels awkward. Yeah. It feels awkward. It's yeah. It's weird. But I also think, I also know like, um, to represent like it's important. Totally. So yeah. You know what's crazy? We've had three female billionaires in here in the last week. Wow. Is that great? Because there's not very many. So then I was like, what's our percentage? We got a high swing ratio. I was like, this is pretty good. What do you think about be patient? Wealth comes with time.

28:39For sure. Time is massively important. It's definitely a marathon. It's not a sprint. I do think there are moments that are not exactly that. Unexpected days, we make a lot more money than we should have. We tell our traders too, when you have that great year, think about it over a three-year time frame. Don't think about it as today's money. We don't want, because traders can be like athletes in many ways, way too much money at too young of an age. And we're really proud that people tend to stay a really long time with us. And being a role model who's conservative around spending, right? We're really also super conscientious there.

29:34Maybe too much so. We've definitely been criticized for that in the past. Like we're watching the pennies to close the end. It's like, well, if you don't want me to watch your pennies, I won't, but I'm going to watch mine. So. What, you said you do a lot of experiments at Peak Syncs. What are some experiments you do with your employees or to determine strategies? Because it does seem like you're a very systems oriented thinker. Yeah, we are. Well, we like to know what is working. It's really hard to discern, you know, what actually it is. I'll give you, this is a fun example. So my co-founder grew up playing hockey.

30:16Six years in, we got married as an FYI. So I know him very well. and um but always interested in the nhl and so when the opportunity was there to potentially you know be part of a team we were looking at it he at the time so let's call it you know early 2000s there were like six guys talking about hockey statistics on the internet you know and so and he was one of them but they're all really bright and uh we said well what if we took all of those people and we just brought them in as a class. And is there something about their approach, the way they think, that might make a different type of options trader?

30:59We did that with poker players many years ago, before I knew poker. We'd done that with taking the smartest people that would possibly come to us. That was a complete fail, by the way. But anyway, so back to our hockey people. So they came on and they were okay. They weren't great traders, but they were there working on, you know, hockey analytics. So if indeed we ever had a team or not, anyway, they ended up leaving, going to hockey teams. And, um, we were talking about this the other day, which is why I was thinking about it. I think the last 12 Stanley cups, five were either one, I think four, and then one was second place.

31:42Um, you know, whatever, runner up, whatever you call loser. But we're ex-peak-six data people. Well, they're data people for the hockey teams, but yeah, ex-peak-six employees. You're like, what's that movie with the baseball guy? Moneyball. Yeah. You're like the Moneyball of NHL? Yeah. Oh yeah. I mean, Matt loves, loves, loves, loves. So. Should you have taken a little piece of those teams? Yeah, exactly. Wouldn't that be nice? Yeah, the Panthers is one of them. But we ended up being part of the Minnesota Wild for a little while. Interesting. That's crazy. And then not anymore. So then is it true that the smartest people that you've hired for traders do not make the most money?

32:25We train. People have no knowledge coming in. So you don't have to know. You don't have to have a finance background, an econ background. You can have a history background. Matt has an English major. So I was an English major. I was a business major. um so we're looking for people at the end of the day who work really hard who are curious um and obviously they have to be above average intelligence like just to get into the math side of options trading as measured by iq do you give people iq we don't give them iq tests but there are lots of interesting you know mathematical ways to solve problems yeah um you know google when they first started all those creative ways of testing people.

33:09We like to do that too. Do you have like a question you ask them every time if I want to come work for Ginny? Do I got to? No, we don't. No. You know, cause I obviously don't want to interview these, the young kids anymore, but, um, you know, we keep it fresh because there's so much sharing and stuff that happens now, but, um, yeah, but there's a lot of culture that's involved in our hiring too. We're different than a bunch of the other trading firms on, on who we bring in and who we don't bring in. But it is, they love it when they come. Like that, that is one of the things we're most proud of.

33:44Though the other interesting thing is, is if they leave, we haven't had any XP6 people really, you know, create a firm like we created a firm. Interesting. Though that is also true of many, you see that actually, some of the other financial firms, you'll find some, but not so much. It doesn't happen that often, right? There's not that many option trading firms, for example. So, um, but the, the, you know, Sesquahanna who was O 'Connor, where we were at competitor forever is still there. Yeah. So, um, yeah, well, I met a bunch of those guys at AEI. I think I was telling you last time and, uh, and, and I didn't, to be fair, I didn't really understand.

34:30When I was in finance, I was in private equity and asset management, but like index funds, commingled funds, that sort of thing. And I always thought about trading. Maybe I did that in the beginning, but it was really like arbitrage trade. It was like for State Street, just making a market. And then I met those guys and I was like, and I think I could say this about them and they would be fine with it. I was like, you guys are weird. Like this is a different crew. Yeah. It's a whole, it's a whole different animal for sure. They're like physicists and rocket scientists that now trade online. That's yeah.

35:08So half of what you're looking for are these people who basically, they just see the world slightly different. There's some like sort of asymmetric little spin they have that everybody else doesn't have. Because it's really a commodity at the end of the day. But, um, you know, being in equities, this is what I always say, especially for females, like companies are about people's stories, right? Just like here, you know, it's about your story and following people is really interesting. Um, following the AI story is really about the people who are doing it. And so, um, I think it's a great place in the equity world for women to, to get their feet dirty because they can, they draw out that and they have real nuances about what they can understand or not understand.

35:56Again, because I see myself, like why was I able to, I was trained by someone who was really good at what they did. And that's what we do for our people. So if you're interested in the markets at all, going on the equity side is a really interesting place to start. So is the framework for being able to take more risk and thus potentially have more reward, it sounds like, and tell me if this is wrong, something like you have to do it more. This is your compounding experience. Then you have to do it, I don't want to say the correct way, but with some sort of mentorship or guidance, just any sort of risk taking, probably not great.

36:34It has to be some sort of structured risk taking. I think it helps. It helps move the ball systematically forward. I don't think it has to be, but I do think that helps for sure. And then what's the next step? If it's take a lot of risks, structure the risks, and then take bigger risks? I think the next step is, you know, again, there's this idea of risk management that I'm doing. How am I evaluating my doing? And you need time to go by. We don't know if a trader is going to be great at their job or not for a while. just like you can go and be a beginner poker player and be a pro you can that that happens you know and so um you need enough time to go by and then some assessment of that that data to start to tell a story it's like playing a hand versus playing you know an entire game of poker that's where the the hands add up to the game and hopefully you know the game I'm, you know, that your table, then your movie, it's like more like a tournament, right?

37:50Then I'm moving on to the next table and I'm moving on to the next table. So along the way is, uh, maybe it's, you know, the context switching happens so much as you're taking risk, you open yourself, like your aperture opens up so much that your, um, your regrouping becomes more important, not less important. And like, as we take more risk in AI, I make sure we step back and say, okay, is that really what we meant to do? Because all of a sudden we're in, we're in so deep, you know, it's the same thing, you know, like I'm on the turn. I'm on that, that, that, that fourth card that comes out on the table and I've got a lot of money in this thing.

38:32You know, the one thing as a trader, you do, you go home at night, you mark to market everything. If I had to start tomorrow, would I do exactly what I'm doing today? And if I didn't, and if I shouldn't, and I should pivot, I got to get out. I got to get out of that hand in some way. And some things you can't get out of, obviously. It's one thing to fold the poker hands, and other things you get out of a business or a business line or something along those lines. But the reassessment, the loop, right? You don't have to go all the way back to the beginning. Once, you know, you're on 10 times doing this, you're going back to 5, and you're reassessing 5 to 10.

39:08Because you got better. You went to a different level, one to five, then you went to five to ten, right? And you're going to come back and reassess, you know? I mean, there's no, I think there's no stopping learning. I think people think once you get to a certain, like, dollar amount or something, like, ooh, you know it. You know the answer. Oh, no. There's a lot more to come, right? I remember, you know, Matt used to say, you know, so what's your number, right? Yeah, totally. And we all would say it to each other in some form. What was it? Well, it was 10 million bucks, right? Then it was 100 million bucks.

39:43Like, wait, so then what, right? It's the same idea. How do you, life moves, right? And if you have figured out a way, but that doesn't, it's not a given. I mean, you know, we've had some serious investments that have been really big valuations that have gone to zero. Like, we're talking 13 billion, a zero. so that that those are real you're watching some of these ai stocks move around like people are getting hurt and a lot of people are making a lot of money right if you're in crypto so like every step is opens you up i think differently but i also think what i love and i love about some of the people who, you know, are following you is that I know where I want to go and I don't need to go to that next, you know, I think I have a, you know, a little bit of an entrepreneur's, you know, disease.

40:45You think so after like 15 turn around? So I was looking at all the companies you've like taken and grown. Yeah. It's not, I have to really consciously tell myself to know because it's interesting to me and people who are entrepreneurs are interesting to me and I want to see them I want them to feel what I got to feel you know even even the bad moments right they really have to be ready I think that's the the you know me in 1997 versus someone starting today it's it's you're not sharing your fails you know you're living your fails like I just keep my fails on my desk, you know, just the list. Do you really?

41:29Yeah. Like a piece of paper with all the things you lost money on? Yeah. Wild. Is it one page, two page? Oh, it's not. So it's not all the trading because there's so many trades, right? But it's the company fails, right? Wow. That's amazing. That reminds me of like Astro Teller from Google X. He used to put on his wall in his office, his failure resume. Yeah. You know, that's fascinating because my other friend who's a hedge fund manager, he does the same thing. In his bathroom, he has a picture, like really big one, and on it are all the companies that failed that he invested in. And like some of the emails of people telling him like, you shouldn't do this.

42:10And then he did it anyway. What is that? Is that like an inoculation to remind yourself you're not superhuman? You know, time heals things, you know, and that pain and suffering of some of those. I don't want, I don't want to make that same mistake just because I can. Um, why should I lose, you know,$5 million or$50 million on something if I, I truly know better when you have quantity, right. And, and I, and I think I heard you say recently, you know, why have three businesses there? Okay. We can have one really good one. I totally agree with that. it's distracting. Um, it's, it's, it's a heavy burden.

42:59Uh, but some people are just built for that. So the fun and the drive and the curiosity, can I, right? So we've created$2 billion, $2 multi-billion dollar businesses. Do I want to create a third? Absolutely. I wish I didn't. I wish I didn't. I really do though. I want to prove it. Why? So who? Well, it's really, it's really to me, you know? Um, and nobody knows, nobody really knows anything because we're a private company. So, but, um, you know, it was one whisper, one moment in time because we were supposed to take a company, one of our companies public. Um, and then we didn't, it was sort of in the spec craze.

43:43So that's one company gets leaked and that's how that whole story goes. But it turns out that story is great so that I can get more women playing poker. Right. Right. So that that's what drives me to to be in public at all and talk. But it's a you it's an itch that you want to scratch and you you have to be super conscientious. I don't care if you have a big business or a small business, but that desire. That's what the failure list. By the way, I have a live event. I only do one a year. It's huge. How big? Really big in Austin, Texas, just for people who want to make more money, buy businesses, build businesses.

44:19It's called Main Street over Wall Street. So if you liked this episode, you're probably going to want to be there. There's only a couple hundred spots left. So click below. I want to shake your hand in person in Austin, Texas, or go to msows.com. M-S-O-W-S. We'll see you there. Hey, it's your friend, Cody. By the way, guys, I just realized that a bunch of you are not subscribed, which is crazy because I feel like we hang out every week and we talk about how to make your life better, how to make your bank account bigger. And I want to do more of that. So one, thank you for being here. Like sometimes I'm like pinch me moment, you know.

44:51And also share this with a friend. Subscribe. The only way we grow is when you share it. And we only show up on your feed when you subscribe. So I promise that if you do that, I will continue to make this podcast a way for you to steal all my rich and successful friends so that your life can be even better every single day. Do you think you can teach people to love the game like that? Like to become obsessed with just playing, whether the game is business or poker or life? And if so, how do you teach yourself to love hard things in business? So I think there has to be some inherent desire that starts it.

45:32Can you put fuel on the fire? Absolutely. I think part of the way to do that is be surrounded by people who are amazing, right? Amazing in whatever way. so like we really we yearn for you know in the arts right when we you know fashion whatever it is like somebody you know matt's some energy company in the middle of utah in the middle of nowhere the other day just because we're so curious and so i think that curiosity builds um you know sort of the awe of being a human what other humans are capable of doing and And we so enjoy watching that. People enjoy hearing financial stuff from us, especially in Austin, which has been really funny.

46:21They're like, we don't know you people down here. Yeah, very much so. So that's been fun since we moved to Austin. We don't know you people. Now they will. Yeah, now they will. But yeah, I think when we are looking, I know you talk about green and red flags. We are looking for someone who doesn't have all the answers. we are looking for someone who's curious and wants to, to figure them out because I think it's inherently draw drawing ideas. We do this a lot. Like our very first piece of technology was because I went into a Wendy's and which is funny. And whenever I say that, I'm like, why was I eating at Wendy's?

46:59But anyway, you look like you frequent the place. Right, right. Exactly. Um, but literally there was someone there taking the order and then there was, you know, it used to be that big boulder of a screen was in the corner and maybe you don't remember that, but I do. And someone was doing the fries and, you know, we used to laugh, you're the fry guy, you know, but we, that was our, that was our tech we built. And because how were we going to, as a couple of people in a room, we're going to manage, because you have to, the, you have to be broad enough in your trading, right? It's not like we're Goldman Sachs and we have flow, right?

47:31Which is two people in a room. So we have to get a broad enough portfolio for this thing to make sense. But eventually it became, it was Walgreens. It was Walmart. Like we created an inventory management system for options trading. And nobody had talked about that before. We literally had off the shelf models where everybody was like the smartest people were using, were creating the best models themselves. Whereas we just bought. So we just approached the problem differently. How do you do that? I think by being curious about the world, You know, being curious about learning new things and, you know, abstract or angular to what you normally do.

48:14What companies have you invested in or built or turned around that you're really proud of but you don't talk about a lot? Because you have a lot of them. Are there a couple that you're like, you know what, we did this thing and nobody even knows? I think there's a lot of pride in turning anything that's hemorrhaging into not hemorrhaging. There's a lot of pride just in that. There's a lot of pride in helping the people who put their heart and soul into it to not feel like they caused a calamity and were really part of something that worked. It just, it just needed some small tweaks. Um, I think there probably isn't there.

49:10I think there's probably more that I'm pretty tough. I'm not, I'm not the one to pat on the back very often. I think there's a lot more that I think we could have done a lot more for. ultimately there are people who are behind these things right that I wanted some other outcome right there's more fails than there are successes and but even ideas we had that we you know thought could be interesting you know we were we were either cocky or stupid or you know we just didn't really understand it so much you know we've entered the insurtech space which is fascinating you know i didn't think anything was older than sort of like the way the financial world the the meat and the you know the pipes of the financial system work oh no yeah just go into the insurance side of it and it's a whole nother and but that doesn't mean people want to change yeah and so those are the things where i i mean i just the the weight of the world on like i know we can does anybody care right and i'm trying to bring a team along to to care with us and be different um an approach solving the world differently but you know they're big industries that's what i think also why i get the entrepreneurial itch because there are you know these smaller businesses that you can continue to do that give amazing opportunity for a small team of people that you don't have to take on that massive world.

50:42Unfortunately, we're sort of in that space. But yeah, I think I'm... You're big now. Yeah. You can't get the same thing out of like a million dollar laundromat. No. I don't know. Maybe. You never know. You never know where it might show up. It's funny though because one of my partners, he talks a lot about those types of businesses and he and I would always talk about them. And so I'm fascinated by it. I think there's an incredible amount of opportunity in sort of cycles. I think we're in a really good one right now with AI to help you sort of leverage it faster, like unique opportunities that come along.

51:24and what does that mean? Whether it's either just helping you on the marketing side or it's helping you on the research side or just helping you execute the bones of getting a company off the ground, which is always more burdensome than people think it is. But you have all those, the tools in your toolkit just got fucking awesome. That's amazing because I think a lot of people are really scared about AI right now. They're like not as optimistic. Maybe the builders, people who really understand tech are like, oh my God, every day I almost can't keep up with the new things. But what would you say to somebody who right now is like, I'm super scared of AI.

52:03I actually think it's going to take over and make me irrelevant. Wildly important that you get your hands dirty. Right. So, you know, for Poker Power, we're building tools all the time for our app, for marketing reasons, et cetera. I'm like, I'm going to get in there and build the tool myself. Right. What are you using? What are we coding with? Well, clog code. Have you ever used Replit too? I have not, but I've heard of it. But I think it's really important. Who cares that it doesn't go anywhere? It helps in so many different ways from how to think about solving the problem to how to get a thought into the world in some form or fashion.

52:49to at a minimum having communication with somebody else or technologist who knows. So I think getting your hands dirty. And you can't mess it up. You can't mess it up. Which is super cool. Yeah. And by the way, everybody else is getting their hands dirty now too. They're not experts. Yes, there's some technologists. We're not trying to compete with those people, right? There's 98 % of the world who's just like you. So we talked a little bit about poker, But if business is a poker game, what are the deadliest tells in entrepreneurship? What do we have to watch out for that we are signaling to other people as entrepreneurs?

53:28I think entrepreneurs, their biggest tell is their overexcitement about the possibility. And so they have a great hand. I'm just not playing, you know, because I don't believe. or it might play strongly against them, meaning I might exit. And we see that a lot because we do see a lot of newbies that do come in. We're happy to think and listen and hopefully mentor a little bit, but nothing can go wrong. And it's like, I don't know, that flush might come out and all you have is two pairs. And they're just not cognizant. But yeah, just a little naivete, I could say. How do you flip that around? So if you are really excited, what do you need to do to temper that?

54:19Is it having plans A, B, and C? Is it being honest about the risks? How would we get Jenny on board? If I'm like, I'm an entrepreneur. I want to do something with Jenny. I want to show her how great I am, but also show her what a smart thinker I am. Yeah. There's a bunch of things. We always say there's sort of not a formula. It's more like a picture. I think that they have to be aggressive on the offensive opportunity. They do. But if they can't address anything defensively and or they cannot, they have not shown where they have failed in the past or acknowledgement of failure in some form or fashion, whether it's in this product or somewhere else, I think those become definitely red flags for us.

55:03I want to know like you're gonna conquer the world but I also want to know how you're gonna methodically get from A to B to C so I think a lot of times it's really important as an entrepreneur to understand what's happening in the room around you like context is super important not only in you know running a business but let's just say there's somebody listening and they want to get promoted or they want to do better in their job or they want somebody to take them more seriously. What can poker tell us about reading the room in life? What cues? Yes. This one I love only because it's so relevant, the context, right?

55:45We talk about levels of thinking. So if you're just thinking about your cards, you might get lucky. You have to be thinking about the other cards at the table. Then you have to think about what they're thinking about your cards, right? So if I'm sitting across from someone and I want something to happen, I want more money, I want a different position, I want a different challenge, I want something, I have to think about what they're thinking. And I have to think about what they're thinking about, you know, if it's my boss, the rest of my team, I have to think about what they're thinking about, what they owe to their boss, right?

56:20I have to set, literally set the table in, you know, full color as opposed to black and white. And that's where we get messed up. It's like, I would love to give you more money, but did you hear, were you at that meeting over there? It's probably not a good time. You know, it's just, there's some things that are wildly simple and people are just so adamant. They're like, they've been so frustrated and they come in and they just want A, B, and C in it. And because they're not addressing the context. That's why when you sit at a poker table and you start to learn, right? And now you're like, oh, I'm going to play with my family.

56:54Oh, I'm going to play with my friends. I'm going to play with strangers. Like all of a sudden you go, oh, that's why this is like the office. That's why it's like that meeting. That's why it's like that conversation. Um, cause I don't know everything about the people I work with. And one fascinating thing we've done with our management teams is have them play poker together. It's amazing what our, our, our managers learn about their teams by playing poker with them. And vice versa. But, you know, obviously I hear more from the senior managers. Would an example be like, Mary always folds really early or doesn't put a lot of chips on tail?

57:36Absolutely. She doesn't take a lot of risk. Yeah, absolutely. No question. And then now it's a conversation. You know, it's a conversation with Mary. Like, I noticed this. Like, you want to do it in a way so that Mary still keeps coming back to the table, right? Because you want her there, but you want her to recognize. So what do you see? How do you approach Mary? And what did you do on that hand? Why? What if? One thing you can probably work on, right? And all of a sudden she starts doing it because that is way uncomfortable for Mary to do three times the big blind when she goes in. She just wants to tippy-toe in.

58:15So what message are you sending? And they start to learn. This is where the self-assessment starts to come in and go. Oh, wow. I didn't realize. So to wrap up, if there is, let's say there's a woman listening out there right now and she knows, like you said, her gut, she knows that she's not taking the right level of risk that she wants to in her life. She is a little scared. She's not sure what to do next. And, you know, she might not have even understood all the things that we talked about today. Like, what would you tell her? Hey, if you want to level up your life next, and if you want to change your mindset about risk and your capability, what advice would you give her?

58:55For me right now, because now I've seen the impact with so many women, hundreds of thousands, what the emails I get, the LinkedIn stuff we do, the DMs, learn poker. And I also say, like, if I could have learned poker when I was younger, I think I would have saved 10 years out of mistakes in my career. You would have had your third billion dollar company. That's right. I'm behind. Real slacker. Jenny, this was such a pleasure. I love your mission. We're going to put in the show notes the link to your website, which I think is, I loved the risk question at the bottom of the website too. It made me think about what my risk was for today too.

59:41And then also about Peak Six and then also most importantly, Poker Power, where they can go and learn more about how to play poker. Now, I think you were working on an app last time I talked to you. Is that out now? Yeah, the app is out, Poker Power Play. That exists. So we teach people in person. We teach them virtually. And we're doing it every day. We have 20 some odd teachers across the U.S. who are traveling or being online to help move the ball forward for anybody who's interested. That's wild. Do you think you're just creating a bunch of competitors now? Because you're going to get all these women now.

1:00:17That's so funny you said it. So my co-founder, Matt, he said, he said exactly that. You literally like one hour ago. And he's like, that would be a pure joy for us to be able to do that. I love that. I think most people don't understand that like at your level of the game, I imagine, yeah, you want to keep winning, you want to keep building, but it's also something bigger. It's like, what are you going to do? Take all the jets to the You know, no, I got to leave some behind. Jenny, thank you so much for being here.

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