Announcer: Wall Street Unplugged looks beyond the regular headlines heard on mainstream financial media to bring you unscripted interviews and breaking commentary direct from Wall Street right to you on main street.

Frank Curzio: How’s it going out there? It’s December 22nd. I’m Frank Curzio, host of the Wall Street Unplugged Podcast, where I break down the headlines and tell you what’s really moving these markets.

Frank Curzio: I went to see Spiderman last night, which was absolutely awesome. Holy cow, it was really, really good. So, my nieces and nephews, I think there was 11 of us in total, but people are definitely going back to the theaters, which is really, really cool. So, just want to share that. You get a chance, definitely see it. A little bit long. A little bit long, two and a half hours, three hours with previews, which you’re there for at least a half an hour with the previews. But the previews were amazing, because there’s a lot of great movies coming out, guys. A lot of great movies. I think movie theater’s back. I think people aren’t as scared anymore. They understand COVID, and the new variants, and all this.

Frank Curzio: Well, I think everybody’s starting to get it now. And, that fear level is definitely going down, because we know more about it. We know who it impacts, and if you vaccinated, you’re not going to get it as bad. So yeah, that’s definitely more people going back to the movies, which is great for some plays. We recommended a play. I’m not talking about AMC and stuff like that, but there is a great play that we’re up on, that I recommended. I think it’s going to really, really, really take off, especially with the new set of movies coming out just through February and March. When you see the previews, it is pretty incredible.

Frank Curzio: So, we usually do for this format, it’s Daniel and myself. Daniel’s back with his family on vacation. So like I said yesterday, I’m going to take some Q&A’s, and send those questions to frank@curzioresearch.com. Got a lot of them, which is cool. And let’s get to some of them, right, in this special edition, just for the holidays. Next week, we will be off. I’m giving my whole company off next week, because they really worked their asses off and did a great job this year, and we had a great year. So, I wanted to reward them for that and make sure they spend time with their families and not… A lot of our workers, they love what they do, they’re having fun. And however, I’ve been in this industry long enough, and you could say this for any industry, even if you love what you do, but if you’re working like a dog and it’s just taken over your life, remember you’re at the workplace more than you’re at home. Right? Any place else just about, not including sleeping and stuff like that.

Frank Curzio: But you have to enjoy it, and more importantly, you have to be able to take a step back, and just forget everything, and be with your families, and stuff like that. Because even we have big launches as, especially on the senior level like, “Well, vacation, I won’t take vacation.” I’ll be like, “Take it. Don’t worry about it. We’ll cover your ass. It’s fine.” And, yeah, it’s really important to me because I’ve seen on Wall Street where people do burn out and it’s not pretty. It really isn’t pretty, I don’t want anyone burnt out, especially at this stage, early in our growth and doing well and stuff like that. So, I just want to thank my team for doing a fantastic job. And that’s why I’m doing this format. Right? And then we have Nick tomorrow, usually do an interview. I didn’t ask anyone to come on. It is very, very close to Christmas holidays, so I didn’t worry about it.

Frank Curzio: So, Q&As this week, and let’s get to it for today, starting with Sam. He goes, “Hey Frank, happy holidays. Why list your token Curzio Equity Owners on tZERO versus Coinbase or other crypto exchanges? If STOs are crypto tokens, what makes tZERO stand out more verse established exchange like a Coinbase, Binance, et cetera? Thank you.” So Sam, when you look at Coinbase and you look at Binance, they are utility tokens, right? Those are utility token sites. They don’t trade security tokens.

Frank Curzio: Coinbase has the licenses to trade security tokens. They need it because the SEC, not if, but when they deem a lot of these securities, because they are securities, then you’re going to see all these companies on Coinbase, outside of the top five or six which have been deemed, they’re not securities. The Ethereums, the Bitcoins, these Bitcoin Cash, Litecoin, a few of them, but they are going to deem them securities. And when they do, they’re going to have to show all the financials. They’re going to have to show their insider holdings. These guys spent a lot of that money. It’s… You’re under Reg, but we’re a security token. We know. We even got audited. There’s not a company there that’s going to get audited, who is a utility token. Absolutely not. Right? Because that’s why they’re doing the utility token, because they can get away with a lot of stuff. It’s less regulation.

Frank Curzio: There’s some great companies in there, but I’d say it’s only about 10, 12% that are really good. And the ones that I see of them right now are coming out with very big backing from venture capitalists, and they’re structured in the right way, right, where there is an actual utility function, where some of these don’t have a utility function. That’s the only value of the token is a utility function. If there’s nothing you could do with the token, or buy anything, or use it for anything, it’s worthless. Because someone comes over and takes over these companies, and Apple says, “Hey, you know what? I like,” whatever, pick your coin token, whatever utility token, say. And it’s trading at a $300 million valuation. They say, “We’re going to pay $10 billion for it.” You get nothing. You get nothing. And so, you don’t have the equity stake, right?

Frank Curzio: Security tokens are different. You own equity or they’re backed by assets. I like the ones owned by… Ours is an equity token, right? So, that’s what tZERO does. And one of the only ones to do in the US, right? Securitize this open air platform, but very, very, very, very new. Again, I don’t like it to where we’re going to have platforms that are great at blockchain, creating digital tokens. And all of a sudden you become a brokerage firm, and a trading platform, which is a totally different business, right? We’ve seen that with Disney going into streaming. How difficult? You just jump in and that’s kind of like the same business. This is different.

Frank Curzio: Hey, creating blockchain and going through this whole entire thing, and then be coming in and say, “Hey, we’re a broker deal.” Or, because we bought a couple licenses, it’s not a… Like I say, it’s a recipe for disaster, but there’s a massive learning curve there when a lot of shit’s going to go wrong. And we learned that. We learned that through our process, right? So, tZERO’s been at this for three, four years now, finally opening up this market. Now the SEC has opened up, these are security tokens. Coinbase does have those licenses and they don’t need to do that right now, because they’re able to trade Doge and all these crazy coins, which is fine.

Frank Curzio: But if they do that, a lot of these companies, they’re going to run off of this platform, because they’re not going to register. They’re not going to show their financials. They’re not going to show their holdings. You’re going to see so much shit inside these companies, it’s a joke. And they will run to Binance, which they, Binance has a US platform. But Binance, outside the US, and outside of these US platforms, you’ll see a lot of these utility tokens just run for cover. And a lot of them will crash, because you’re going to see trading reduce significantly, because they’re all going to have to come off US platforms. That day is coming. It’s going to come. And, people may disagree with me and say, “You’re…” Look, I know regulation. I know the SEC. That’s the way to regulate this, because you’re always going to have shit that can’t track and defy, and stuff like that, and people losing money.

Frank Curzio: And it’s hard to control, because if you lose money in these things, everybody wants decentralized finance, just totally off the record. Yeah. But when you lose your money, who do you call? Nobody. Goodbye. You lost it. It’s gone. It’s gone. What company was that, that was asking that by accident, what fellow platform it was. Lost a couple hundred million dollars and was saying, “Get that distributed.” To people saying, “Hey, you know what? We’re going to alert the tax authorities,” or whatever. He couldn’t even say, “Big deal. Alert the tax authorities. You just gave this to me.” They couldn’t even say anything other than that. But you know, “Okay, here’s a hundred million dollars. I’ll pay 30 million in taxes to keep the rest. You gave it.” There’s no laws. There’s nothing there. Guess he’s going to be… You’re going to say, “Fuck off.”

Frank Curzio: So, you need the regulation behind it. Not to the point, it’s almost like our economy and stuff, right? You don’t want too much government control, but you need the government there to police, right? You really need this way. There’s a lot of bad actors in every industry and nothing you could do. And you want to make sure that these guys get nailed, if they’re messing around with retail investors and stealing money, right?

Frank Curzio: So, security tokens, it’s going to be similar to an E-Trade platform. You’re seeing lots, and lots, and more tokens come out. This industry is here now. It’s going to be, 2022 is going to be the year of the security token. NFTs, non-fungible are again, non-fungible tokens are basically assets, right? Backed by assets’ security. So, when you’re looking at these exchanges, tZERO is pretty much one of the only ones. There’s others that are opening, and like four or five of them, and we’ll explore. And then, Coinbase does go security tokens, yes. We’re going to look to trade on that platform as well. Just the way you see Bitcoin, Doge, whatever trading on 10, 12, 15 platforms, we’ve want to get more and more liquid. That’s great for us. We do that by trading on more and more platforms.

Frank Curzio: So, when Coinbase opens up, we’re going to be a perfect candidate. Why? Because, we did it right. We structured it right. It’s an equity token. You’re looking at our financials, are great. So, not great in like, we are growing, but I mean, great where we were audited last year. So, there’s not a lot of companies had audits. So, you have to go through all the checks and balances here. They’re not just going to put anyone on there, and which means there’s a higher barrier to entry, because you can’t have just any bullshit trading on it, but also you’re going to have high, high quality, and that’s going to result in institution investors coming on board. I think we’re going to see that.

Frank Curzio: But, right now we could take our company anywhere. We’re a financial publishing company. We’re in the security token industry. We’re probably going to open up a consulting, marketing subsidiary next year. Also, we could do whatever we want now. Right? So, it’s kind of like, going in different directions. Where do we want to go with growth? And, where we are right now is perfect. I mean, we could even really get into the metaverse if we want, start buying properties and different things, investing in certain companies. That’s what I like about this, where utility tokens, you really don’t know where they’re going, what they’re doing. They had a whitepaper saying, “Hey, this is what we’re going to do, and build this technology.” And they start investing in other tokens, which they didn’t say in their white paper. Right? But you got all these investors.

Frank Curzio: Again, it’s the definition of security. You’re raising all this money from investors, you’re trading this, people are making money. Expectations are high that you’re going to make money. This is a security, it’s a security. Checks off all the boxes. Okay. So, it’s not a utility for most of them. So, when that happens, and it will happen for a lot of these things, then you’re going to see Coinbase open up. You’ll probably see Gemini open up to security tokens. And, that’s where we are going to be in the driver’s seat, which I really love, because we’re ahead of the game. And we did all this. And I can’t tell you how many companies, how many of my friends are finally coming to me, that didn’t want to invest in this.

Frank Curzio: I tell them, “This is a really good idea, if you want to invest in it.” We had early investors. A lot of them are like, ah, throughout the industry, and we have tons of contacts through this podcast, such a long time. But it’s kind of amazing how many people are coming to me now, within their industry. “How do we create token on gold, and uranium, on this, on that, on the security tokens?” So, you’re going to see this industry start booming, but right now, Sam, it’s tZERO who’s the largest, based on liquidity. And we’re going to be trading on there. I’m going to say early Q1. We were going to try to push it out in like next week, and you know what? It just didn’t make sense. It didn’t make sense for us, because I know a lot of people are going to be on vacation.

Frank Curzio: We wanted this to be a big launch, right? This is like a really big event for us. I mean, it’s almost like an IPO, that’s going on the New York Stock Exchange or NASDAQ. And yes, we were trading on MERJ. We’re no longer trading on MERJ. We had to list for MERJ in order to go tZERO, and freeze our cap table. So, all the data’s already transferred. And then I said, “Let’s do it like fourth week,” because the first weeks, man, I’m going to the Consumer Electronics Show. Guys, tune in, TikTok, live videos, check out our website. I’ve given you so many different ideas through videos. I remember back when Kodak, nobody had Kodak. I did a live video that was three minutes and said, “Guys, I’m going to give you a name, you’re going to laugh at me.” And it went from $3 to $21 in six months. And, just different ideas that I see there from being in the market so long, and saying, “What the hell does Kodak have two separate booths here? What are they doing?”

Frank Curzio: I start looking at it. Insiders are buying. I’m like, “I don’t know what’s going on. You can’t find a lot of information,” but you don’t see big insiders buying a company like this, unless something’s going to happen. And, they got that contract and whatever. It’s lower now, but they got that contract with Trump, and then they got investigated for the manufacturer, whatever it was. But there was something coming. Insiders were buying it, and just going there and seeing the presence with Kodak that I’d never seen before, going there for eight years, these are the ideas I get at the Consumer Electronics Shows. So, definitely, definitely pay attention, guys. It’s going to be a lot of fun. That’s from the third to the eighth, then I have another major conference. I go to the Bahamas. So, we’re going to have this token launch pretty much the fourth week, or the first week in February, or the last week in January, because that gives us an opportunity to really market this.

Frank Curzio: Also, tZERO wants to market this, but we want to let everybody know, “Hey, you know what? This, we’re here, we did this,” and make it a big event where at first I’m like, “Well, let’s just get on their exchange,” and whatever. But, and it’s not an exchange. It’s an alternative trading platform, to be politically correct and compliance wise. But they call them ATSs, right? Alternative Trading Systems. So, but having that event in Q1 is going to be awesome for us. So, for me, being here those two weeks, three weeks, and being able to focus and not only that, look, we’re going on this exchange, there’s a lot of investors that are going on. There might be questions.

Frank Curzio: And being on the road, if I’m on the road, my team’s working extra hard to get everything out and stuff like that. So, we want to make sure we’re here for you, right? We have to make sure that process is smooth, because people who are listening to this right now know our podcast, they know our brand, they know our reputation, but there’s going to be a lot of new people who don’t. And they’re going to be skeptical, and they should be, right? “Who is this guy? We went to other newsletters, and they sucked, and they burned us,” and all this shit. That’s the audience where we want to build up right now. Right?

Frank Curzio: These people who have had shitty experiences elsewhere, let’s teach them, “Hey, this is how it’s done. You’re going to see us through the research. Yes. We’re not going to get everything right. But you’re going to see the work that all of our analysts put behind this research and new ideas, the boots-on-the-ground, it is entertaining. You’re going to get ideas, well ahead of the curve, which I’ve done all my career,” especially, going to conferences like the Consumer Electronics Show. I went to John’s Hopkins a couple weeks ago to look at this company, met with heads of two departments. And, it’s a micro-cap company that could be a competitor to Humira, which sells it. It’s the largest selling drug in the world. Really exciting stuff. I wanted to see it firsthand. So, just getting lots of ideas and stuff like that is cool, but that’s the audience we want to attract. And that’s why it’s going to be a really big event.

Frank Curzio: So, and I want to make it a big event. And, if anyone has questions or comments, feel free to email me, frank@curzioresearch.com, but I want to be here for that. This way, we can walk you through it, make sure that first experience is great. Because, if it’s not for those people, they’re not going to come back and they shouldn’t. Right? That’s the way everything is. I mean, if you’re trying something new, you don’t have a good experience, you’re not going to come back. So that’s, in order to grow our business, that’s where we are right now. Everyone that knows us, yes. And subscribers, subscribe to lots of products like you guys. But to really grow this business, to scale it, now it’s going out to everyone who doesn’t know us. And how do we market to them and tell them, “Hey, listen, we’re doing the right thing here. We have a great brand. We have great products and stuff,” and we have to show them, and that token will be a big step. So, a lot of people are going to probably sign up to tZERO, which you have to do to buy it.

Frank Curzio: We don’t get paid or anything, but if you want to purchase our token, you get an equity stake in our company. If we get taken over, just like a stock, you’re going to get paid. So, that’s an equity stake in our company and it should be based on our financials and how we do going forward. And, where we’re going with our growth angles, and stuff like that. And that’s the way it should trade. If it’s cheaper, we might look to do buybacks. If it’s more expensive, then maybe we’ll do a capital raise to raise more money. This way we could build the company up even further. So, we want to trade like a stock and get that premium valuation, and use that stock as currency, especially to acquire new businesses. But it’s going to be a lot of fun going forward, and I’m looking forward to the next year. So hopefully, I answered that question about tZERO versus Coinbase. We don’t have a choice right now, but tZERO is the largest. We’re going to be trading on it, in a couple weeks.

Frank Curzio: Let’s get to the next question from ML. He says, “Hey Frank, this is going to be a nice year-end question. What has been your best trade in your career?” That is a pretty good question. Actually, I would say, Uranium Royalty was really good. So just, Amir starting that company, I thought was a fantastic idea. I think it was 2016, and I was able to get in, 25 cents. That was very speculative at the time. I think I put in maybe 25 grand and then put in more at a dollar. And I know they did more capital raises after that, at $1.25 with warrants, and $1.50 with warrants, which I didn’t go in, because I was in early. So, I didn’t follow with the warrants.

Frank Curzio: But I wound up selling half at $2.50. $2.50 cents. And then, I’m letting the rest ride because I’m a big believer in uranium, and that is like the premier uranium company. I think it’s going to do fantastic. And it’s over $4. I think it hit five. I don’t know where it is today. I really don’t care what it’s today. I just think it’s going to be double digits one day, and maybe I’ll take some off the table, but it’s been a monster win for me.

Frank Curzio: Ethereum. Buying Ethereum at 180. Yeah. I’ve seen four, 500% gains in a couple months in crypto. That’s why I’m telling you, as someone who’s been in the market all my life that, you don’t see gains like that in the regular markets anymore. Yes. You could pick out an isolated example of a biotech, and you bought it ahead of phase two data that was positive, and it went up 300% in one day, but it’s very, very rare. And you can’t, you’re buying, look at Robinhood, look at Beyond Meat, look at where these companies came out, look where they trading. Look at most SPACS. I think it’s like 65% of them are trading below that $10 price now, whatever they came out at, right? Because these, they’re inflated valuations. You buy these things that inflated valuations. You’re buying Rivian at a hundred billion valuation.

Frank Curzio: So, a lot of that, wouldn’t you like to buy it at two, three, four million, $10 million valuation, you get that opportunity in crypto. And, the risk is, look, you’re taking on a lot of risk buying these companies that have no revenue right now, and that can go down 60, 70%. Could these other companies in crypto, and again, these are utilities that, could they go down a lot, 50, 60? Yeah, they can go down 60, 70%, but your reward is 5X, 10X, 20X. I mean, even now, if you look at the price where Bitcoins, wherever it is today, 43, 44, I don’t know where it is today. It was 66 and it came down, right? Over the past month and a half, two months or so. Even if you take today’s price and you go on coinmarketcap.com, and look at the top 30, and just look at an 18-month chart, they’re all up 20X plus. And where could you see?

Frank Curzio: So, it’s not like I’m pulling out isolated examples. I mean, you’ll see it in our newsletter, how many of them that that were up 30X, 35X, 27X, 15X, 17X. And they’re volatile. I was down 30, 35, 40, 45% on some of these things early on, taking small positions. But man, when it comes to crypto, again, I bought Ethereum at 180, I sold it around 1500. It makes me an idiot, since it’s wherever it is. I think it’s a little below 4,000. Man, I wish I held onto that one a little bit longer, but I can’t get pissed off with a gain like that. And that’s why investing is tough, and trading’s tough, because you always look at the what if? And now, you would buy something. Let’s say if you bought Ethereum at 180, you sold at 1500. Now the next time around, you’re like, “Oh, shit, I don’t want to sell too early.” It’s hard.

Frank Curzio: You’re like, day trading’s really freaking hard, guys. Most people get crushed in day trading. Most people. When I say most people, 98%. They want to be day traders. It’s gambling and you can’t. It’s just like gambling, when you win a couple of games early on, at the one o’clock in football. You’re going to bet the four o’clock, even if you don’t like them. That’s just, it’s almost impossible. It’s like dangling a big steak in front of a lion. No matter what, right? No matter what, it’s just, most people don’t have that discipline. “Well, okay, I’m going to get out at 8%,” or, “I’m going to be at a 8% loss, and let my losses, or let it ride.” Or, but I know when it comes to day trading, a lot of those people, they don’t have massive, massive, massive, massive winners.

Frank Curzio: List their options and stuff like that, but if you’re buying options and you have these massive winners, that means you’re taking on excessive amount of risk, meaning you could lose a lot of money. Most of the best traders are here generating small profits, small profits, small profits, small profits here, here, here, limited losses, so it’s really, really tough to day trade. But, those are two of them. I’ve got lots of them over my career. Those are two I recently remember. But, I will tell you this guys, my best investments have come, investing in private companies, or investing in private placements where I’ve gotten warrants. That’s really how you make a fortune. Unfortunately, a lot of that’s only opened up to accredited investors, right?

Frank Curzio: And I’m able to get in certain circles, and I bring that to Curzio One. You don’t have to be an accredited investor to be in Curzio One, but we offered three or four deals, I think, through Curzio One. One or two, I think are down a little bit. I’m very, very happy with them, but one of them is really, I’m super optimistic. I mean, it’s a fund that we invested in. It’s a biotech fund that has access to some of the greatest early stage startups. And, I think they’re up to eight investments plus, and holy shit, man, these investments are really good. I’m really excited about that one. And I’m really excited about the other two. And one was gold, one was helium, and gold has been kind of crappy lately, but I’m positive on this. And, I think we could do very, very well on these names, but that’s where you’re really, not that all those deals work out, but just having access and being in the right circles.

Frank Curzio: Because now, you have innovators and talking about how they’re going to structure these companies, and how to get investors in and stuff like that. And that’s the early stage, right? You get in there, you significantly lower your risk to the point where if one of these small companies becomes mildly successful, you’re going to make a fortune on it. You’re going to make a fortune on it. And even if they’re not mildly successful, like with these SPACs. I mean, when they’re doing these pipe deals before they actually come out, right, they announce that the company they’re going to take over and then they got to do the financing behind, and they’re doing these pipe deals. And these guys are getting in at three, and getting in warrants at four. So, even if that thing goes from 10 to seven, to six, to five, these guys are making money while you’re getting murdered. It’s unfair. Right? And, we try to level the playing field.

Frank Curzio: One good thing is Reg A. Now you can raise money through Reg A, but you don’t. When you see Reg A, it’s still kind of like a black eye a little bit, because if you’re going to raise money and you have institutional support where your idea is that good, you’re not going to do Reg A, because when you do Reg A, it opens a door to retail investors. But now you have tons of retail investors, all these people investing and say, if it doesn’t work out, these are the people that are going to maybe call the SEC. “I lost a thousand dollars. It was my life savings,” or whatever. That’s what you open a door to. I mean, they again, the JOBS Act, and Reg A, and the company in security tokens that’s trading on tZERO’s platform, Exodus, raised $75 million, very, very, very quickly. That’s the max you could raise. I mean, you could raise really big money in that. And Reg A, but you that level’s a playing field a little bit.

Frank Curzio: But still I see people using Reg A as a way to say, because their deal isn’t really that good, and they’re like, “Okay, I know I can raise money from the general public, because the general public’s dying to get into private deals.” I don’t blame them. They see all these other deals, people making a fortune, and the rich get richer, and stuff like that. And you have to have certain status to get into these deals. Reg A levels the playing field, but there’s still a lot of bullshit around it, which we’re trying to, hopefully companies just weed out. Kind of like crypto, a lot of BS companies using crypto, and launching ICOs with bullshit models, just as a money grab, same with STOs.

Frank Curzio: I’ve seen it as well in security tokens with guys have come to me, and I’m like, they’re like, “Well, it’s based on these assets. That’s what the ownership is going to be. And then we’re going to pay out a percentage, a percentage of profits to our shareholders.” I’m like, “You’re a freaking new company. You’re not going to generate profits for 10 years. So, they’re getting fucking nothing; yet, you’re raising $30 million, right? You’re going to put that in your fricking pocket to grow the company, when you grow it. You guys are the biggest investors in the company. But yet, the individual investor, they’re not even getting equity in this.” They’re going to get a percentage of profits. Really? I mean, small companies, their job is not to really report profits. Right? You want to put all that money back into the business, back into the business, back to grow, grow, grow, grow. Amazon did that for 20 years, 25 years before reporting profits. Netflix as well. I mean, that’s what you do.

Frank Curzio: So, I could report massive profits for my business, if I cut staff and I stop marketing, right? And make our business look really, really good. That’s, we’re growing. We want to grow our small company. That’s why investors invest in us, to grow this to potentially becoming a billion dollar company, not to just stand still, and be where we are, and we’re not doing anything. So, Reg A does level the playing field a little bit, but you have to be careful with those deals. I’ll vet those deals, if we have Reg A deals that come on across my plate. You’ll probably see them, and be able to invest in those Reg A deals, through Curzio Research Advisory, and also Curzio Venture Opportunities, and things like that. But that’s how you really make the most money.

Frank Curzio: And, for Curzio One, again, it’s a premium membership. It’s worth every penny. There’s not one person that has gone in it and said, “It’s not worth it.” It is a high price tag, but you get all of our services, all of our newsletters, everything, for free now, and everything we produce going forward, and you pay a $499 fee for every year. Right? And that really is like a maintenance fee. It’s not like a refrigerator fee in a hotel that doesn’t have a refrigerator. I mean, we have to pay, we have to distribute. We have to design these newsletters. Forever, you’re in this thing. Right? So, to pay itself off, and it makes sense, that’s what we do. But it’s definitely worth it, because you also have access to some of these special, smaller deals that I’m getting into, that a lot of those people have taken us up on.

Frank Curzio: It’s not a lot, it’s a few dozen that are in there, but that’s where you really make big money in private companies. And you want to have exposure to that guys, if you can. I know it’s hard. You want to be an accredited investor, but the Reg A allows that. And that would, that’s what opened the door for crypto. That’s why it’s $2 trillion industry. It’s the first time ever, you’re seeing the individual investor have a leg up on Wall Street, and Wall Street’s late to the party here. That’s why you’re seeing these massive returns. Not when you’re able to buy Rivian at a hundred billion dollar valuation, or Virgin Galactic with no revenue at a $15 billion valuation. These things are going to crash. They’re not doing any revenue, but that’s the first time individual investors get to see it. Look at Robinhood again, Beyond Meat. Look at these things get destroyed, man. It’s fricking insane. It’s insane.

Frank Curzio: Even Coinbase, as well. A lot of people who own Coinbase were able to get into that, and then, it crashed. It’s down to 240. A lot of these people bought above 300, three, four, whatever it was. I think it went to 400 at one time. It’s a good platform. It’s a good company, I just, but it has come down with crypto, but you get my point. As an individual investor, you only get to buy these things that have really expensive, expensive valuations, and you’re not getting in early, and to make absolute fortunes or life changing gains, you want to get in early in some of these things. So, we’re in the right circles now. And, we’re able to do that for some of our clients. I want to try to bring that to all of our clients, and bring good Reg A deals to you guys, as well. Right?

Frank Curzio: I mean, I want to level our playing field. That’s why I’ve started this. I can make enough money as you could see to easily retire, to support myself, just through a lot of these deals and stuff like that. But, I love what I do and I work hard at it. And, I’m going to bring a lot of this stuff to you guys, right? If it kills me. So, we level the playing field here, and you can get into a lot of these deals. Not all of them are going to work, of course, but you have that opportunity to make 30, 40, 50X gains. Again, and those are life changing. And that’s what you want, when you’re speculating with your money.

Frank Curzio: You want unlimited upside, and limited downside, which may mean your full investment in the stock, and a thousand dollar, or $10,000. Or, you put a stop loss on at 35%, where you limit your downside, but you don’t want to invest in something with 50% downside where you have 75% upside. That’s not worth it. That’s not worth it. You want to make sure that you have two X, three X, or more, and hopefully unlimited gains on the upside. That’s how I invest. So hopefully, yeah, it’s a good question, ML. I appreciate that.

Frank Curzio: Let’s get to one more. This is from Jerry. “Frank, what’s your favorite large cap to own going into next year, and which is one to avoid?” Yeah, I like that question. Given the market conditions going into next year, my favorite large cap is AT&T. I’ve downed it personally. I know some of you down it as well, because I have it in the Curzio Research Advisory portfolio, but once they get that deal done, which I’m expecting a little bit early, it’s definitely going to happen in 2022. They’re going to split into two companies. And, I went through the numbers and the data, and I understand that this deal has taken long.

Frank Curzio: So, the reason it’s taken long is again, it’s a lot of markets and international, and a lot of moving parts, and I get it. And that results in institutions being like, “Well, I’m bored. I don’t really want to get in this. So, what’s going to be the catalyst.” And, they said they’re going to lower the dividend a little bit, which they should, because I think it was like 7%. So, it’s going to be more like three and a half, 4% for, I think they’re wireless division. But when I look through the numbers, and so I mean, the value that they’re extracting by doing this is incredible. Half of this is going to be a pure play streaming company with Discovery, which is, and will continue to be the second best behind Netflix, by far.

Frank Curzio: I mean, they spend 30 billion plus a year on new content. The only one that could spend that much along with Netflix. I mean, Disney can’t spend that much. They don’t have it. They’ll say they’re going to spend that much, but they don’t. And all the other is, again, they don’t have that kind of money or cashflow to spend on that. So, you’re going to get new content. That’s the key to streaming, right, is new content. It’s not just existing content. It’s because you’re going to get sick of it, and you’re not going to pay for it, especially now, when everyone’s going back to work and everything. When you’re staying home every day to COVID, it’s different, but it’s all about new content. But you’re looking at, the new content that HBO has been producing is awesome. And they’re going to merge with discovery.

Frank Curzio: So, that’s going to make them light years ahead of Disney. Light years ahead of Disney. The other division’s going to be a steady, massive income generating wireless play, and that’s going to have massive cash flows and 3% plus dividend. Now again, it’s been so developed. So, I understand that the excitement has dropped off. So, the company has fallen. Probably why it’s not seen those huge institutional inflows, but now that’s starting to change. I mean, December, it just got two upgrades and at these levels, given the marketing conditions of rising rates and inflation, and yes you could say, “Well, AT&T has a lot of debt.” They do, but they generate $25 billion plus in cash flow every year. Free cash flow every year. And put that in perspective, it’s almost… Take out the trillion dollar companies, the technology companies, and these guys generate more cash flow than any other company in the world.

Frank Curzio: That’s how much money that is. Free cashflow, right? So easily, easily paying off their debt. Easily. But, you’re going to see massive cashflow coming in from all these divisions. Again, I really like AT&T going into next year at this price. And again, with difficult market conditions, I think it’s going to provide a safe haven. And I think, it could easily return 30% next year, and go up even a lot, lot more than that the following year. I mean, again, it’s down like 15, 20%, fell a little bit more, but you’re seeing the upgrades come now, saying, “Okay, this is a joke where it’s trading.”

Frank Curzio: And once you see this deal and how great it is, again, when I analyze the numbers and really dug through it for a while, I was like, “Holy shit.” It’s just, a lot of times, my biggest mistake is analysis, I’m earlier than expected, which means I’m going to be wrong early on. But a lot of times, that thesis plays out later on. This thesis, I think, is going to be, is play out later on. I mean, they got all the tools in place. These guys are really killing it streaming, and I think they have a ton of upside.

Frank Curzio: The one I don’t like is Ford. I don’t think they’re going to be able to deliver on all the promises when it comes to production. I mean, they’re trading at a premium valuation. You guys did great in the stock. I went back and looked at 2019, where I have a video to see. Yes again, I’m going there next year, which is January 3rd, January 8th. So just what, two weeks away? And I went back and looked from 2019, last time they had it, which was live, right? Last year was virtual, which kind of sucked. But I was at the Ford booth, going over the technology, even in ’18 and ’17, telling you about the EV technology, and the billions they’re investing and how good, and the stock was in the single digits. Right? I was talking about that.

Frank Curzio: Look, the stock is up a lot. Good. Great. And you’re looking at EVs and they’re going all in at technology, the Rivian investment, but it’s going to be difficult for them to sell their current fleet of non EV cars, because they’re promoting their EV portfolio so aggressively. And now, you have all these promises of production, which they’re not going to be able to meet. They’re not. They can’t be, they even said it, right? I mean, they didn’t say it publicly, but you could read it and say, “We’re going to only be able to offer 10%.” That’s why they stopped taking orders.

Frank Curzio: They’re like, “Oh, demand’s through the roof.” It’s not. Yeah, demand’s strong, but it doesn’t have to be too strong, because if you’re looking at taking percentages, a hundred percent of the F-150 truck, right, it’s the largest selling truck, whatever it is. Say, if it’s 10 million that they sell, they’re only going to be able to sell 10% of that. So even if 20% of those F-150s say, “You know what? I want an electric vehicle, because I’m going to put a lot of miles on this thing, and it’s pretty cool.” They’re not going to be able to get it. So it’s not like, “Oh, my God, we’re seeing massive demand.” That demand is coming from existing demand for the F-150 truck, which is going to slide over to EVs.

Frank Curzio: Now, they don’t have great technology. The F-150 Lightning is coming out after the Rivian, which is out now. You’re going to see some deliveries of that Rivian R1T. Rivian’s a much nicer truck, just go to YouTube. It’s amazing. It was just named 2022 Truck of the Year from Motor Trend. Rivian’s a competitor of Ford. Ford was able to invest in Rivian. They should have even took over Rivian. Again, they made a lot of money and good for them, but they’re competitors. And when I look at Ford, being a super expensive stock, they’re all saying the right things. I love their marketing now. They’re very, very good with marketing, right? They’re saying the right things, but expectations are sky high, and they need to get everything right in EVs. Because, every single major auto manufacturer is doing the same exact thing. So you’re looking at production, that timing is huge. Getting them materials to manufacture at scale for EVs, which they don’t have yet is huge.

Frank Curzio: You better make sure you don’t have any recalls on these vehicle. I mean, you’re going to see massive competition out there. But, we saw many companies saw streaming and said, “Oh, we’re going to get into streaming. Look at Netflix.” Yeah, it’s fun. It’s nice. But, you got to spend hundreds of billions of dollars over a five year period to charge people $12 a month, $13 a month, and Disney now understands that they can’t even get $5 a month, right? They’re lowering, they’re giving it away for free now, for a month or two. Right? Because they don’t have pricing power with it, because there’s so much competition. And they’re not coming out with their best free content, because their best free content is Marvel, which they have to release in the movies because that’s what generates the most revenue for them, billions of dollars every year. So, that’s not even going to be on the streaming platform until after most people have seen it.

Frank Curzio: But you saw how many companies want to go into streaming. It’s been a disaster for almost every one of them. I mean, same thing here, where it took many, many years for Tesla to be where they are today, including being one month from going bankrupt in 2013, which Elon Musk admitted. But it’s not easy to enter an insane capital intense industry, which both of these are. I mean, it sounds exciting when you say, “Well I’m going to become a streaming company, EV company,” but Netflix, AT&T are spending $30 billion plus on new content where you have Disney. Look at all those, Disney, Peacock, Paramount, Apple, Amazon Prime. Then you have the live streamings, FUBO, Sling, YouTube, Hulu, right? Which has streamed sporting events.

Frank Curzio: But outside of Netflix, Hulu is the second oldest streaming platform. And it lost close to, not close, but in 2017, it lost 1.8 billion. In 2018, had combined losses, right? This is like another $1.5 billion. And that was combined for Comcast, Fox, AT&T, and Disney who all owned it. Then Disney became pretty much, I think they’re the sole owner, if not, maybe Comcast. They bought that from Comcast and AT&T, and they took over Fox entertainment assets. So, they almost own all of Hulu, if they don’t own the whole thing, but I know it was like seven billion combined for AT&T’s and Comcast’s stake. But, losses have been so bad that Disney had a partner with Star, a very popular brand in Southeast Asia, to launch Hulu internationally because it costs so much. So, you’re looking at Hulu and you could say, “Hulu’s a success story next to Netflix.”

Frank Curzio: Let me tell you something about who, who has 40 million subscribers, right? 40 million subscribers, generating 4.4 billion in revenue. And they’re reporting a half a billion dollar in loss this year. That’s what they’re expected to report. Half a billion in loss, probably a little bit more. So you’re looking at… That’s the most successful streaming platform next to Netflix. That’s how hard this business is. Yeah. They can’t generate income. Same with EVs. It’s really freaking exciting though, don’t get me wrong. It’s cool creating the new EV. It looks amazing. By the way, you should see all the EVs at the CS over the past four years. Wait until you see them this year. I’m going to be there again next week, go to TikTok. I’m going to be streaming alive. Just all over our website, you’re going to see everything, really, really cool stuff. I go there, and we have a media pass, and I have access to so much stuff.

Frank Curzio: Wait until you see the cars, how beautiful they are. The only problem is they just, they can’t scale them. They can’t scale these beautiful cars. Right? But you have to see how amazing they look. I mean, Tesla cars are really ugly. In my opinion, they’re kind of ugly. They’re cool inside, but they’re kind of ugly on the outside. These things are great. It’s just, you can’t produce millions of them. But as you’re producing this, what does this mean? I mean, how do you make five million of these cars? Where are the charging stations? By the time you release these vehicles, I mean, technology’s going to be changing so fast. You have the latest batteries that go over 300 miles per charge. Because I could tell you, I’m not buying an EV that goes 250 miles per charge, if one’s out that has released, that goes 400 miles on a charge. Because, that has that battery technology. That’s important. I mean, it’s a big difference. It takes a while to charge these vehicles.

Frank Curzio: So, it’s a cap intense industry. Ford is super, super expensive at 19, 20 bucks. I just, I don’t… They’re not going to be able to live up to those expectations. I think that stock will fall next year. And we’ll see. I mean, if people still get excited about their truck and everything, and they’re just not going to be able to make, meet production goals, I think they’re going to fall short in a couple quarters of estimates, but we’ll see. Maybe I’m wrong. But get to my point, I like AT&T. I think Ford’s going to have another tough year. Stock may go up early on again, on that marketing stuff, which is great with EVs. But once people realize that they’re not going to get their EVs that they order, until 2023, 2024, it’s going to result in delayed purchases, which it’s going to result in weaker sales in these years, as customers are likely to wait it out until that new EV comes to market. Again, they’re not going to get it for a couple years. They’re not going to get it next year. That’s for sure.

Frank Curzio: All right guys. So, Moneyflow Trader, we’re offering a special deal. I told you why I’m doing that for you guys, 40% off the retail price, which is a great deal by itself. But, you also get a year for free, but next year’s going to be extremely volatile. Genia is killing it right now. There’s a period that you’ll see. You’ll see the portfolio. You’re going to see losses in it, because this is a product that makes a lot of money when the market does not do well and sectors fall, or again, she’s buying puts. A very, very simple strategy, very easy to teach. It’s on the website. She’s going to walk you through every one of these trades. You can do it simply through your online buying account. And it provides a hedge. Not only that, you can make three X, four X, five X, which she did when the market really fell during COVID.

Frank Curzio: And now, you’re looking at some of these stocks, the average stock right now, US stock’s down 25% off its highs. Think about that for a minute. And you look at the major indices going, “Oh, we’re down like four or 5%.” The average stock. That’s how crazy the market is. Your portfolio is down, and you’re wondering why, that’s why. A lot of stocks are getting nailed, because the Fed’s raising rates. It’s a different market going forward. This is a way to protect yourself and generate money on stocks that are going to get nailed, because even the ones that are down 25% are still insanely expensive. So, this is a great product. This is the lowest we’ve ever discounted it for. If you interested, that’s cool.

Frank Curzio: Also, I’m getting a lot of questions on holiday deals and, “Can I purchase a subscription on one of the products, Curzio Research for a third party, or a friend, family member?” So, here’s what I’m going to do for you guys until December 31st. If you want to take advantage, you can, if not, no worries. Every single one of our products, okay? Not the Curzio One membership, but every single one of our products are going to be on sale. So front end products, that’s the lower price products. You’re going to be able to get 60% off almost every one of them. That’s going to take them below a hundred dollars a year, which is Curzio Research Advisory, Unlimited Income, Dollar Stock Club, Big Money Report, all for under a hundred dollars. And, our backend products, I’m going to offer all those for 50% off. And that is Curzio Venture Opportunities, Crypto Intelligence, Moneyflow Trader, Big Money Trader. All those products are going to be 50% off.

Frank Curzio: We have that on our website at Curzio Research. If you’re interested, that’s my way of giving back to you guys. That’s going to be available to December 31st, again, only to Curzio Research followers who listen to the podcast. We’re not doing that outside of our list. So again, Moneyflow Trader, guys, if you’re interested, it’s 40% off the retail price. Again, great deal by itself. Also, going to give you a free year. This way you’re in this product for two years. It’ll help educate you on how to buy puts, how to protect yourself, and how you can really make a killing on some of these stocks that, if they decline 10, 15, 20% over a year period, or even more, how these gains can turn into three X, five X, 10X gains. And that discount’s available for the end of this week. If you’re interested, feel free to take advantage. If not, no worries.

Frank Curzio: So guys, that’s it for me. Again, questions, comments for tomorrow’s podcast, frank@curzioresearch.com. Love to hear from you. It’s going to be another Q&A tomorrow. Looking forward to it. And then, we have one more podcast on Friday, which is only available to our paid subscribers, which is our Frankly Speaking podcast. So, if you’re a paid subscriber, you get that podcast for free, right? And that’s exclusive, right? That’s off of iTunes. Otherwise, tomorrow’s podcast will be our last for the rest of the year. Gave my whole team off, like I mentioned earlier, really exciting stuff. They did a great job, but I will see you tomorrow. Again, frank@curzioresearch.com. Let me hear from you. Get some of those questions, and I’ll see you guys tomorrow. Take care.

Announcer: Wall Street Unplugged is produced by Curzio Research, one of the most respected financial media companies in the industry. The information presented on Wall Street Unplugged is the opinion of its host and guests. You should not base your investment decisions solely on this broadcast. Remember, it’s your money and your responsibility.