The Phil Bak Podcast: Recent Episodes
Phil Bak
The Phil Bak Podcast takes you deep into the worlds of economics, investing and entrepreneurship as Phil talks to the innovators who challenge conventional thinking and exploring the narratives that are driving market moves.
Meb Faber explains how America built the world's greatest stock market, and why investors now pay record prices to own it.
Aaron Brown rejoins the podcast to talk about his new book Wrong Number, and how to be skeptical when you read studies and statistics, and how smart people get fooled by official studies and credentialed experts - without a trader's mindset can cut through the fog.
Andrew Jeffrey talks cap rates, bad incentives, AI underwriting, tokenization, and why San Francisco multifamily is the contrarian CRE trade hiding in plain sight.
Layoff fears dominate the headlines but opportunity hides beneath. Khe explains how AI will cut your expenses, grow your revenue, and streamline your job.
Understanding the concept of decentralization, instutitional rot, and why this trade resonates so strongly with a generation.
Brad Hargreaves explains how AI, automation, sensors, and innovation are transforming multifamily operations and evolving the real estate industry.
Nate explains everything happening in the ETF industry, from the ethics and economics of retail product design to asset managers bringing ETF tax efficiency to mutual funds through share class filings, and more.
Adam Blumberg's journey from stand-up comedy to advising financial advisors on crypto, and how he built Protocol Wealth entirely on decentralized finance rails.
How does a Philadelphia bartender become one of the top finance writers in just a few years? By reading just a little bit more, going just a little bit deeper, building personal relationships, and trusting his nose for bullshit.
This is Quoth the Raven's story.
Randy Zisler talks about his new book on CRE investing, best practices, and how bad incentives are keeping people from utilizing better public REIT valuations.
Adam Singer unpacks how corporatism and compliance crush authentic voices, while grifters thrive in finance and crypto. He explains how AI-generated writing is like sending a robot to the gym, AI content farms flooding the internet, and why advertisers still get duped by hollow metrics. Ultimately, he explains, it is trust - not clicks - that is what really matters.
Dan Joseph explains his Berkshire-style model combining private housing investing with public REIT bets to exploit wrapper-driven mispricings, and how supply drives Real Estate pricing.
Jared Dillian opens up about meritocracy, authenticity, spirituality, and trading with stoicism.
Leyla Kunimoto from Accredited Investor Insight gives a masterclass on LP investing. She explains how LPs evaluate venture capital pitch decks, explains how Private Equity Real Estate differs from NAV REITs and Private REITs, whether PE managers are better investment than their funds, the market’s lukewarm response to the PRIV ETF, and ends with an explanation to the persistent gap between public and private real estate prices.
Nick Maggiulli joins Phil Bak to talk through The Wealth Ladder — a thoughtful framework for building wealth and using money as a tool for freedom, rather than ego. Nick explains the psychology of spending, lifestyle creep, risk management, and the difference between grocery freedom and yacht regret.
After a near-death experience on a mountain trail, Adrian Jones rethinks everything and emerges with a clear mission to help others live more authentic lives.
Charles Frischer runs a family office and is the largest shareholder of Regional Health Properties. He explains his battle to unlock value in the micro‑cap “zombie” REIT. He exposes ignored $4‑plus offers, skewers management’s merger ploy, and invites real operators to seize an easy eight‑figure upside.
Eric Balchunas is the author of The Bogle Effect and The Institutional ETF Toolbox. He is the host of ETF IQ on Bloomberg and the Trillions podcast. On this episode we talk about the bitcoin ETF approval saga, whether independent issuers were treated fairly by the SEC, and why mutual fund ETF share class filings are the bigger story.
Hunter Hopcroft dissects why passive indexing fails in real estate, builds a case for economic realism in “a world the Keynesians built”, and shares reflections on writing and the role of AI in modern finance in a smart, sharp and soulful podcast episode.
Bob Pisani has covered markets for CNBC for 35 years. He is the author of “Shut Up and Keep Talking: Lessons on Life and Investing from the Floor of the New York Stock Exchange”. On this podcast we talk about how financial media is changing, the creator economy, AI, the NYSE trading floor, and reflections on Bob’s legendary CNBC career.
How fraud and waste turned affordable housing initiatives into a fee machine
Elliott White writes on Substack and Twitter/X under the handle ResetBasis.
At Hayden Glade, Elliott oversees the company's strategic direction through acquisitions, financing, and investor relations. Under Elliott’s leadership, Hayden Glade has acquired more than 3,000 units through relationships with public/private for-profit owners, nonprofit partnerships, and the trust of various public entities in different municipalities.
Before founding Hayden Glade, Elliott was the head of acquisitions for Weston Associates, a regional affordable housing developer in Boston. At Weston Associates, Mr. White worked on various acquisition-rehab projects in Massachusetts, New Jersey, Georgia, Virginia, Maryland, Louisiana, and Mississippi. These projects utilized many different programs, including Low-Income Housing Tax Credits (federal and state), 1602 exchange programs, Section 8 rental assistance, Section 13A, Section 202, Section 236, HOME funds, CDBG funds, NHTF, and other subordinate debt.
Carol Roth writes a weekly newsletter, sign up at CarolRoth.com/news. She has a Legacy Planning System at futurefile.com, and she is the author of The War on Small Business and You Will Own Nothing.
Phil is joined by friend of the show Ben Hunt for his fourth appearance on the podcast. Ben Hunt holds a PhD in Political Science from Harvard University, is the co-founder and CIO of Epsilon Theory, and co-founder of Second Foundation Partners. Ben and Phil discuss narratives driving flows in markets, the incentivization of risk-taking by financial and government institutions, and the issues that have arisen within American academia over the past several years.
Richard Adler was a co-founder and former Managing Director of EII Capital Management, an investment advisory firm for over 38 years managing REIT portfolios beginning in 1986. He has sat on the advisory board of Armada since its founding, and is a storied entrepreneur and business leader. Richard joins Phil to discuss REITs, investment, and reflect on his career spanning over 4 decades.
Cliff Asness is the founder, Managing Principal and Chief Investment Officer at AQR Capital Management. Phil joins Cliff at his AQR office to chat about market concentration, value investing, and the market environment as a whole. Through the conversation, Cliff shares a wealth of knowledge and perspectives from his 30+ years of experience in the asset management space.
Michael Antonelli is a market strategist at Baird Private Wealth Management and author of the "Bull and Baird" blog. In a world where there is no shortage of anxiety inducing doomsday narratives, Michael stands out by being a bullish optimist. Michael makes the case for communicating about the market using common language, using a data driven approach to being bullish, and navigating uncertainty with more confidence.
Jared Dillian, author and investment strategist, joins the Phil Bak podcast. He is the author of books such as No Worries: How to live a stress-free financial life, and Street Freak: A Memoir of Money and Madness. Jared and Phil discuss financial freedom, hard work, rules for success, and taking control over your financial outcomes.
Mike Green, CFA, is the Portfolio Manager and Chief Strategist at Simplify Asset Management. Mike and Phil discuss the over-emphasis of indexing, passive investment, and low fee competition causing potential hazards in investing. This includes large cap companies receiving the bulk of capital, reduced reward for conducting fundamental analysis, and more.
Phil Bak sits down with Rob Simone, managing director of Hedgeye Risk Management. Rob has over 15 years of corporate equity research within the REIT sector. Rob joins Phil today to discuss his famous short call on Medical Properties Trust.
Phil sits down with Randall Zisler to discuss real estate and REITs. Randall is the co-founder of Zisler Capital Associates and a highly respected academic with a number of works on real estate investing, economics, and finance. In his conversation with Phil, he shares a wealth of knowledge pertaining to real estate valuations, REITs, public vs private real estate investment, and more.
In this reposted podcast, Phil sits down with Meb Faber and explains his mission and strategy in the real estate space. This conversation is the "why" behind what Phil does on the day to day, trying to create unique value within the real estate investment market. This episode is censored when Phil or Meb directly mention particular funds by name.
Phil sits down with Shana Sissel to discuss her journey founding Banrion Capital and her alternative investment strategy.
Phil revisits his discussion with David Kotok (Cofounder, Cumberland Advisors) recorded in early 2020. David and Phil discuss entrepreneurship, surviving difficult market conditions, and the benefits of studying history and math. David reflects on his career and shares his experiences and insights from decades spent in the industry.
Michael Gayed joins the podcast to discuss research, launching funds, and dealing with having a large following on Twitter.
Phil brings on Carol Roth for a conversation about the WEF, economic regulation, CBDCs, media, and more.
Phil hosts Christopher Volk on to discuss his book, The Value Equation: A Business Guide to Wealth Creation, as well as other useful insights on real estate investing and finance.
Phil Bak hosts Axel Merk on the podcast to discuss issues within the banking system. Axel provides his insight on what went wrong, and what he thinks the proper regulatory response is for better banking outcomes.
In this episode of the Phil Bak podcast, Phil is getting asked the questions! Enjoy this replay from Grizzle's Twitter Spaces in which monetary policy, finance, and REITs were discussed.
Doomberg joins the podcast to share how they mastered the art of content generation, the five pillars of business, and the secret to their writing process.
We're back! Dr. Preston Cherry joins the show to talk family, life transitions, personal finance & behavioral finance.
Learn more about Dr. Cherry at www.drprestoncherry.com
Matt Hougan, CIO of Bitwise Investments, joins the podcast to explain Decentralized Finance (DeFi), decentralized exchanges, Ethereum, stablecoins, smart contracts, breakthrough protocols, Tether's risk and contagion, and how it all ties back to his potato peeler thesis.
In this third part of a breathtaking conversation with Ben Hunt we discuss narratives: how they are formed, how they spread, how to identify them, and the impact they have on the world around us.
This is the second part of a breathtaking conversation between Ben and Phil about how the financial markets are being turned into political utilities right before our eyes.
Ben Hunt is Co-Founder at Second Foundation Partners & author at Epsilon Theory.
(Replay from The ETF Experience)
This is the first part of a breathtaking conversation between Ben and Phil about how the financial markets are being turned into political utilities right before our eyes.
Ben Hunt is Co-Founder at Second Foundation Partners & author at Epsilon Theory.
(Replay from The ETF Experience)
Michael Ashton, Founder of Enduring Investments, joins the podcast to discuss all things inflation: how it is measured, how to analyze it, how to protect your portfolio from it, and how to profit off of it.
Catherine Wood and Tom Staudt from Ark Invest join Phil to talk about the early days of Ark Invest and how they built their business. Cathie tells the story of her eureka moment when she had the idea for disrupting the asset management industry. Tom tells us how he met Cathie and ultimately got an offer letter filled with exclamation points!!! Cathie and Tom talk about the early lean years, how the firm pivoted, and how her conviction and confidence in the firm and in her bold calls has never wavered.
[Replay from The ETF Experience]
Darren Schuringa, Founder and CEO of ASYMmetric ETFs, talks about battling his personal demons and persisting through an early career rise-and-fall to re-emerge wiser, healthier, happier, and with a new asset management firm.
Dan McCabe shares his story that began as CEO of a high frequency trading firm to starting product development shop Precidian, including an excruciating twelve year regulatory pause before launching non-transparent ETFs. This episode takes you through decades of innovation in the capital markets.
Adam Butler, CIO of ReSolve Asset Management, tells stories of his career progression and how his investment approach evolved through the years, culminating in a transition to systematic quantitative investing.
Famed quant Aaron Brown, Phil’s former professor, joins the show to discuss a wide range of topics, from his teaching style to poker to bitcoin, and more. Highlights include:
- Professor Brown’s unique teaching style
- How to have an edge at poker
- Whether factor investing still works
- Lack of creativity in quant factors
- The case for bitcoin
- The disconnect of intrinsic value
- Pulling the goalie, in hockey, life and business
Vance Barse joins the podcast to tell the story about how he left the hedge fund world to ride a Harley Davidson across the country, and how he found meaning, purpose, and formulated the vision for starting his company Your Dedicated Fiduciary on that journey.
Amanda Agati joins the show to talk about her recent promotion to CIO of PNC Bank and to give a macro overview of the markets. She explains what is going on in the Repo markets and across the macroeconomic landscape. She discusses what alternative data she uses to understand the markets, what the Fed is doing to depress volatility, whether equities are historically expensive, and more.
Stephen Sikes, COO of Public, joins the podcast to talk retail trading and why the segment is growing exponentially. Stephen explains how payment for order flow works and why Public chose to stop accepting PFOF on their platform. The conversation includes insights into social media, investor education, the difference between investing and gambling, and more.
Author, investor and entrepreneur Brian Portnoy joins the podcast to talk financial education, behavioral investing, the concept of funded contentment, and lessons from his new book, How I Invest My Money.
Julia Carreon joins the podcast to talk about her personal journey and how she became a leading voice advocating for financial institutions to better connect to Gen Z.
- Innovation and technology in financial services
- Why legacy firms struggle to adapt
- The coming generational wealth transfer
- Being self-promotional and out front
- Lots more
Eric Balchunas joins for a look at how the ETF industry changed over the years, and whether it remains "the Silicon Valley of finance". The conversation includes:
- Innovation in the ETF industry
- The Terrordome (fee war)
- The rise of Cathie Wood's Ark Invest
- Measuring Jack Bogle’s impact
- And more
Bloomberg's Eric Balchunas and Logica Capital's Mike Green join the podcast to debate whether price discovery and fundamentals have disappeared from the markets, and whether ETFs and index investing is to blame.
Dr. Daniel Crosby joins the show to talk behavioral finance, how he merged the fields of psychology and investing, the science of likeability, overcoming fear, his process for book writing, and whether Phil should write a book.
Mike Alfred joins the podcast to talk to Phil about his entrepreneurial journey as a two-time founder, his investing ideology, the case for bitcoin and what is next for fintech.
Dave Collum joins the podcast for a provocative conversation about markets, wealth creation and contrarianism versus conformity.
Phil is joined by Greg Martin, founder of Liquid Stock and Archer VC for a conversation about how employees can access liquidity for private company equity and options, private vs public market company valuations, whether late stage VC companies are in a bubble, the future of fintech, and more.
Alex Matturri, former CEO of S&P Dow Jones, joins the show for a wide ranging conversation about his career and the growth of index investing. Alex debunks some common myths around index investing and then explains how he built a brand at S&P that led to remarkable growth. the conversation delves into smart beta, ESG investing, the role of the index committee, price discovery and more.
Darren Riley joins the show to talk about all areas of the entrepreneurial ecosystem, including his work at Endeavor Detroit, his entrepreneurial journey at Rapids Air Quality and his new VC fund, Commune Angels.
Phil sits down with Vince Vitale, President of the CFA Society of Detroit and Director of Equity and Alternative Strategy Research at Advance Capital Management for a conversation about the markets and about giving back. They discuss selecting active managers, factor based portfolios and US equity valuations, and then talk about giving back to the community and creating a legacy. Vince announces the stock market challenge - sponsored by the CFA Society of Detroit - and about Junior Achievement of SE Michigan, who the challenge is raising money for. Finally, they talk about persistence and grit and how that drives Vince's career.
Register for the stock market challenge here: https://www.jamichigan.org/stock-market-challenge
Patrick Kelly, CEO/co-founder of Signal Advisors, joins the show to discuss fintech for financial advisors - including his new launch and how to advisors can seamlessly onboard annuities for their clients. The conversation then goes on to discuss entrepreneurship, early doubters, stoicism and more.
Phil is joined by Doug Drouillard, Co-Founder/CEO of Shrine Development, for a conversation about technology, app development, startups, and how social media and digital distractions impact our energy and focus.
John Bartlett, President of Reaves Asset Management, joins the podcast for a deep dive into investing in infrastructure and utilities. They explore the state of infrastructure in the US, why infrastructure matters, what factors drive the sector’s performance and more.
Phil sits down with Melissa Joy, founder of Pearl Planning, to discuss how Melissa launched her firm, gender gaps in the wealth management industry, personal finance tips and more.
Phil talks to Jared Dillian about creating and monetizing content across various mediums. They also discuss asset managers blinded by their anger at the Federal Reserve, Robinhood traders, inflation, and Jared's DJ career.
Ranjan Roy, Founder & CEO of The Edge Group and author of The Margins on Substack, joins Phil to tell the story of how he arbitraged pizza prices on Doordash and to discuss content creation, antitrust issues, Silicon Valley "platform" business economics, Robinhood and the game-ification of trading, and more.
Phil is joined by legendary ETF pioneer Jim Ross to reflect on his career, the state of the asset management industry and a fresh start in M&A as he launches a new SPAC targeting asset managers.
David Nadig joins Phil to explore the rapidly changing landscape in the Asset Management industry. They discuss ETFs, ESG, commoditization of financial products, whether you should trust this market, how to look great on a Zoom call, and more.
Nancy Davis, Founder and CIO of Quadratic Capital Management joins the show to talk about her fund and how it can help investors hedge against interest rate and inflation risks. She also talks about the challenges of entrepreneurship and how it has been difficult to brush off rejection in the financial services industry as she continues to tell the story of the fund and how it is designed to help investors.
Joe Smith, Founder of Parti Pris Investment Partners joins Phil for a conversation about entrepreneurship, direct index and diversity in the asset management industry. Joe discusses his new startup and how they are utilizing technology to deliver customized solutions to financial advisors. Joe and Phil then have a candid discussion about diversity and inclusion in the asset management industry, with Joe recounting his personal experiences and offering ideas for industry improvement in the future.
Liam Vaughan joins the podcast to talk about his recent book Flash Crash: A Trading Savant, a Global Manhunt, and the Most Mysterious Market Crash in History. The conversation includes details on how the flash crash went down, the aftermath and the resulting blame games, Nav Sarao and whether he was scapegoated, the complexity of market structure, and the status of a potential upcoming movie about the events of the flash crash.
April Boyle, Founder and Executive Director of the Build Institute in Detroit, talks about how underestimated entrepreneurs and communities can build lasting wealth and ownership. April discusses Build's mission, why small business is the backbone of communities, and the challenges in getting small business funding. The conversation includes how Detroit companies are surviving the Covid shutdown, the impact of monopolies on small business, and alternative funding sources such as community capital and invisible capital.
Learn more at www.buildinstitute.org
Phil is joined by the "Quant of Asia" Tariq Dennison. Tariq is the Founder of GFM Asset Management based in Hong Kong. Tariq explains what life has been like in Asia since Covid-19 hit, and how Hong Kong in particular has managed to contain the virus. Tariq then shares his outlook on a number of Asian and EM countries and currencies, and explains why he is bearish on gold as an investment.
In this flash episode, Phil talks about ETF classifications, listing rules, and why the Fed's actions will lead to civil unrest.
Tony Greer from TG Macro and the Morning Navigator Newsletter joins the show to talk global macro, what happened to WTI oil futures and the USO ETF, the dominance of big tech, the airline trade and whether markets are disconnected from the fundamentals.
David Abner, President of Dabner Capital Markets and former CEO of WisdomTree Europe joins Phil for a wide ranging conversation about the digitization of the asset and wealth management industries, where the puck is heading, and how the world will be changed post-shutdown.