#413: Mark Phillips on Why Derivatives Are for Everyone

Mark Phillips is the founder and CEO of Harvested Financial. He has spent much of his career at Group One Trading in Chicago, where he learned how to trade derivatives. In this conversation, we discuss options trading, what Harvested Financial’s mission is, how the product works, and why Mark believes everyone should have some derivatives exposure. ======================= Crypto.com is the only all-in-one platform that allows you to BUY / SELL / STORE / EARN / LOAN / INVEST crypto all from one place. Join over 1 million users currently using the Crypto.com app. Download and earn $50 USD using my code ‘pomp2020’, or use the link https://platinum.crypto.com/r/pomp2020 when you sign up for one of their metal cards today. ======================= Diginex is the first company with a cryptocurrency exchange to be listed in the US. That exchange, EQUOS, has been built to institutional standards, but is available to everyone. You can trade Bitcoin and Ethereum spot, as well as Bitcoin perpetuals, and get a 5% discount on all fees, by signing up using equos.com/pomp ======================= Pomp writes a daily letter to over 80,000 investors about business, technology, and finance. He breaks down complex topics into easy to understand language, while sharing opinions on various aspects of each industry. You can subscribe at https://www.pompletter.com

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Anthony Pompliano?

  What's up everyone, this is Anthony Pompliano. Most of you know me as Pomp. You're listening to the Pomp Podcast, simply the best podcast out there. Let's kick this thing off. Mark Phillips is the founder and CEO of Harvested Financial. He has spent much of his career at Group One Trading in Chicago, where he learned how to trade derivatives. In this conversation, we discuss options trading, what Harvested Financial's mission is, how the product works, and why Mark believes everyone should have some derivatives exposure. I really enjoyed this conversation with Mark. I learned a lot, and I hope you enjoy it. Before we get into this episode, though, I want to quickly talk about our sponsors. First up is Crypto.com. They're an all-in-one platform that allows you to buy, sell, store,

• 0:43Anthony Pompliano?

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• 1:28Anthony Pompliano?

  Digenex, and also check out the exchange, which is called EQOS. E-Q-U-O-S. EQ-U-O-S is the name of the exchange that Digenex has. That exchange, EQOS, has been built to institutional standards, but it is available to everyone. You can trade Bitcoin in Ethereum spot, as well as Bitcoin perpetuals. And you can also get a 5% discount on all fees by signing up using equos.com/pomp. Again, equos.com/pomp. Go check them out. Lastly, don't forget, I write a daily letter to over 80,000 investors about business, technology, and finance. I break down complex topics into easy-to-understand language while sharing my

• 2:10Speaker 01

  Personal opinion on various aspects of each industry. You can subscribe at pompletter.com. Again, pompletter.com. All right, let's get into this episode with Mark. I hope you guys enjoy this one. Anthony Pompliano is a partner at Morgan Creek Digital. All opinions expressed by Pomp or his guests on this podcast are solely their opinions and do not reflect the opinions of Morgan Creek Digital or Morgan Creek Capital Management. You should not treat any opinion expressed by Pomp as a specific inducement to make a particular investment or follow a particular strategy, but only as an expression of his opinion. This podcast is for informational purposes only.

• 2:47Anthony Pompliano?

  All right, guys. Bang, bang. I've got Mark here with me. Thank you so much for doing this, sir.

• 2:53Speaker 02

  Yeah, thanks, Pomp, for having me. I'm stoked to be here.

• 2:55Anthony Pompliano?

  For sure. Let's jump right into your background. Kind of what did you do before you started Harvested Financial?

• 3:02Speaker 02

  Yeah, so my whole background has been in the options business. You know, I walked out of college. I was actually an internship on the college floor that like I saw what that exchange floor looked like and it was like, you know, paradise, right? The energy that was going on there, the way guys were trading, the way guys were making money, like just the enthusiasm for that product and like the energy of that floor from 9:30 to 4:00, I was like, I have to be down there. So it was the pits that really lured me into options originally. Um, and then, you know, as the business transitioned, the business started to become more electronic, the pits became less interesting. I moved on to the more electronic side of the business, looking at how we could capture opportunity across the different exchanges. And as options kind of became more and more popular, you saw more and more exchanges growing up.

• 3:46Speaker 02

  So as a, as a market maker, our goal was to touch as much flow as we can. And sitting as a market maker at the center of the business, you see exactly what goes on. You have to price the options. You have to know how they trade. You have to know where they're going to trade. You really have to know all the ins and outs of how options work. And it was just a fascinating bootcamp to, to understand the industry.

• 4:07Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah, for sure. And so this whole idea of options trading, I think what most people think of trading, they think of spot exchanges, right? Hey, I buy and I sell an asset, a stock, whatever it is. Uh, options is a little bit different. So maybe let's just start with like a options 101 course. Like what exactly is an option and how do people trade them?

• 4:26Speaker 02

  Definitely. So I think people are used to buying stocks. People are used to saying, you know what? Apple's going up, I'm gonna buy Apple. Bitcoin's going up, I buy Bitcoin. If I buy it at 10,000, it goes to 12,000, I've made my $2,000. Options are a whole different other dimension, right? You have this derivative relationship to the underlying, and they have a sense of time too. So that's also a really important element, that options, when you buy a stock, you hold the piece of that company for as long as it's in business. Same with a crypto investment. You're holding that for as long as you want. With the option, you get all these weird behaviors because they expire, because they have a duration to that. And what you're looking for, you know, a simple example would be a call option,

• 5:07Speaker 02

  that you have the right to buy that stock or that underlying at a given price. And to be clear, there are options on all different kinds of things. You can have options on crypto, you can have commodities, you can have options on stocks. We focus on equity options, but an option can exist on any underlying security. So buy a call option means you have the right to buy that stock at that fixed level. Well, if stock goes to that level, you then are sitting on a sort of convex return, that you can use a small amount of capital and really leverage your position in that stock. If you think Apple's gonna pop, a great way to make that play would be to use an option strategy. So if it doesn't work out, you have defined risk, it's gonna expire, it's gonna go to zero,

• 5:49Speaker 02

  which is different than an equity. Your Apple equity might never go to zero, but the options are gonna go to zero because they have that timeframe, and they make for some really interesting ways to overlay on top of existing strategies. You know, you might be a long-term holder in any given security, and so options can complement that portfolio, but then they can act totally different. They can act as ways to earn income on the market. They can act as ways to, you know, balance and protect your portfolio to the extent that you want to secure it against a drawdown. So really, options can provide almost any type of feature and complement your portfolio that you're looking to do.

• 6:25Anthony Pompliano?

  So let's start with call options first, and if I want to purchase a call option in Apple, let's say, walk me through kind of how that works.

• 6:34Speaker 02

  Okay, so right now, Apple's trading around $120. I don't know exactly where we are right now, but around $120. So if I want to go out and buy one share of Apple, I have to put out, you know, $120. If I want to buy, say, the 125 strike call, that would mean that I have the right to buy Apple stock at $125. Now, with Apple trading at 120, that, you know, that right isn't worth anything except for its future probability of Apple being over that amount. So if I have something that's expiring next week or next month, what's the probability that Apple's going to jump over that level by the expiration period? And the big question there is the volatility.

• 7:18Speaker 02

  I think a lot of people hear options and they also hear volatility. So, thinking about that call strike, how much do I think Apple's going to move is going to determine how much that strike price, that call at that strike price is going to be worth.

• 7:33Anthony Pompliano?

  Got it. And then what about a put option?

• 7:35Speaker 02

  So, put option lets you, gives you the right to sell the stock. And so, it's betting on the opposite direction. That, you know, you can use that as a protection policy. It's a great insurance policy that, you know, if Apple's trading at 120, you get nervous with it dropping below 110. You want to protect your investment, you buy a put at 110. So that gives you the right to sell Apple at 110. You'll, no matter where Apple trades, between now and the expiration of that contract, you'll be able to sell Apple stock for 110. So, it gives you the right to sell with a put option and the right to buy with a call option.

• 8:07Anthony Pompliano?

  Got it. And then talk about the premium, right? So, in either of those scenarios, how can I earn premium?

• 8:13Speaker 02

  For sure. So, premium gets back to that volatility concept that the option has both an intrinsic value and it's got an extrinsic value. And that intrinsic value is if Apple's trading at 120 and the call is struck at 115, well, you know that's worth at least $5 because I can buy the stock for 115 and sell it immediately for 120. But how much more is that worth? Well, that's what traders, options traders are betting on every day and trying to price. How much is Apple going to move? How much is Bitcoin going to move? Well, if it's going to move a lot, if you have a name that's, you know, a Tesla or a Shopify or something like that that's whipping around, there's going to be a lot of that premium in there. There's going to be a lot of that volatility, extrinsic value.

• 8:56Speaker 02

  And so, that premium is both your potential as the owner of the option that, you know, Apple's going, I'm betting on it going over 125. But it's also the value that the seller of that option can capture. So we talked about buying calls as a way to buy stock and buying puts as a way to sell stock, but you can sell calls and you can sell puts. So if you sell an option, you're going to be the one that's collecting that premium. And in a way, you're betting against something not happening. And so that's another dimension of options that gets really interesting is that you can train them from both the buy side and the sell side. It lets you be the insurance writer. So when you write an option, you're the person saying, you know what?

• 9:39Speaker 02

  I think the probability of house fires in this area is 90%. If I sell 10 people insurance at $100 and I only have to pay out $90 on average, that $10 difference that I've made on average, that's your options premium. And that's the value that you as a writer of options gets to keep. And you as an owner, well, you're hoping for moves. You're hoping for that gas behind it to go.

• 10:02Anthony Pompliano?

  Absolutely. And it feels like what a lot of people are doing is they're basically already in the market. So you talked about kind of using the securities that you already own to participate. Explain how that works.

• 10:13Speaker 02

  For sure. I think there are two broad categories of the way you can approach an option strategy. So they're great at being an overlay on an existing portfolio that you have. So do you want to amplify that? Do you want to like turn up the gas on your existing holdings? Do you want to protect your existing holdings? That's a great way to dampen the overall volatility, whether you're reaching retirement, whether you're reaching a savings goal. Like you might want to lock in a little bit more of that money. And, you know, there is a trade off there. You know, you pay for insurance, that's going to be a little bit of a drag on returns ultimately. But that can be a very beneficial way to sort of dampen the exposure that you might get with the, you know, equity investments that you currently have. They also work well separately though, and they can be traded entirely separately as

• 10:58Speaker 02

  an opportunity capture and diversification element in your portfolio, taking advantage of a lot of those things like writing premium, using defined risk strategies to collect that premium and benefit from being the writer of insurance.

• 11:13Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah, what's so interesting to me is a lot of the options, one, people don't understand it, but two is you're essentially making a bet with somebody else that a thing is going to happen in a predefined amount of time, right? So you think that this thing, you know, A, is going to happen in the next 90 days. I think it's not going to happen and therefore we enter into basically a bet. There's nuance to it. That's an overgeneralization, but like that's basically what's making the market, right? Is that you and I have a disagreement as to what's going to happen in the future and we're both willing to wager risk for a reward in, in kind of wagering on what we think the future looks like, right?

• 11:49Speaker 02

  Exactly. I think that's a great way to frame it, that this is a risk transfer, that there's no free lunches out there, right? I'd be completely wrong to tell people that options are the secret and that, you know, there's a free pot of money at the end of this rainbow. They're just a risk transfer, exactly like you say. And I think what makes it really interesting from a market perspective is that unlike equities, when you're buying or selling equities, or when you're buying and selling most other underlying assets, you're probably dealing with naturals. Whereas in the options market, you have a lot of these intermediaries that are pricing all of the different strikes and stocks that have options listed. You know, there are a million different option series out there. There's not always natural liquidity in every single one of those.

• 12:32Speaker 02

  So you have this other important component in the market of these market makers that are sitting there, standing ready to deal at any given point. They're the bookie that's moving the line on the Jets versus Giants game.

• 12:42Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah, absolutely. Now, this stuff's super complex. You started a company to fix that. Explain a little bit about where did the idea for Harvested Financial come from?

• 12:53Speaker 02

  For sure. So, you know, spending all those years as a market maker, you really develop a passion for what the inside nitty gritty works. And I find myself talking to people and they go, well, that's kind of cool, but like, what's the detail here? Like, how can I make this work for me? And so what Harvested Financial is, is we're an advisory business. And so we're specifically set up as an advisor and not a broker because we want to take the pain away from people of managing those option strategies. I very much found myself trying to execute my own strategies for my personal account. And you're chained to the computer. You've got to be there at four o'clock when those, you know, option contracts expire. You've got to be there picking your strike and you've got to be managing this trade on a very detailed basis.

• 13:38Speaker 02

  So what Harvested does is as an advisor, we take all of that away and we're digital advisors. So we've automated it. So we have an entire platform that goes from recommendation all the way down to execution of that strategy. And computers are really good at moving all those levers in and out. And so by automating this digital process, like we've developed a platform that makes options super accessible and, you know, easy for people to integrate into their portfolios.

• 14:03Anthony Pompliano?

  Absolutely. And part of this, it feels like is this like robo-advisor for options trading. How much of what you guys are doing is educating people on how options work and why they should have it as part of their portfolio versus just simply helping people execute the actual trading of options?

• 14:22Speaker 02

  You know, it's a really interesting combination of both. You know, there are certainly people that are coming to us because they're saying that, hey, I just want exposure to options. And I understand that they provide these big buckets. And for that, we've really designed these model portfolios that we can have. And so you can simply say, I want the diversification of options and we take care of the rest. It's similar to like a target date fund or something like that. So there's certainly that type of client that just wants access to that. And they want to understand, you know, a little bit of where that's coming from, you know, get into some of the basics of how decay works and, you know, what is a put and what is a call? What does premium mean? All those sort of things that we talked about. There's definitely a distinct segment that are interested in that. But we also work with people that know what they want to do and they just don't want to deal with the pain of managing it.

• 15:07Speaker 02

  And so that would have been me. You know, if this company didn't exist two years ago, or I'm sorry, if this company had existed two years ago, I would have signed up with them and said, you know what? I want this call selling, put selling, you know, premium capture strategy. Can you just go and do it? So we work with people that have these ideas and just need them implemented on a sort of regular serial basis.

• 15:27Anthony Pompliano?

  Got it. And how did you guys actually come up with what securities to trade from an options standpoint? How do you set strike prices? Like explain to me a little bit about what's the nuts and bolts behind the actual product.

• 15:40Speaker 02

  For sure. So we've got a lot of our strategies backed by data and kind of the first project when we set out to form harvested was running a whole bunch of numbers on these different strategies and thinking about what kind of not necessarily to back test them in terms of an optimization standpoint, like we're not here to say that if you sell exactly this strike, that's the perfect level to trade at. It's more about describing the texture of returns that those are going to give. So what does adding a short premium strategy look like in your portfolio? How does that perform when the market's rising? You know, you can't get everything, right? So like you can have strategies that do well when the market rises, when the market, you know, is neutral and when the market falls. And you sort of like, what's the right combination

• 16:22Speaker 02

  of income that I can earn when the market's not moving that I can use to reallocate and rebalance? And so we did a lot of work analyzing the data behind what the texture of those returns looks like. And so we use that to help inform how to spread people out amongst the different strategies. So that's really what drove our sort of model portfolio selection. But really, for those really active investors, there are certainly people that know what they want. And, you know, they sometimes will ask us for data about how this is going to look and how that's going to integrate with the rest of their portfolio. Other times, they just know their strategy and just want it banged out.

• 16:56Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah, that's awesome. And talk to me about the product itself in terms of what the user experience is like.

• 17:02Speaker 02

  So our goal is to be as simple as possible and, you know, really try and figure out how much the client wants to get involved with their strategies. And so that's where a model portfolio works very well for people that say, I need a little bit of different. I want something a little bit different in my portfolio. You know, bonds are dead, right? Like, we're hearing that from a lot of clients that they go, you know, someone told me that I should put 40% of my money in bonds because that's what the 6040 allocation says, and I'm earning, you know, point 000 on it. So what, where can I get something different? So like for that type of client that they definitely can go in and say, give me the diversify or give me, you know, some income. It's that simple. That the goal is that we

• 17:43Speaker 02

  do all the nitty gritty of the strike selection and the rolling and, you know, for the most part, we're Finding people aren't particularly interested in that. Um, so, simple, intuitive, and education is really a big front for us. Uh, you know, we have a director of education whose mission is to help our clients understand how their strategies are working, what the performance metrics look like, you know, what strategies to select in the beginning and creating an interface that allows all this to happen seamlessly.

• 18:13Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah, and talk a little bit, I guess, in terms of, uh, when you guys look at the macro environment and all the volatility that's happened in the market in 2020, is that a tailwind for options trading? Is that a headwind? How do you think of that?

• 18:28Speaker 02

  I think it's definitely been a tailwind for options trading. You know, I, I look at what the OCC, uh, the Options Clearing Corporation that tracks all the listed options trades. Their numbers have just been booming over the last year, and I think that's a great thing, right? I think, you know, there's sometimes, uh, these conversations going around that, oh, retail investors are, you know, buying calls and it's flipping the market around and, you know, the, you know, traders that are going on these YOLO bets and look how dangerous this is, you know. There are certainly very dangerous things you can do with options. But I think overall, it's great that people are getting involved and getting their hands dirty because, you know, when you get into any risk class, the only way to understand that is to really roll up your sleeves and feel the pain of losing, you know? Whether it's traders I've worked with or books I've read on traders, everyone talks about

• 19:12Speaker 02

  getting burned and developing a risk management system that's going to help you kind of move on. So I think this overall interest in options has been fantastic. And whether that's volatility driven or, you know, whether that's just general positivity, volatility really makes options interesting and it's where they shine to either capture opportunity, right? Stocks start moving a lot, like you can put on some very odds-on risk-managed spreads, or you can use it to buffer, right? There are plenty of people that go, you know what, like, looking at the market going into the election, how do I protect myself there? Um, so volatility is, uh, you know, that's really the main pricing factor in options. So the more that moves, you know, the more excited we get.

• 19:54Anthony Pompliano?

  Absolutely. And talk a little bit about just how much leverage people can use in options.

• 20:00Speaker 02

  Yeah, so options, because they are a derivative of the stock, instead of having to buy that $120 Apple share, you can actually buy a call for $1, $2. And so I think you can get a lot of leverage, but the way we like to think about it is using that capital efficiently. So instead of saying, "Oh, I can 10x my money", that you want to think about it as a way to capitalize on odds on returns. So one of our strategies that might kind of highlight this is we call it the rolling bull strategy. So imagine you have a bullish thesis on an underlying investment. Your option is to buy that investment, or what we do with the rolling bull

• 20:43Speaker 02

  is we roll a series of call spreads over time. So if you think on average this stock is going to go up more than 50% of the time, we'll lay out a bunch of trades that give me 50% odds of that going up. And if you have some edge that's going to suggest that 55%, 60% of the time, Tesla, Apple, whatever your name is, goes up, trading that series of call spreads is going to be much more efficient for your returns, something like 2 to 3x your returns compared to seeing 20% and 30% rises in the stock. So that's where we really see the efficiency of leverage, but done in a very risk-managed way, right? You don't want to necessarily lean into something with a highly leveraged play. You want to have a series of plays that are defined loss, defined gains,

• 21:28Speaker 02

  capture the gains when they pop, don't have to worry about when to sell, but cover me on the downside. So I'm not screaming at red numbers, or seeing red numbers scream at me in the face. So leveraged well-managed, I think, is the important key there.

• 21:41Anthony Pompliano?

  Got it. And when people hear options, obviously, there's this very bullish case. You guys have built a great platform in terms of helping them do that. How should people think about the risk, right? So there's risk management, but what is the risk in options trading?

• 21:55Speaker 02

  There's a lot of risks in options trading and, you know, interestingly, one of the risks is not even necessarily what people might think in terms of dollar loss or whatnot, but the operational risk of options is actually very real. So, one of the strategies that we use is a butterfly strategy. Um, you know, some listeners might be familiar with that, but generally the idea is to, um, bet on the market not moving. So, this strategy pays out if stock sits right here, where we are today, and the sort of options premium collapses. The way to achieve that, though, is through four different contracts across three different strikes. And so, when it comes time to close that, depending on where stock is, you're really looking, it's 350, 351, where are we going to close?

• 22:39Speaker 02

  Are we going to be above or below that? That that kind of risk is actually far more dangerous to people than excess leverage, that, you know, managing the ins and outs of that, you know, if you're not there and you get distracted for 10 minutes, all of a sudden you're buying 100 shares of stock that you didn't expect to, or selling 100 shares of stock that you didn't expect to. So, I think operational risk is one of those sneaky risks that, you know, underlies, you know, options trading, and that's what we really want to solve. That's what a computer platform does incredibly well, um, and tightening up that whole process there.

• 23:11Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah, and talk a little bit just about, in terms of that operational efficiency, the team that you've built so far, kind of how has that come together? And then, we could talk a little bit about, kind of, in the future, where you guys are aiming to be.

• 23:25Speaker 02

  Absolutely. So, you know, right now, we're a relatively small team. It's, uh, five of us total, uh, three engineers, uh, and a director of education, like I mentioned, plus myself. Um, so, really, what we're trying to do is build the simplest, tightest platform to handle all of the advisory process. So, you know, it really starts at, uh, onboarding a client and understanding what is going to work for them. And, you know, there's very much that educational, you know, uh, assignment, uh, process where we try and, like, assign the person to the right strategy and figure out where they fit. You know, what's your target date, uh, for retirement objective or whatnot? So, that's a process that we've streamlined. And automated there, but then also on the execution side, you know, making sure our orders are going out efficiently.

• 24:11Speaker 02

  I actually still do a little bit of semi automation because the trader in me can't not have my hands and fingerprints on those orders. And I still think there's quite a bit of edge and that's actually a big place that we deliver edge as an advisor. That the options market structure, not only are there the operational risks, but one of the improvements we can bring is execution quality. So, you know, stock markets are relatively tight. If you want to buy Apple, the bid is a penny below where the offer is in Apple. With options markets, it's not always that tight and we like to go with the more liquid strategies or more liquid securities generally. But it's not always the case. And for every time we get a penny better for our client, that's an extra dollar in their pocket.

• 24:51Speaker 02

  So, you know, instead of paying 160 that might be offered, we try to look at the 155, 160, can I get a little bit? Can I look at what the market's doing? Is volatility coming in? Do I want to be a little bit more passive? So there, there's a lot of automation going on in the background, but for really that precision trading, we still rely on like a little bit of that special human touch. So I think our goal for the future is to build more scale, to build more automation that is going to allow us to serve more clients and serve. You know, the more people we have executing strategies, the better pricing we can get overall in the market. So we have the ability to start looking at block trades. We have the ability to start looking at different styles of trading. Once, you know, the automation lends itself to scale.

• 25:35Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah, that's awesome. So what do you hope to build here, right? Or kind of what's the goal or mission in terms of if you look out 10 years from now? And, and you've accomplished that you say this was success. What does that look like for you as a business today?

• 25:52Speaker 02

  So our mission is that derivatives are for everyone and that we believe that everyone has some need for some of the elements that derivatives provide. And so we like to bucket them into diversify, amplify and protect. And so.

• 26:08Speaker 02

  Most everyone has a need for some type of derivative strategy, some type of alternative allocation in their portfolio. We'd really like to see, as common as people are investing in their 401ks and they're putting money in passive low fee investments, which I still think are great. I still think that should be a majority of where people are putting their money. But having that alternative class there, that people are starting to have that 5, 10, 15% allocation to a passive income stream, to a protection source. Having that type of strategy more broadly accessible to people, I think that looks like a huge success.

• 26:43Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah, that's awesome. And I feel like as you guys are building this out too, not only one is there's the education piece of hey, here's what options are, here's how they can help your existing portfolio. Here's some risk that you can take. Here's that passive income. But also the technology you're building, I'm assuming, will eventually kind of spread out across both other asset classes. So not just kind of public securities, but into other things. And then also you can add all types of derivatives on top of that, right?

• 27:12Speaker 02

  Absolutely. Like equities is really just the start. I think there are some really interesting things you can look at in crypto markets. I think there are really interesting things you can look at in a lot of the commodities markets. You know, one of our big kind of white whales that we look at is structured products. And that's an enormous market out there, right? But one of the problems with structured markets or structured product markets is that they're single counterparties. So you enter into a structured product agreement and you have a single counterparty you're facing off as. The OCC, the Options Clearing Corporation, is a centrally cleared entity. But there's never been a default. There's never been any concern about what the CDS of this bank is trading at. That you might enter into a bilateral trade, but it's completely cross guaranteed.

• 27:55Speaker 02

  And so not only do you have the counterparty risk with structured products, but you also have the cost, right? Like if you're looking at like 2% on some of these things, we're charging 50 basis points. And like we're charging 50 basis points on liquid markets that you can easily get in and out of. And so starting to look at some of those packages that people are interested in for their simplicity and attacking that as a way to get people more liquid, more efficient, cost-effective, you know, investment solutions.

• 28:22Anthony Pompliano?

  Yeah, makes a makes complete sense. Where can people find you on the internet and find Harvested Financial?

• 28:28Speaker 02

  Yes, you should check us out at harvestedfinancial.com and if you throw our promo code slash pomp at the end of that harvestedfinancial.com slash pomp, we're offering our beta rate for the first three months that anyone signs up. So our beta rate is only five bucks a month. And that's half of our current rate. So 10 bucks a month is the minimum fee and that gets you access to an entire suite of options products. That'll get you up to 25 grand of option strategies managed for only 10 bucks a month. And that provides a really nice diversification for people's portfolios as small as $500 is our minimum. So you can find us at harvestedfinancial.com. You can check out our Twitter harvested underscore D A F E derivatives are for everyone. And that's where we're at.

• 29:12Anthony Pompliano?

  Awesome, man. Before we finish up, I ask the same two questions to everybody and then you'll get to ask me one to end it. What is the most important book that you've ever read?

• 29:23Speaker 02

  Oh, I think reminiscences of a stock operator, Edwin LeFevre book. The one of my first internships was at a hedge fund at a Tudor Investments with Paul Tudor Jones. And I remember hearing about his interest in that book. So, you know, early getting into the markets, reading that and thinking about, you know, being that bucket shop operator and, you know, trading in the swings and the highs and the lows of it all. So I think going through that personally too afterwards, that that's still definitely resonates as an interesting book.

• 29:53Anthony Pompliano?

  That's great. What was it like working at a Tudor?

• 29:56Speaker 02

  It was interesting. So I was only there for a summer, you know, as a college intern. But I absolutely remember Paul walking in one day and just, you know, having come back from safari and like, you know, just regaling us with these like fantastic stories. And all I could think was, wow, how can I get in those shoes? Like, I want to be him. I want to be sitting right there.

• 30:16Anthony Pompliano?

  That's awesome story. That is a fantastic story. The second question is a little bit more fun, which is aliens believer or non believer?

• 30:26Speaker 02

  Uh, I'm probably a non-believer.

• 30:29Anthony Pompliano?

  Why?

• 30:30Speaker 02

  Yeah, I think I'm a non-believer, but I think that's probably because I haven't seen, you know, distinct enough evidence, right? Uh, but that said, I remember actually listening to a great podcast with, um, uh, Dan Aykroyd, um, who is a huge alien believer. And after two hours of listening to him talk about it, I think I came a little bit off my high horse. So I'm willing to be convinced of anything, but as of now, probably I would have to say no.

• 30:59Anthony Pompliano?

  You, uh, my whole thing is just the universe is so big. It's gotta, they gotta be out there somewhere.

• 31:05Speaker 02

  Okay. So that's I, as a probability guy with options, right? Like I should be thinking I could in those terms that, you know, like you said, the universe is so big. What are the odds that we're the only group of, uh, you know, knuckleheads on this space block?

• 31:17Anthony Pompliano?

  Absolutely. You could ask me one question to finish up. What you got for me?

• 31:21Speaker 02

  Uh, if you were going to describe yourself as an option strategy, how would you describe yourself?

• 31:29Anthony Pompliano?

  What, what is the one that only, only goes up, right? Stocks only go up? Is there an option strategy that only goes up? That's me.

• 31:36Speaker 02

  Long calls. That, that, that works for me. Long calls and, and maybe out of the money calls, right? You want that convexity that like, you want to buy something for a dime and get paid $10 for it.

• 31:47Anthony Pompliano?

  I want as, as much asymmetry as possible in, uh, in my portfolio. So, uh, if, uh, if that's what does it, then I'm down for sure.

• 31:56Speaker 02

  All right. Well, option strategies might very well be for you.

• 31:59Anthony Pompliano?

  Awesome, Mark. Listen, thank you so much for doing this. I'm super excited about what you guys are doing. Uh, I think that, uh, options are obviously a key part of, of many people's portfolios, but, uh, just making it easier to understand, educating people on it. And then obviously having a platform, uh, that can kind of, you know, drastically reduce the barrier to entry, uh, for folks is, uh, is a pretty good idea. So, uh, thanks so much for, uh, coming on. We'll have to do this again in the future.

• 32:22Speaker 02

  Absolutely. Thanks so much for having me. This was a blast.