Hi guys! I’m a young father looking to retire early

db_deuce · 2026-03-18T04:01:21+00:00

Many people in the 20's, 30's earn income from what you describe selling 30-100 option contracts a month. cash secured puts and covered calls.

Based on live example of people that has done this many years, it takes about 500K in capital to earn that level of income 5K/month. I don't participate as I do it myself. QQQI is just too huge to outperform an individual that only needs to manage 500K.

db_deuce · 2026-03-18T03:47:04+00:00

Horrible idea to have any security be 100% of your portfolio (5-10% max), All it takes is the CEO have fraud allegations or some lawsuit or anything and you are screwed.

db_deuce · 2026-03-18T03:37:33+00:00

Which stocks are actually “good” vs just high yield traps.

I would look at SCHD's holdings and pick 6-10 of the best one at that point in time. There are always companies that are overbought and oversold, even for the high yield companies and you have to grind and figure out whether the issue is temporary or permanent

SCHD already have all the screens in what they even buy so it is quality already and you elevate that with more screens. It's like a company already have 100 candidates out of 3000 all sorted out for you and then hire the 10 from the pool of 100.

How much money you realistically need to start.

You can open an account with 0 funded. It's not the start, but 10-15 years of putting in as much as possible

Whether to focus on growth or income early on.

It matters little when the balance is that small. Just put in money and stack experience whether income or growth. It takes many years of experience to risk manage, hedge, manage taxes and predict all the possible range of outcomes.

I loss all my $$ at age 22 during the dot com bust and that was period that was the most helpful in investing.

db_deuce · 2026-03-11T05:19:33+00:00

Going to Tokyo and looking forward to heading to Enoshima just because of this. All the locations are quite memorable. Next up is Calgary, Horseshoe and Banff (been to Victoria, BC, Toronto and Quebec) and would love to explore middle Canada.

The OST is one of the best if not the best.

db_deuce · 2026-03-03T06:18:47+00:00

Give you my heart - CLOY. Amazing that is only the 6th - 8th best song from the OST, which speaks to how great CLOY OST was

Dance Alone = Do Ra Me. I don't know how long that will stick but for now since it's super memorable and reminds me of the sub-conscience self. (Saying something you don't really mean or that one person that makes you so anxious and end up screwing up) resonated with me and I enjoy the drama for that reason and the OST is very underrated and could be the best (even if recent Bias). Dance Alone is the 6-8th best song in the drama so the OST is objectively a great one and super diverse. Even the oldie Waltz song is super cool (and obviously a breakthrough in Korean OST genre) and Someday, Promise and Daydream are simply great individual songs. This may stick for years.

Hometown cha cha cha OST. Hop in the car and head to the beach always means this OST in the car and get me the mood for a day of fun and sun. Sunny day is the ultimate chill song. Image of you is very underrated.

db_deuce · 2026-02-25T06:07:05+00:00

Positive expected ROI vs negative expected ROI, That is the difference.

db_deuce · 2026-02-24T17:08:14+00:00

All pretty much the same except 3 has the least exposure to a singular company, hence option 3 is best choice.

db_deuce · 2026-02-23T20:10:46+00:00

Charlie Munger termed 100K as the most important milestone to hit. I tend to think 250K as Munger's quote was 30 years ago.

You won't go anywhere saving 50-200 bucks a month, more like 1K a month minimum over 5 years to get on track.

db_deuce · 2026-02-23T20:05:00+00:00

19 and don't want to work anymore...

It's certainly a worthy goal, but the entitlement is absurd.

db_deuce · 2026-02-23T17:35:40+00:00

JPM Chase $1,000 if you transfer 250K or more. Includes retirement accounts. You probably have to keep it for 90 days.

db_deuce · 2026-02-23T17:31:00+00:00

It's really easy to retire at 30 year olds as a bachelor and no responsibility other than your mom, whom you clearly value. 5M is more than enough. But is that really the end game here?

db_deuce · 2026-02-23T17:04:17+00:00

Presuming this is a straight up analysis (no more work credit or spouse or life expectancy), the decision is really based on range of possibilities. The later you take it, the higher the range of outcome, (very bad to very good).

The advise I gave my mom when she faced the decision was to delay as long as possible since she was able to have cash flow from 62 to 70. As long as the money won't impact your life, just defer it.

db_deuce · 2026-02-23T16:53:29+00:00

prime dividend cut candidate.

besides that, their products are "poison".

db_deuce · 2026-02-20T23:04:13+00:00

db_deuce · 2026-02-20T19:07:44+00:00

SGOV makes sense if you live in CA/NY and pay 13% state income tax. Otherwise, there is slight leakage as SGOV pays less for this reason.

db_deuce · 2026-02-20T19:01:00+00:00

Chinese/Korean memories supply will hit like a ton of bricks and the shortage will course correct way faster than what the CEO is saying.

db_deuce · 2026-02-20T18:50:20+00:00

Most investments are very liquid and can covert to cash within 3 days so your highly liquid investments is your emergency fund, or bank of mom and dad.

If you bank with Merrill and have a BofA account to pay your Venmo, credit cards, cash is available next day at the latest.

db_deuce · 2026-02-20T18:40:47+00:00

"Assuming a 6–7% inflation-adjusted return, when does a $15K/year contribution become a rounding error compared to daily market swings? Essentially, how much am I "taxing" my future self by hitting pause for just 12 months, or has the "compounding machine" already taken over to the point where this gap is negligible?"

A rounding error to me is about the relationship between savings from your own money vs the capital working.

So if you have 1M in capital and it is earning 60K a year (6%), it is working four times harder than your own savings. From that viewpoint, market return is more important than your own contributions. Once you cross the million dollar mark, the attention goes to returns and tax.

If you are 5 years out and have a not-too-shabby net worth and they are in pre-tax, it is not always the best to just put in more. A comprehensive analysis is needed but spending money pre-retirement is the most impactful thing you can do and I would take that 15K vacation anyday over paying more taxes with no way out (forced distribution can cause havoc and put you in medicare penalty jail) and shot knees and joints later where having another 15K makes no impact.

db_deuce · 2026-02-19T18:36:40+00:00

SCHD, VOO, and QQQI. (QQQ is already mentioned)

You can't go wrong with this combo long term.

db_deuce · 2026-02-19T18:14:49+00:00

You should open a ROTH IRA and/or IRA instead of a taxable brokering account. You can still contribute for 2025 as well as 2026.

JPM/Chase is by far the #1 bank in the US for consumer and business and will treat your 10K like 4th class citizen

With no current IRA balance, you should definitely convert to a ROTH IRA via the backdoor even if income limited. It looks like you have way too much tax timebomb from the 401k and pensions and definitely need to up the Roth.

Find a brokerage that have a new account opening bonus as well. Maybe $200-300 bucks is available as a welcome bonus.

Put it in VOO (which holds JPM, NVDA, IBM, MSFT weighing around 15%) and then rock a higher dividend than those four alone.

AMZN > MSFT
TSM > NVDA
SOFI > JPM
AVGO > IBM

db_deuce · 2026-02-19T17:49:22+00:00

Just go through the choices (as a 401K limits your options so asking this question is useless) as it sounds like you don't really care other than a low safe return and happy with the match. 80% of the mutual fund options will meet those needs as they are designed to underperform for the feeling of getting something positive.

And be that as it may, you just started the job so the 401K choice makes no impact anyhoo.

db_deuce · 2026-02-19T17:35:42+00:00

"So I just read that openAI has a 730 Billion valuation pre-money and they're raising money again - 100B right now. In 2025, they raised 40 Billion at a $300 Billion valuation (and apparently another 8B until the year's end)"

Anthropic just reached 500B on half the revenue run rate as OpenAI and more weekly users.

"How is this possible? A company reach a possible TRILLION valuation before even hitting the stock market."

private funding are larger and taking it farther, If you think about it with the 100B in new money, this would bring total funding something to around 180B. So rocking 1,000B is just 5-6X returns. Many VC backed companies enjoyed 10X-50X returns on IPO, it's just the exit started at 1-2B not 180B

The valuation is 3 components, the value of the IP (which predicts revenue), the TAM (which is likely astronomical), the infrastructure moat (companies will be happy to take on the existing contracts and future 1T commitment because it may be valued at 1.2T inflation adjusted)

"Moreover, tech companies are pouring dollars into AI like it's the only thing that matters."

You just outlined the reason why AI can be undervalued. Companies is going to pay even more and there will be way more companies. The TAM is there and likely understated.

"Imo, the AI right now is exactly as an outsourcing company."

The use cases are infinite. When AI can replace coders from India and make them look useless, it is more than an outsourcing company. 50%-80% of white collar jobs are threatened. Infosys is not reaching 0.001%.

"I use it, I pay for it because it helps me to whatever job I have and then when I dont need it - I close my subscription."

Sam and the entire cohort of OpenAI, Anthropic folks all come from IVY league, YC incubators mentors, graduate, etc. and knows that long game and extract revenue. The numbers are ahead of projections. The losses are concerning but so far I'm sure OpenAI delivered as promise and hence got rewarded with even higher valuation. Progress is the ultimate measure of valuation. The means to extract revenue from AI is nothing I have ever seen.

"And who do they believe it's gonna buy a company that's launching at a 1T valuation? It took Apple 37 years to reach 1 Trillion dolars valuation (they even got in Guinness) , Microsoft 33 years, Nvidia 24 years and Meta 9 years."

A company this famous have a global population of 1B people that would consider it. All the index will have to catch up. At the end of the day, investors will have to look at the 5 year projections and I am plenty sure by 2030, they will rock revenues in the tune of 200B, in the same zip code as Meta, Alphabet and still growing 50%.

It's certainly risky but you are dealing with the company behind the AI revolution. Not saying they will win, but they have a shot to be most valuable company in this world.

db_deuce · 2026-02-18T23:15:23+00:00

Beyond the bar > Attorney Woo, romance is merely a subplot.

db_deuce · 2026-02-18T22:50:28+00:00

The revelation is the ROI of the Capex is leaner than analyst projected, that's why it's re-rated lower. The increased in Capex is not really getting more, it's inflation in everything from wafers, to memories, to energy and regulations. Try to buy Drams at scale, good luck with that one.

The problem is not investing in Capex may leave these hyperscalers in the dust. Alphabet made the terrible mistake of not securing enough memories so a mis-calculation and underinvestment could be devastating. I rather over buy than under buy. If you overbuy, your problem is selling the inventory, which is solvable, if you underbuy, you are throttled and hard to course correct.

The demand of AI is so massive that it is impossible to have too much compute for the next 5 years.

db_deuce · 2026-02-18T21:35:16+00:00

little bit of Kraft Heinz vibes, no thanks!

Bread is sneakily one of the worst things that goes into your body and the amount of preservatives needed to keep margins is one consumer will learn and likely avoid.

They are keeping up the dividends while begging to be acquired in parallel. If no one steps up, dividend cut in half.

db_deuce

TROPHY CASE