Should I Still Be Investing in International Stocks?

Welcome to EWA’s Fin-Lyt podcast. EWA is a fee -only RIA based at Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. We hope all listeners of this podcast will benefit as we deep dive into complex financial topics that we will make simplified for you.

And we hope that this really serves as a catalyst so that you can make the best financial planning decisions for your family and also save time. Welcome everyone. Today on Finlet’s podcast, we are talking about several topics joined by two of the smartest minds at EWA here, Nick Stonzifer and Ben Ruttenberg.

Nick, let’s give us the heads up. I know you’re leaving on vacation to Colorado for a week. Maybe we’re catching at a good time here before you go, but what’s the topic today? Yeah, topic today, we’re primarily going to take a look at international investing.

So taking a look at, I guess, recency bias in the past 10 years, international markets, compared to domestic markets, have lagged significantly. So why invest internationally? It is something that we believe in and something that we’re going to back up and justify here today.

But see, we’re going to take a deep dive today into international investing. Absolutely. And then specifically, Nick, we’re going to put you on the hot seat. So international specifically, ETS versus mutual funds, we’re going to ask you, what’s the difference between the two?

Break it down. We actually have had several clients ask us for some education on that. And then why do we select ETS or mutual funds for each category, specifically international? I think it’s a great way to explain that.

So, well, perfect. Well, we get questions really frequently over the last five years specifically about why are we invested in international? The returns, our reports are very clear. It shows by asset class, here’s the returns of every single holding, a fund by asset class.

etc. So, internationals have definitely lacked. So, Ben, give us some data on, you know, the past five, 10 years. Why do you think we’re getting this question? Yeah, you’re right. It’s something that when we work with clients on educating them about EWA’s investment principles, really the first three are asset allocation, diversification, and having a long -term time horizon for funds that are invested.

So, within asset allocation, we want to make sure that we’re investing in each asset class, United States, and international. So, if we just look at really the last five years, so 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, there was only one year in that timeframe that international equities, both developed markets and emerging markets, outpaced US equities.

So, which year was that? That was 2007. So international outpaced us by 3 .2%, but every other year in that timeframe, us outperformed by a pretty significant margin, 2015, 2 .2, 2016, 11, 2014, 18 .6, 2011, 14 .3.

So really in the last and those aren’t just returns. Those are how much returns above the US got over international. That’s correct. Okay. That’s correct. That’s big. So obviously, like, if you’re looking at a statement, you’re saying like, I did.

You know, like 20, there’s been several good years in the past, 2022, not so much, but this fund did 25%. Why did international do 3 %? That’s a valid question, right? So I think it really boils down to back to the investment principles of, you know, do why are we investing?

Do we want our money to ultimately dictate how we live our life? So for example, if everything is in one fund, like the S &P 500 index, do we want to pause our life when we have an inevitable downturn?

Or if it takes, you know, like the last decade after the tech bust 2000 through 2002, there are very small returns in the US because of that. So do we want to pause our life just because, you know, what our money is doing?

Or do we want a life by design where the money’s goal is to support our life no matter what the markets happen? So that’s asset allocation. The second thing is diversification, which Nick will get into when we talk about the ETF.

That just means holding bundles of companies in each category. And the third thing is, well, really, we ask, you know, if you’re investing in a time period of under five years even, you shouldn’t be invested from the get -go.

Sure. Right. So a lot of those questions, I think it’s just we need to make sure that an advisor understands the client’s objectives. Any money you put in the market, whether it’s internationally US, whether it’s diversified asset allocation, it has to be long term money.

It has to be allocated in a way. So really quick before we start getting into. into the weeds of this, just to go back to our basic principles. Now over the last 15 years, we pulled this data of our quilt, of our asset allocation quilt.

We love this. So the US, the returns of large cap holdings from 2006 to 2020 have been 9 .88%. Now the corresponding risk of that, so standard deviation has been 15 .12%. So just in general, we’re going to use round numbers.

We’ll say 10 and 15. That means standard deviation. So on a normal year, if the average return was 10, you could expect 15% below that or 15% above that. So you could expect anywhere between negative 5 to a positive 25 in a given year.

And then over a long enough period of time, you’d go back towards that mean of that closer, that 10% return. Now if you look at international over the same time period, the returns were almost half. It was 4 .97%.

And the risk was actually higher. So the risk was 17 .48%. So you got half the return. and you’ve took even more risks. So we’re like, well, that doesn’t make any sense. And then emerging markets over that time period, 2006 to 2020, they did 6 .95% returns and the standard deviation was 21 .76%.

So if you look at that last, you know, 2006 to 2020, said, well, I should have just been invested in large cap. Well, then if you look at on a higher level, how asset allocation works as a whole, and really we look at seven categories, having all seven categories in that same time period, you’d have gotten a 7 .11% return.

So greater than emerging markets, greater than international, not quite as much as large cap, but you got that at half the risk at a 9 .78%. So as close as possible to a one to one relationship between risk and return.

So asset allocation diversification, it’s not about getting the best way to return, I wanna make that very clear to the audience. It’s about getting the best return for also the lowest corresponding risk that comes along with that return.

And if you’re looking at a financial plan and goal -based objectives of I want to retire, I wanna be financially secure, I wanna send my kids to college, I want the money to be there. I don’t just wanna get, die the richest person in the graveyard and accumulate massive wealth for no reason.

You have to pay attention to the risk versus return scenario. And that’s in general, if I were to give one blanket statement before we go into the weeds, that’s why you invest international. That’s why you invest in emerging markets.

So when you add those two sectors to the US, it really does magic for the risk adjustment of the portfolio. It really does magic for your life by design where if the US economy is in the lost decade, you have optionality of where to pull money from.

And so your vacations, your life and your financial security don’t pause. Your life continues to happen regardless of what’s happening in one specific sector of the market. I just wanna piggyback off that because that’s such a good point.

And there’s real world data to support that. So if you invested $100 ,000 just in the S &P 500 index in October of 2007 and you didn’t touch it and you let it sit and you looked at your statement in December of 2020, your 100 ,000 would have grown to 319 ,000.

So that’s over. That’s over that from 2007 to 2020. So over that 13 year timeframe. The key component here is though, again, you invested in 2007. So by the time March of 2009 rolled around, your 100 ,000 would have been down to 45 ,000.

Again, if it was just in the S &P 500, which mirrors 500 of the largest U .S. companies in the world, that’s a negative 55% on your investment just in that two year timeframe. Again, if you would let your money sit until 2020, your 100 would have grown to 319, but you saw a dip.

of 50% in that two -year time frame. If you were invested in a portfolio that had half of the downswings, but also half of the upswings, your 100 ,000, again, same exact time frame, would have grown to essentially the same number, 320 ,000, but you would have had a downswing of 34% in that two -year time frame where we saw the Great Recession, as opposed to the 55% we saw if you were just in the S &P 500.

So what does that mean? Returns, you ended up getting to the same place, but you saw 20% less of a downswing because you had exposure in other asset classes and you weren’t just subject to United States large cap, the S &P 500.

So exactly what you just said, the return conversation, we’re not seeking to get just the maximum amount of returns, no questions asked. It’s the maximum amount of returns with the appropriate level of risk that we’re taking the portfolio.

So having that split of asset classes being invested in different buckets that we’ll talk about in a little bit prevents those significantly large downswings when they do occur. And we don’t know when they will occur, so it’s important to always have that downside protection.

No question. So I ran some numbers here to coincide with that. So let’s just say we were sitting down with a high income learner, like a doctor or something, starting to invest from scratch. So they just paid off their student loans, now they have a high cash flow.

They’re old, so they’re trying to catch up. They invest $5 ,000 a month and they put it all in a U .S. holding. Right. So they’re $5 ,000 a month for 10 years. They hit 10% a year for this first 10 years.

Any guess where they’re at? The $5 ,000 a month. I’ll pass to the smart gamma rate. $60 ,000 a year. over 10 years, that’s they’ve invested 600. Now 10 years is not a large amount of time for compounding interest to work, but still is large enough, 10% is great.

Where do you think they’re at? 10% returns over 10 years? Oh man. Say a million. You’re pretty close, so a million 32 ,000. We’ll forgive you, 32 ,000 off. That was a lucky guess. All right, you deserve a vacation, Nick.

You deserve a vacation. All right, so they’re at a million 32 ,000. So they’ve invested 600 ,000, their growth is 432 ,000, and the point I wanna make picking back off of it then just said is if they’re in just that large cap holding, right, so they just said 10% over 10 years.

Their 600 has grown to a million 32 ,000, 5 ,000 a month for 10 years. One year, which we know could happen, like that October 9th of 2007, we saw the top of SB 500, and then what we saw between October 9th of 2007 to November 9th of 2007 too.

March 10th of 2009, we saw a 54 .9% drop. So let’s just say that’s a 50% drop when that million is now worth 500 ,000. So 10 years we felt really smart getting those 10% returns. One drop were now down to 500 ,000.

So I just wanna point out that is now less than what this person actually saved. They saved 600, now they’re down to 500 ,000. Now, let’s say they get a 50% return the next year. So that’s just a fluke, are they back to even?

No, no, Matt, they’re not. Because we need, again, if we add, if we’re at a million, we drop 50%, now we’re at 500. Let’s say we get a, we get a, we get a, we need to double our return. Again, we’re doubling off of the 500 ,000 that we’re at now.

So if we have the 50% drop to get us to 500 ,000 and then we have a 50% recovery, we’re at 750 ,000 because that 50% recovery is based off that smaller number. So I think this is why Warren Buffett says, like the number one rule of money is you don’t lose money and then the number two rule is like you don’t forget number one, right?

So it’s so important because those bad years can just ruin a life’s work, right? And I think that’s also like similar, where like it takes a lifetime to build a good reputation. One moment you lose it, investing it, it’s the same thing.

You can have a lifetime of amazing returns and one bad decision, you could really, really set yourself back. So that’s why we invest in international and in a nutshell, it reduces risk. It’s not about, you know, a conversation of what do we think’s gonna be hot next year?

What do we think’s gonna outperform or underperform? But with that being said, some of that, you know, the business cycle data, we do, we do take into very strong consideration with the weightings and the types of international investing that we do.

So let’s start getting into that. So Nick, let’s start first, let’s talk about ETFs versus mutual funds. So there’s, I know you outlined this for me so I can ask specific questions. So ETF and mutual fund, just in general, I’ve got a couple categories I wanna ask you about, seven specifically, but just in general, what’s the breakdown?

What’s an ETF, what’s a mutual fund? So yeah, I guess I’ll start with, I’d be amiss to not include in today’s investment landscape, I think we make generalizations about ETFs versus mutual funds with active versus passive investments.

Some mutual funds are passive in nature and some ETFs are active in nature. So for the purpose of this conversation, we’re just going to talk active versus passive investing. Primarily speaking, ETFs tend to be passive in nature and mutual funds tend to be active in nature.

Just kind of put that blanket statement out there. But so yeah, where do we wanna start? Just the basic breakdown, what is an ETF, what is a passive investment versus an active? Yeah, so taking a look at like a passive ETF.

It’s priced according to the market, minute by minute basis. You’re actively buying and selling shares based on their market prices versus a mutual fund which is priced at the end of the day, net asset value after market close, and you’re typically buying dollar amounts increments for that.

Passive investments tend to be less costly, lower expense ratios than their active comparisons there because an active manager is attempting to beat their respective benchmark in their index. That’s the nature of it versus a passive investment is trying to track with an index or with a benchmark.

Rather than beating the benchmark, let’s invest along with it versus an active manager that’s making active moves to hopefully outperform the respective benchmark. There is an added cost there for sure when you take a look at a mutual fund versus an ETF.

You’re paying for the marketing, the distribution, and also the money managers and their attempts through their research and their analysis to beat their respective benchmarks. You’ve obviously hit on a lot of the questions I was in it.

Let’s talk about for just in general, is there a minimum investment for an ETF because it’s just available in the market? Same thing for a mutual fund, talk about the different, some mutual funds could have minimum investment, some may not, etc.

Some mutual funds, they are open -ended in nature, so you can continue to buy mutual fund shares at will. Some mutual funds do have minimum investments, some you can get in for $100, $200 versus an ETF.

You’re purchasing whatever the price is per share So you’re buying a share at least a share and an ETF at whatever the open market price is for that ETF Awesome for sure. And so both of these just on a more basic level like an ETF You could have a large cap ETF and it could hold 200 stocks in the US And if it’s a large cap ETF or yeah large growth ETF, it would be 200 growth oriented companies You’re probably gonna see a lot of tech exposure A lot of companies that are growing versus paying dividends and then if you’re pay if you do the same thing like a large cap Value or dividend paying eat a dividend focused ETF that would be more Mature companies utility company companies that are gonna pay a dividend or Aren’t going anywhere But less in general may be less risky because of their business models versus like a tech company It may soar, but it also has a higher risk as well.

And then mutual funds can is the same thing but instead of like going after a broad basket where that doesn’t change, a mutual funds manager is actively trying to say, well, Pepsi is gonna be better than Coca -Cola because of this, or we’re gonna go heavily into the bank, the financial sector this year because of Reason XYZ.

If you’re holding an S &P 500 ETF, that’s gonna track the ETF. And there’s really not gonna be any kind of thought process or reasoning behind the 500 companies other than trying to mirror the index versus a mutual fund may go and try to select and overweight certain sectors, pick companies over other companies, et cetera.

So talk to us about, you know, it’s, with technology specifically, and then all the information that’s readily available in the US specifically. So I know this is an international podcast, but this is gonna lead us into the international aspect of this.

If I’m looking at the EWA portfolio and we do a video every quarter talking about it, I don’t see any active stuff in the US sector. Why is that? So we’ve done some different research. We’ve pulled research reports from multiple outlets and really what it comes down to us is, over the long term, as you stated earlier, our investment philosophy, our strategy in general, focuses on long -term time horizons, but over the long term, the success of an active manager beating their respective benchmark diminishes greatly.

In the short term, you’re talking maybe it’s a coin flip in domestic markets. So it really comes into, are you getting an active money manager that happens to be in the small, in the small category of a company?

active managers that’s actually doing this with success on a consistent basis. So in short term, in a one year time period, if it’s a coin flip, maybe you have a decent amount of managers that are doing pretty well there.

But as you start to take a look at the research and you spread it out over five years, 10 years, 20 years, it turns into maybe 5% on average of domestic money managers, active with that much at play there, we personally don’t see the value in going all active in domestic markets when the overwhelming majority of the time the active managers aren’t outperforming the respective benchmarks.

Nick, I love that you use the coin flip because in the one year, US large blend, 54%, a little bit over half have outperformed, active managers have outperformed the index. If you look at large cap growth, 37 .5% of active managers outperform.

from the index. So it’s really like what you said is so accurate like a coin flip like 50 -50. If you choose a mutual fund versus an ETF and then you compare it 12 months later, there’s a 50% chance that your manager who you’re paying an extra high fee to of that soft cost, you’re paying an advisor fee and then you’re paying that the cost of the portfolio itself, you know, that may be another half a percent to 1% if you choose it.

There’s a 50% chance that you beat by just choosing a low cost index that you may be paying like five basis points to or 10 basis points. So literally a tenth of the cost in most cases. But as you said, if you spread that over 20 years, I’m just looking at, you know, morning star data right now.

So US large growth, the amount of mutual fund managers, active managers have outperformed the index is 4 .7%. That’s less than 5%. So less than 5 out of 100 companies. So if we spend our time, first of all, going back to the principles that then you started the podcast with, we asset allocate, we diversify, and we’re long -term investors.

So we’re not making decisions over short term. We’re making tactical moves while maintaining a long -term time horizon always. And again, you should never put money in the market unless you have a long -term time horizon.

So therefore, everything fun that we invest in, we’re looking at lifetime returns, lifetime results. So if you look at the 20 years, what we’ve evaluated is what you’re guaranteed with the active manager over 20 years is you’re guaranteed to pay 10 times the fees you would with a passive manager.

You’re also guaranteed based upon historical data over the last 20 years at least. So we’re not guaranteeing the future of this could change, but only five out of 100 of those active managers have outperformed, just simply following the index.

So we could spend all of the time and research and money to go try to pick out those five out of 100. That’s a really high cost of failure and not something we’re comfortable with putting clockwork. through is here’s a real guarantee to pay 10x the fees and there’s a 5% chance it’ll work out.

That doesn’t make any logical sense, right? So now that we’ve clearly covered ETF and a mutual fund, that completely changes when we’re looking at international. If you look at the even the like four and large blend, the data is similar in the one, three and five year, but if you go all the way out to the you know a 15 year it’s 24% or even 20 year it’s 18 .9% of active managers have outperformed and then in emerging markets it’s 38 .4% and then in Europe specifically over like 15 years 40% of active managers have outperformed.

So there’s a it’s not a coin flip 50% but I do want to state that there’s so many players out there that say oh we have an active image we’re gonna tag a 1% fee and we’re gonna you know do all this research internationally and so I think that the players are really skewed because every company that has this international offer.

But when you look at really the good companies, the big companies that have the firepower, Nick explained to us why we’ve been able to consistently research and why we have some active plays internationally only.

Yeah, I mean, for us, it really comes down to the exposure to information and efficient markets versus any efficient markets. So for us, we’re not fully active in the international space. We are a bit of a blend there, active and passive, but we see incorporating active management in the international space as being a boon to our portfolio because we’re going into some of these inefficient markets and we’re paying for active managers and their active due diligence and research in areas where economic and political changes may be happening pretty frequently.

We want to be out in front with an active manager who’s pricing that accordingly and making the changes on the spot to try to capture some of that positive volatility there versus an ETF strategy, which really is not making those active plays.

It’s not making those aggressive moves to the portfolio and reacting to that information in the amount of time that an active manager would. So again, we’re not saying fully active in international, but we do see, as Matt said with the numbers, we do see a benefit to having an active play in those market segments.

Well, Nick, thanks for sharing so clearly all the difference between the ETFs and the mutual funds and specifically how we use information to build the EWA portfolio. Thank you. All right, Ben, let’s get back to just basic client question.

So what are some compelling reasons? Obviously, if you look at the last five years, it’s like, why was I having to have anything international? Obviously, we still have them underweighted significantly compared to US, but we’re not.

we’re maintaining those positions. So let’s look at the data of like, if US does this percent, what does international do, and then vice versa. And let’s make the case of why we should stay the course, other than just clearly risk adjustment in the portfolio and life by design.

But let’s just get really nerdy here for a second. So let’s just go back, and we touched on this a little bit in the beginning of the podcast. But let’s go through just running through exactly what you said.

So from 2008 to 2022, the S &P 500 averaged 8 .8%. So very strong 14 -year time frame for US equities. Over that same time frame, 2008 to 2022, the developed market, so MSCI index averaged 2 .3%, and the emerging markets index averaged 1%.

So exactly what we just said, and this is the crux of all of these client questions, international has performed so poorly over this 15 -year time frame. Why don’t we move? more into the US equities to achieve those types of returns.

Well, let’s take a step back and look at the years prior to 2008. So from the eight year timeframe from 2000 to 2007, the S &P 500 only averaged 1 .7% annually over that eight year timeframe. And that was after that you said, what was the timeframe again?

2000 to 2007. Okay, so that includes the tech bust and then even some strong gears and recoveries. You’re basically flat lining. Correct. Those years. Correct. And over that eight year timeframe, again, S &P 500 1 .7% returns the developed market index 5 .6%, the emerging markets index 15 .3%.

So if we were sitting down recording this podcast in January of 2008, after that eight year run where internationalists just crushed it over United States markets every year, the questions we probably are getting from clients are, hey, why are we even in US equities?

Why don’t we just move 100% international? Look at the last eight years. Like, why isn’t this run ever stopped? Clients would probably want to physically move international after those kind of returns.

And so the script has completely flipped. And again, this is 15 years ago. So this is in the context of someone’s financial plan. If they’re saving for their financial independence, if they’re saving for education, these are conversations that have completely done a 180 from 2008 to when we’re recording this in 2023.

And so that’s all to say that just because something is familiar doesn’t mean it’s safe. And so the math says one thing, but the recency bias, we’d always need to keep that front of mind just because something has happened over the last couple years doesn’t mean it’s going to happen in the future.

I’m an Ohio State football fan. The last two years, Michigan has absolutely destroyed Ohio State. However, You know recency bias is kicking in we’re forgetting the ten years before that when Ohio State Absolutely stuff Michigan into a locker for ten straight years.

So again, then that sounds first of all that sounds like bullying and second of all Which I know Ohio State would do because that’s just who they are and then secondly I’m just thinking I’m saying Michigan’s gonna win again this year I did just want to go on public and and make a little bet here.

We’re happy to do that I did just watch the Swamp Kings documentary about Urban Meyers So yeah, there probably was a little bit of bullying in that time frame, but back back to recency bias and how it equates to us versus international Really powerful statistic if we look at ten -year rolling periods US returns versus international returns from 1970 to 2020 Years in which US returns were less than 4% International outperformed us 100% of the time So again, from 1970 to 2020, a 10 year rolling return in that timeframe, US under 4% international outperformed every single time.

So, 1977, 1980, 1971, 1981, 1972, 1982, every 10 years that the US didn’t do well international crushed. Correct. Correct. Got it. Same exact, same exact scenario. If US returns were under 6%, international outperformed the US 94% of the time.

So 62 out of those 66 rolling periods, international outperformed US. So it just goes back to. And one thing you just said, like real quick is like, so there were six, that’s crazy. I mean, 66 of those simulations, the US over those 10 year rolling periods were under 6%.

Yep. So it’s so, with all the data that’s out there, I mean, it’s so many people want to finish with like mess with the portfolio decisions and like the, you can get 95% of your results if you stick to the basics.

And this is, so this data is so important, why you should stick with the basics and not just jump on to the next fat. So anyways, I’d say that. Even just again, if we, we looked at, you know, 10 year rolling returns, if we just look at all of those returns period, just annually, US outperformed international 54% of the time, international outperformed US 46% of the time.

Again, at the time of filming over the last 15 years, it would seem as though US has outperformed 80, 90, 95% of the time based on what we’ve seen. But historical data, Matt just, just hasn’t shown that.

So over the last 50 years, the US has only has outperformed over a 10 year rolling periods. You know, depending on what month you’re starting, you’re at 54% of the time. So it’s almost. coin flip, if you were to say, over the next 50 years, if someone was to say, I never recommend this, do I invest everything in US or do I invest everything in national, looking back 50 years, it almost be a coin flip of, if you’re looking at 10 year increments of which one was gonna do better.

But if you have both, we know you’re gonna reach your goals, your family’s gonna be secure, and we can do so with the least amount of risk. And so that’s why we don’t pick between international and US, that’s why we don’t pick between small cap and real estate, that’s why we don’t pick between mid cap and developed markets internationally, that’s why we have everything in a diversified asset -allocated portfolio, because we’re most focused on clients living their best lives by design and making sure that they have no financial regret and that they’re secure the whole time with peace of mind.

And that’s the best way to achieve those things is what we found analytically, but also, just like in the trenches with clients and going through problems that arise. Solving those problems, you know, on a daily, weekly, monthly, yearly basis for clients, you have to manage peace of mind, you have to manage risk.

It’s just not just a simple return equation looking backwards. It’s much more, you’ve got to be much more thoughtful than that. Yeah, totally. And just on top of that, because the math is one thing, but I think behaviorally is behavioral analysis is another thing.

I think most people that either have these questions or are thinking about these topics, whether they want to admit it or not have a home country bias, they feel like they have a better understanding of US markets, whether it’s large cap, made cap, it’s small cap, than international, and they just generally feel more comfortable investing in their home country as opposed to international markets, international funds, whatever it may be.

There’s a really powerful example of this. If you look at the country of Japan in the 1980s, completely outperformed US equities, completely outperformed the rest of the international space each year, 1989, 1981, 1982, all the way through the 80s.

So if you had said, again, if we were having this conversation in 1990, hey, Japan’s crushed it for the last decade. Why don’t we have more exposure into the Japanese markets inside of our international space?

Why don’t we be more heavily weighted there? From January of 1990 to May of 2023, the MSCI Japan Index returned 0 .9% per year. So over that 33 -year timeframe, if you were invested heavily in just that Japanese index, less than 1% return per year.

So taking a step back, again, what does that mean? Two things. Number one, just because something has happened over the last 10 years doesn’t mean it’s going to continue in the future. And number two, be aware of any sort of home country bias.

So if you are a Japanese investor in 1990 and you said, I understand Japanese markets. This this makes sense. I don’t understand all the international markets I want to be invested in the Japanese markets That would have been a bad decision over the last 33 years But if you were a Japanese investor in 1990 and you said I’ll be asset allocated I’ll have international exposure which means other countries which means US markets you would have had Certainly a stronger investment return than then simply just being in the Japanese markets.

No question All right, so I think we’ve proven on this podcast that we’re not We’re not market timers. We’re not picking segments. We’re not you’re not essentially we’re not gambling We’re not stock pickers.

So because we’re not let’s at least try to have some fun and act like we can’t pick some stuff So Nick I see you’re wearing the shirt you played Eastlake this year at a charity event one of the charities that we support So the the final FedEx championship is there I think it starts today Ben would know this It does, hypothetically.

I don’t know that for sure. So who’s your, who do you think’s going to win? There’s 30 people left in the field. Who’s your pick? Well, they start with a staggered start. So again, Scottie Schaeffler is going to be starting the tournament at 10 under.

I believe Victor Hovland will be starting at 8 under, Roy McElroy, 600. So Scottie Schaeffler is the favorite. He’s coming in with the two -stroke lead. He’s earned it. He’s number one in the FedEx Cup.

So if you maybe pick someone, I’ll say Scottie, but that’s certainly the boring answer. I would not be shocked to see Hovland or Rory get hot and take it. Yeah, it’s like picking. That’s basically you saying, I’m going to invest in US stocks because they did so well in the last 15 years.

I’m just saying. Little. That’s true. It’s hard to argue that. No, he’s got a nice swing. He’s consistent. Nick, how about you? I mean, once you get down to the final 30 in the FedEx Cup, it is a little difficult to set that format.

And I believe since they’ve adopted the format, nobody has come back to win that started anywhere less than four under. So they tear it. So Scottie will start at 10 under. And I believe the biggest comeback, somebody started at four under.

So I mean, if you take a look at it. Was that Rory last year? Because he was pretty. Was it Rory when he came back? Rory definitely. He came from four. He was back. But the nature of it, certainly you might have an outlier year in there somewhere.

But by nature, you’re really kind of isolating it to, you know, the top 10 of the 30 have an overwhelming, you know, chance of taking home the title here. It’s yeah, it is a boring answer, but Scottie Schaeffler would potentially as well, just because for an additional reason, because of his heartbreak last year, he dominated last year.

He was right there. He got to the final round of the FedEx Cup at East Lake. And I don’t want to say choked, because I think he shot maybe like a 70 or something. But it was right there for the taking and Rory just went off the last few rounds and took it from him So I’ll throw I’ll throw a dart on Wyndham Clark at four under East Lakes a birdie Fest Wyndham can make birdies.

He’s not coming in with amazing form But if you’re gonna make me pick someone that’s a little bit off the radar Gimme Wyndham. I think he wants to get in good form before the Ryder Cup in Italy in September.

I Think all right. I’m just saying you guys were phenomenal at the international at that You may want to consider being like sports announced. I think you prepared more for this than you did further All right, well, I guess I’m gonna go with what’s rookie.

I love rookie. Is he is he like even what’s his Rookie’s my long shot until I hope wins like, you know him come back this year, but I’m gonna go with John Rom He’s right up there, right? Yeah, so rom rom six under yep Rory seven under Wyndham is four under Ricky is three under.

Alright, so Ricky’s got a shot. Well, anyways, back to the schedule programming. Thank you for joining us on, by the way, by the time this is published, this golf will be over and you’ll see who’s the smartest person on the table here.

So anyways, thanks for joining in a pick. I’m sorry, Ricky and Ricky, fouled my long shot because you picked two. You said Wyndham John, Rob out there. So you’re Scotty and John and I’m John is thought you threw John to my number one who I think is going to win and then Ricky is who I hope.

Just saying. Alright, thank you everybody. Thanks for tuning in to our podcast. Hopefully you found this helpful. Really hope this is as beneficial and impactful to as many people across the nation as possible.

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