AWM Insights Financial and Investment News

In this episode of AWM Insights, Chief Investment Officer Justin Dyer and Portfolio Manager Mena Hanna tackle the real-life decisions that set elite athletes—and successful investors—apart from the crowd. They break down why focusing on process beats chasing short-term hype, sharing strategies for navigating market fads, clarifying your financial goals, and building a decision-making framework built for lasting results. Listeners will walk away with concrete techniques for making disciplined, high-quality choices that compound over time, both on and off the field. Tune in to learn how a proven playbook can help you win, not just in the markets, but in life and legacy.

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Chapters
(00:00) Playing the long game and real-life investment scenarios
(02:00) Using a structured decision framework
(03:00) Clarifying goals and evaluating decisions
(05:00) Focusing on process over short-term outcomes
(07:00) Probability, confidence, and quality in investments
(09:00) Applying the framework to personal financial situations
(10:00) Avoiding risky shortcuts and compounding quality decisions

Creators and Guests

Host
Justin Dyer
Chief Investment Officer and Chief Operating Officer at AWM Capital
Host
Mena Hanna
Senior Investment Analyst at AWM Capital

What is AWM Insights Financial and Investment News?

A bite sized discussion on timely financial news and investment topics, to help you maximize your net worth and wealth for the next generation with Justin Dyer and Mena Hanna of AWM Capital.

Justin Dyer: Hey everyone.

Welcome back to another episode of a WM
Insights, Uh, Justin Dyer here, chief

Investment Officer at a WM Capital, joined

by Mina Hana, portfolio
manager here at a WM Capital.

We're gonna talk today about
playing the long game, how

elite

athletes and investors.

win through Process, not hype.

Love that title.

Uh, so we, we, we set up a, um, somewhat
of a series on making good decisions

last week.

We're gonna carry on with that through
the next few episodes and, uh, and

really start to take that
into everyday real life

applications.

Today we're gonna.

Go through a, a general,

um, scenario, a frequent scenario
that we get pretty, pretty

often where, um,

quite often we get a question around,
Hey, should we be invested in, you know,

X, Y, ZX, YZ is not an actual asset or an

investment, but you

know, insert.

The

asset of the moment, gold or Bitcoin
or some sort of meme stock or something

like that Anything that just generally
gets attention through socials or

in the financial news, et cetera, that

is often brought up in conversations with

clients.

Not a bad thing.

Totally makes sense.

It's front and center.

It's in your eyes.

You

should be asking about it.

where.

We're gonna go through how we apply this

framework

in

answering that question more or

less, and answering a lot of
questions when it comes to,

you know, new things that
are capturing your attention.

Maybe they're, uh, it's a
new, um, exercise regimen or

something like that right?

there.

these things in this day and age

come up all the time.

Should I be

doing

X, Y, z and this

decision framework

that we've.

set up.

It's not unique to a WM.

It is very much

a kind of tried and true, I
think I mentioned this, it,

it, it, you can actually go get
a PhD in this, type of stuff.

And so there's a lot, a lot of

study and research that goes into
making good decisions that you can

apply into all, all sorts of your life.

And so today we're gonna get into
this, how we should think about, you

know, investing fad of the moment.

And let's just jump into
the framework, Mina.

So how,

how do we I try to answer these
questions that that often come up?

Mena Hanna: Yeah.

and this might be a little bit
of a boring answer, but you have

to really understand what you're

going

for, like clarifying
your goals, establishing

where your guideposts are and where you're

trying to get to is step number one.

Like to think about this,

and we were talking about this.

If you're playing football,
like where is that first

down marker?

And based on that and based on,
you know, the number of downs you

have left, you can identify and

determine What kind of play

that you want to call to

actually get yourself there.

So I really think that is step
one in actually thinking through

how to make a good decision

and structuring your decisions

in in an effective way.

Decision making is all relative, like
it's going to be unique for every

person, for every scenario,
every stage of life.

So really capturing all of

this information in.

Even.

Even with the concept of

I wanna win this game, I

wanna make the best.

Outcome of where I'm at,

situationally

breaking it

down into the most minute

and call it.

Justin Dyer: it.

Mena Hanna: a unit based decision
or decision based framework is the

best way of actually evaluating

how to go through it.

If

it's, you know, third in one,
you're the Philadelphia Eagles,

you're running

the toosh push, that's what
gets you the first down.

You can think whatever you want about it.

That is the most

effective way of doing that.

It works.

Yeah, it works.

Um, now if it's third and
15, you're going to make

probably a different decision.

So identifying,

I guess, where you're at

is.

100% step

number

one.

Justin Dyer: Yeah, that's great.

That's great.

I mean, there's so many, as you were
talking, I just did a quick little

search of, of quotes along this topic,

and, and they're endless and it's.

Amazing.

I, I shouldn't say amazing.

That's a little bit, uh, cynical of me.

Um, and I'm kind of going off

script here in a sense, but it's a, it's,

it's human nature to get caught up

in, in.

whatever distractions that really take you

down, kind of the, a
path you shouldn't get.

But there's

just, like I said, so many quotes

here, uh, Joe Madden, if you
focus on the process and not the

outcome, you'll have better results.

Right?

Like, you can just keep repeating
these, repeating these, repeating these.

Stephen Covey,

concentrate on what.

will produce results rather than on the

results, the process
rather than the prize.

I mean,

Endless, endless, great

quotes along

these lines where

you

need to have that process.

But to your point, you

need to, set the goals up ahead of time.

Otherwise you don't even know what
process to to, build or structure.

Um,

Mena Hanna: hundred percent

And we, in order to,

Justin Dyer: yeah, frame,
frame what an outcome

Mena Hanna: Yeah.

And really talking about

outcomes, like flashy outcomes are
what we hear about day in and day out.

Gold is a perfect example of that.

Gold is done exceptionally well this

year.

It's up 50% now, today
it's down five and a half

ish percent.

So, uh, yeah, maybe a little bit
of a pullback and come back to, uh,

come back to earth moment for gold.

But that is an

outcome that if you actually

look at the historical data,

your process, a strong
process would tell you not to

invest in gold and you would've.

Been better off probably doing, not
investing in gold for 39 outta 40

years in, in the past, you

know,

four decades.

But you're only going to hear
about this one year where gold

outperforms the market substantially

and, you know, makes investors back
some of the money that it should

have made them over the past 40

Justin Dyer: years.

Right?

And so trying to put this to,

to some

concrete, um.

points, we we really think about
things in probabilities, right?

So clarify your

goals, Okay?

Then how do we

best support those goals
with the highest probable

investments?

We've talked about gold recently.

Not a terrible, uh,

asset.

Let's call it.

I was gonna say investment, but I'm,
I'm cautious in using that word because.

It,

it doesn't have the, these

uh, these things called cash flows
that allow us to value it with.

Any

meaningful confidence.

it doesn't mean it
doesn't go up or, or down

or appreciate over time
or retain its value.

We're setting all that

stuff aside from our perspective.

We want to then bolster
your goals as best as

we can, and in our opinion, the best way

to do that is to start to build a

portfolio or have a portfolio

with

assets or investments
that we can value with.

Strong probability

or also go back to the history of data.

And have

a confident

uh,

approach or expectation of
certain returns going forward.

So we know, hey, in order to fund.

Choose

your your allocation of wealth

in order to fund

that.

Maybe

it's

multi-generational.

Maybe it's a

second, third, fourth home,
maybe it's a huge charitable

bequest.

We want to make sure that is then

matched with an asset or

an investment that gives it
the, gives you listeners.

the Highest confidence in meeting that.

Like That is how We then distill this
framework using this gold example.

We just don't have that confidence.

Doesn't mean it won't go up in

value, doesn't mean it
won't go down in value,

just doesn't support or or fit
into our decision framework.

Mena Hanna: A hundred percent.

Yeah.

And really taking that framework and
applying it again, like, I'm gonna be

repetitive here.

If you only need a yard.

You can run the

tush bush.

If you have a wedding, kind of
applying this to our client's lives.

If you have a wedding in the

next six to 12 months.

You're probably not gonna gamble

that money.

You're probably not gonna throw the deep

ball.

You're essentially, that
is a third in one moment.

You don't want to get to, to fourth down
potentially with your wife and have to

remove some people from the invite list.

But you're probably not gonna take a shot
down field either in a good asset class

like venture capital, which.

Is successful over time or
in an asset class that might

be less favorable in gold.

Like that part doesn't matter.

What you're trying to do is

accomplish your goal, and at the end
of the day, the asset still matters.

Like, I want Saquon running the ball.

I don't

wanna, you know, hand the ball off to

myself potentially, and do it myself.

You need, you need a
quality investment quality

player in the position to

Execute and give you that

probability, but it has to be
in the right structuring, in the

right framework, and with the right

Justin Dyer: implementation.

Yeah, 100%.

I mean,

quality

is, is a great, um,

just term to

use here.

where

We've

all heard stories

of

People

getting lucky and, you know,
you only needed one yard,

but you scored a touchdown or
what, you know, pick your analogy.

The, a great one that
I love is the founder

of FedEx.

I think he had like, I mean,
he is basically bankrupt.

He needed to go

to Vegas.

He went to Vegas and gambled
his whatever he had left

in his life savings in
order to make payroll.

And

now FedEx is the company it is today.

That is

not Good quality

decision

making.

It works in these edge cases, but we
as a WM, as stewards of your capital

do not make decisions in that manner.

That's, That's, reckless.

That

is not what we're trying to do.

And so quality being
a, a hugely important.

Term and word for us, right?

We're, We're, in the job of keeping
our clients wealthy, not necessarily

just putting it all on black, right?

And often when we're talking about

the, the psychological

aspect of, of chasing,
you know, again, gold

kind

of asset of the day, right?

There is this incredibly risky, uh,
behavior and, and, and, uh, Yeah.

Behavior at play

Mena Hanna: here.

Yeah, And kind

of uh, piggybacking off of that
example, if you actually follow

the game plan, you're never gonna

have to go to the casino and

gamble your life savings to stay afloat.

Like ideally, you never get to

that fourth and 50

situation where you need a
miracle to happen to save you.

If you're following a game

plan, like you're moving the ball
consistently down the field, you're

scoring points, you're winning
games because the strategy

makes sense.

The investments

that you use are high quality, and
it is the odds are in your favor

to succeed.

So even taking a, a whole step back, like

if you, if you do this right, you'll never

have

to kind of worry or be
afraid or have to gamble,

um, to.

Force a

Justin Dyer: good

outcome.

Yeah, totally.

I

mean, at, at the end of the day, we
can kind of distill this conversation

down, uh, which hopefully there weren't
too many analogies, But I think they were

great analogies if I do say so myself.

But good decisions really are Relative.

If we can apply a

consistent, disciplined approach

with

high quality decisions embedded in it.

that's going to compound over time, right?

to your

point, Mina, Run the playbook
run the playbook of high quality

decisions, and that's going to compound

over time, both in your portfolio.

And in life.

Again, we, we talk a lot about

the mental game,

right?

1% better, little changes
compound over time and get you

to win games.

But most importantly, win that

championship.

And the championship when it
comes to investing is making sure

you can accomplish your goals.

So, uh, we're gonna wrap there.

Hopefully this was helpful.

We're gonna continue to riff
on this general concept of

making good

decisions, making quality decisions
when it comes to investing.

We'll get a little bit more
granular in the episodes, uh,

upcoming talk about actual

asset classes and even how we apply,
uh, to a, a specific asset class

and manager selection in some cases.

But until then, own your

wealth.

Make an impact.

And always be a pro.

Thanks

for

listening.