First, Beware of Grifters

There are no shortcuts.

Finance attracts a lot of grifters. They sell books, courses, newsletters, and anything else that looks like hidden knowledge. Their tactic is simple: turn basic ideas into something that feels complicated and exclusive.

The actual fundamentals are straightforward:

• Time is priceless
• Compound interest works
• No one can predict the future

Most traders don’t outperform the market over time. Retail traders lose money so reliably that roughly 97 percent would have done better putting their money into a diversified index fund and leaving it alone.

Professionals don’t fare much better. A large share of active money managers fail to beat their benchmarks over a 10-year period, even with research teams and full-time focus.

So before buying another book or paying for a course, remember that selling the dream of getting rich is easy and the promise of easy money is usually a grift.

The good news is that most of the information needed to become financially aware is free and there are no shortcuts.