Invest Like the Best with Patrick O'Shaughnessy
00:46:50 · Patrick O'Shaughnessy
[00:46:50] S0: I'd love to learn how that same idea has applied to you because you're the founder of Ribbit and it's a business, you treat it like a business. It has adapted like crazy. I mean, we won't say the returns, but they've been spectacular. And those returns have come across wildly different styles of investing and different portfolio concentrations across the different funds. What has been the hardest part about being able to continually grow and adapt and not get sucked into, Oh, Ribbit's a firm that's had success doing this thing and they're going to keep doing this thing. That's nice to say. I think everyone listening would agree like, Yeah, I want to do that too. I want to grow in that way. I want to be adaptable. But it's hard, obviously, otherwise more people would do it. So what have been the hardest parts about keeping that in your DNA?
00:47:34 · Micky Malka, Patrick O'Shaughnessy
[00:47:34] S2: It's being willing to kill the things that got you here. This concept about, personally, always go back to this idea. I grew up in an amazing community in Caracas, in an amazing high school. My class is, could not have been better in everything. Our teachers, our school, my classmates. It was literally... I cannot even explain to you how good it was, how good we had it. And I always think about going back to our reunions and looking at somebody and saying, oh my god, that guy peaked in high school or that guy peaked in their five year reunion. That concept in my mind does not allow me to even, I wanna peak the day I'm in the cemetery, the day I die. That day, I wanna say, this guy peaked today. So that mindset, it forces this behavior that we have here that we've worked so hard to have, which is burn the bridge that got you here. Whatever got you here will not get you to the next phase. What got me to come to The US in 2007 is not what will make me be happy 2024. Just be willing to change and change and change, and don't look back one day at what you did in the past. Just don't forget where you came from. Don't ever forget where you came from, but always be looking where you're going. [00:48:54] S0: One of the great joys of this business for me is picking sides, deciding that you're gonna throw your conviction behind somebody who's going after something. What does conviction feel like to you? Like, if you had to describe the feeling of conviction when you get it and have it, how would you describe it?
00:48:54 · Patrick O'Shaughnessy, Micky Malka
[00:48:54] S0: One of the great joys of this business for me is picking sides, deciding that you're gonna throw your conviction behind somebody who's going after something. What does conviction feel like to you? Like, if you had to describe the feeling of conviction when you get it and have it, how would you describe it? [00:49:12] S2: As a team here, we have the conviction. We just don't listen to anybody else. We just don't listen. And people will say, no. But this and that, I'm like, yeah. Thank you. Conviction is one of the most important traits, I think, for any human. If you don't have conviction, you end up diversifying. And diversifying is like a conviction. It's not an investment philosophy. It's just like a conviction. So most people that are successful in life and find joy in life is because they found a handful of things in their lives that makes them very happy. You don't need 50, you don't need diversification. You don't think of that. You don't have more kids to diversify. You have more kids because you have conviction that you can be a good parent. All of those examples are just the ways we sort of think about it. [00:50:02] S0: I think heart pairs incredibly well with conviction. You're one of the biggest hearted people that I've met in this business. What is the role that heart plays in Ribbit's story?
00:50:02 · Patrick O'Shaughnessy, Micky Malka
[00:50:02] S0: I think heart pairs incredibly well with conviction. You're one of the biggest hearted people that I've met in this business. What is the role that heart plays in Ribbit's story? [00:50:13] S2: It's core and center. It's central. It's the central system of everything. First and foremost, we're all humans, and we all have flaws, and we all have attributes. If you're not willing to embrace those, both of them, then you're in the wrong business. We have had a share of founders that have found themselves in controversies that have not been fun for them or their families. And we end up going out, reaching out to them, calling them, meeting them in person, and then even backing them for the next venture when that occurs in their lives and being there from early days. Why? Because we had conviction. We got to know them. We saw them. We did our work. And no matter what you read out there, no matter what people say, if you really understand them as humans and they recognize that there was a mistake made, and we're all humans. We all make mistakes. I wouldn't be here if a lot of people allow me to make mistakes and keep believing. But there's times in society when that's not allowed, but we should not forget that that's hard. [00:51:19] S0: Where do your personal dreams come from? What are the source materials, the ingredients?
00:51:19 · Patrick O'Shaughnessy, Micky Malka
[00:51:19] S0: Where do your personal dreams come from? What are the source materials, the ingredients? [00:51:25] S2: This concept of making money better. And that has driven me since I was five or six years old, and it will probably drive me until my last day in this planet, which this concept of every time money becomes better, people live better lives. Doesn't mean more money. It means better money. It means it's easier to access, it's easier to save, it's easier to get a loan, it's easier to do aspects with it that you couldn't do before so you can build your vision and your life. So the metrics that I care the most at Ribbit, it's more the number of people that we touch every year in trying to make their lives better because that will probably drive the output of what investors want, which is returns and impact and all of those measures. But right now, we touch 900,000,000 people every year with financial services that we make their life better. I would like that number to be couple billion.
00:52:23 · Patrick O'Shaughnessy
[00:52:23] S0: Maybe it's a great excuse to talk about an investment that you made, a very big one, that was very creative and very different, which was a partnership with Walmart. Maybe tell us the story, but use it as an example of how you and your team at Ribbit work. Where did it come from? What was the process that happened behind the scenes for you to get excited about it and shape it, the things that you cared about as investors. I want a couple excuses like this to ask you about the process. Like, once you find something, what then happens? But this one was so unique and different, and I know you've done one or two others like it, but maybe can you tell us the story of the joint venture that you did with Walmart?