Financial Tips: She educates listeners on financial literacy, wealth building, and investment strategies.

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hi, I am Rashan McDonald, a host the weekly Money
Making Conversation Masterclass show. The interviews and information that this
show provides are for everyone. It's time to stop reading
other people's success stories and start living your own. If
you want to be a guest on my show, please
visit our website, Moneymaking Conversations dot com and click the
be a Guest button. Chris submit and information will come

(00:23):
directly to me. Now let's get this show started. My guest,
so your fears, son your fears? Let me a little
background on a financial advisor and Global Sports and Entertainment
Director with Morgan Stanley. She began working in the financial
services industry in two thousand did she joined Bank of
America Merrill Lynch in two thousand and six. She assists
transitioned to Morgan Stanley, where she is one of the
one of the fewer than two percent of Morgan Stanley's

(00:45):
financial advisor to obtain their Global Sports and Entertainment Director
of Destination. Please work with the Money Making Conversation Masterclass.
Sonya fears, how are you doing?

Speaker 2 (00:53):
To sign you?

Speaker 3 (00:53):
Good evening, Good evening, Rashan, thank you for helping me
well well.

Speaker 2 (00:57):
Thank you well you know, I think that we get
as prices.

Speaker 1 (01:00):
You know, in some areas going over five dollars, a
lot of people want to know what's going on with
their money.

Speaker 2 (01:06):
I guess do you get?

Speaker 1 (01:08):
Are you getting the phone calls that you're getting now
different from the phone calls that you got during the pandemic?

Speaker 3 (01:13):
They are? And the reason being the reason why they're different.
Of course, you know, we had the pandemic and and
and then we had unrest, and you know, with with
police or a lot of us is different. And so
people are nervous. There's a lot of anxiety, and the calls,

(01:37):
although similar, because there were anxieties there. These anxieties are
unknown for a lot of people, so they are a
little different.

Speaker 1 (01:47):
Yeah, because our reason you can say that, because did
you look at televisions. Let me just answer myself the
question to myself. For instance, when when the Civil War,
rest was here, when the George Floyd situation, the pandemic
was here. When I walked up front door, I had
to deal with either wearing a mask or not going
out in the front door, I had to deal with
worrying about the police, the police where they where they

(02:08):
stopped me. Because I will stopped several times. One was
because my tag was expired. I was nervous. Whereas the war,
I can just turn the TV off. I can ignore
it in the sense even though it's going on, but
that ignoring still doesn't mean it's not impacted me. Because
my gas I went to fill up because I used
premium gas in my car, and I was like stunned.

Speaker 2 (02:27):
I was like, wow, this is ridiculous because on TV
they only give you.

Speaker 1 (02:31):
The lowers priced gas, the regular premium that the regular gases.
So but there's gas out there in some places five
and six dollars a gallon.

Speaker 2 (02:39):
But in time that also.

Speaker 1 (02:41):
Tells people who because you deal with people on retirment accounts,
you deal with people who don't know if they should
take their money in or redirect their money. And were
always talking about closing the black wealth gap. So you
have a lot of questions that come to you. The
first question I'm gonna I'm gonna ask you what is
the wealth gap?

Speaker 2 (02:58):
The black wealth gap?

Speaker 1 (03:00):
Is there any possibility that being closed in my generation?
And if so, how can it be achieved?

Speaker 3 (03:08):
That's an excellent question. It's something that you hear a
lot more younger people talk about which which is very
very encouraging to me. And really by having the door
open one one often is the greatest component to increase

(03:29):
the black dollar in wealth in the black community. Education
is another way what we what we need is more
people who look like us to understand the different components
of building wealth. And and that's where we start to
really understand how you build wealth. Because when you understand,

(03:51):
we can work towards closing the gap, you know, having
the opportunities really to talk to youth and an engaging
way and to not only focus on finance, but promote
financial literacy so that we can shed light on the
mindset and the discipline needed to become wealthy. Because it's

(04:14):
discipline just like the same kind of discipline that it takes.
And I know you're an early riser to wake up early,
to wake up early, and for those who can do
that and have the discipline to regardless of what's going on,
to get their rest so that they can start early

(04:35):
and they can have a full day, the discipline to
exercise every day. It's the discipline to really understand and
have a mindset to be intentional about understanding what your
money can do for you and understanding what you need

(04:56):
to do to allow your money to work for you.

Speaker 2 (04:58):
You know, I thank you for that information. He just
told us.

Speaker 1 (05:03):
When you was talking to your opening credits, I talked
about when you was at Merrill Lynch, you created the
first African American mother daughter wealth management team with your daughter.
So I'm assuming that the conversations and the approaches were
different as the people you were dealing. I want to say,
in your age group or the group that came to

(05:24):
you for financial advice and the group that came to
her for financial advice, what.

Speaker 2 (05:29):
Was the Was there any common denominators or.

Speaker 1 (05:32):
They were just extreme people looking for extreme different different
approaches to their financial strategies.

Speaker 3 (05:40):
So the common denominator and that's what you see now
and that's why I'm encouraged about the wealth gap closing
is the fact that people that are my age, or
people that are looking towards retirement or putting together an

(06:01):
estate plan, or people that are my daughter's age, they
all want and need guidance. You know. That's that's the
common denominator. People that don't do this every day and
is not investing people's money and not putting together financial

(06:23):
plans for people so that they have that guide to
help them through life and not have to worry about it.
They really don't know, you know. So we we have physicians,
and we have athletes, and we have business owners and

(06:44):
and they they are very good at what they do,
but they don't do this every day. And if they
don't do this every day, they don't really have that
roadmap at their fingertips to help guide them through knowing
what their numbers are, owing that based on the seven
life priorities, what the numbers look like, that will make

(07:06):
that retirement plan successful. And so that's a common denominator
that young or middle age or older need the knowledge
and need the guidance to be able to fulfill their
goals and have an effective plan towards building wealth.

Speaker 1 (07:25):
Sonia, where are more minorities involved in in stock activity now?

Speaker 3 (07:29):
In terms of why minorities are not in the stock
market I really don't think that's necessarily the case anymore.
I really see a lot more minorities getting into investing,
but working with the financial professional, not as many. You
hear about a lot of younger folks now they're getting

(07:51):
involved with cryptocurrency or they want to start investing, or
you know, they have a Disney stock and things like that.
So I think think it's changing. It's just that we
need to get more involved and and and get to
our goal where we have a predominant amount of us
involved in investing.

Speaker 1 (08:12):
To ask you this question, so as you said the
word cryptocurrency, I've had experts on my show talking about cryptocurrency,
talking about bitcoin, talking about stocks. Does cryptocurrency and bitcoin
does that fall in your wheelhouse?

Speaker 3 (08:28):
So many brokerage firms, including Mortgage Stanley, really shy away
from offering cryptocurrencies to our clients. Neil, We were actually
the first brokerage firm on Wall Street to offer bitcoin

(08:48):
on our platform. But you have to be an accredited
investor to be able to buy it. So for for us,
you have to have a million dollars with us, and
the minimum you can put in it is fifty thousand.
And again we set the criteria very high because the
potential for loss is tremendous, so is the potential for gain.

(09:12):
But that volatility. A lot of people that have, you know,
their retirement funs, we discourage them from putting that into it.
You have to have significant disposable assets before we would
encourage that.

Speaker 1 (09:26):
Well, okay, And so that means that that let me
just slow it down because you know, a million dollars
you probably got a lot of people hung up on
my shoulder right there.

Speaker 2 (09:36):
I can't listen to this guy. I don't have a million.

Speaker 1 (09:38):
Dollars, you know, because of the fact that you know,
we're talking about investing, and so they say a small
amount of money. I want to invest a small amount
of money. Is it worth it? And let me ask
that question because you know, as a child, you know
to just put twenty dollars in a bank, but one
hundred dollars in the bank. What is a starting point

(09:59):
for or savings and creating a relationship with a person
like you? Or should we just go to an app
like a robin Hood type app type did you get started?
Can they come to you with a small amount of
money to invest and start their their their old their
journey to financial success?

Speaker 3 (10:20):
And so I want to say that, yes, you can
start with a small amount of money to invest. The
criteria and I give this to clients across the board,
children of my clients. We have to start with savings

(10:41):
right right, and for a young adult that's starting out
and they're looking to buy their own, their first car,
and potentially save to get their first home. Do you
have an emergency fund? You know? I always start there.
And the criteria to establish an emergency fund. If you're single,

(11:05):
it's six months times your monthly expenses, your electric, your rent,
your gas, your whatever. Your monthly expenses are six times
that amount that should be your emergency fund. If you're
married or you're a couple, is three times your monthly
expensive So once you've established your emergency fund, then the

(11:28):
moneies that you have left over, that's what you use
to invest.

Speaker 2 (11:32):
Don't go anywhere.

Speaker 4 (11:33):
We will be right back with more insights from Money
Making Conversation master Class. Welcome back to Money Making Conversation
master Class hosted by me Rashaan McDonald. Money Making Conversation
master Class continues online at Moneymaking Conversations dot com and

(11:56):
follow money Making Conversation master Class on Facebook and Instagram.

Speaker 3 (12:02):
And you start where you are, and if it's one
hundred dollars a month, that's where you start. And if
it's a thousand or five thousand, that's where you start.
But I definitely encourage at any level you should start.

Speaker 1 (12:16):
Okay, cool, I think they back on it. But I
think they've rejoined me. The one hundred dollars. They rejoined
me so good. I can see that the phones are
lighting up now. But you know, you know, the fun,
the fun part of I got all these you know,
got these people on TV screaming about stock. They got
these different shows talking about the stock market going up,

(12:38):
going down. And you know what is what is a
term hot stock? What is what is is that a
term that's being used on television only or that term
is used within your in your framework of doing business,
the word hot stock?

Speaker 3 (12:55):
You know, I get that all the time. You know.
I I go out and people here and understand what
I do, and they're asking, you know, for a temp
or to you know, what are the hot stocks that
I should invest in? And and I mean it's not

(13:16):
a bad question, right, but you know, I have to
tell them that our team primarily focuses on longer term investing,
so we don't necessarily recommend a stock or two for
short term purchase, nor will we recommend just one or
two for a portfolio. You know, it's all about asset allocation.

(13:39):
And if you are starting if you're starting out and
you cannot diversify across different sectors. You know, so there
are eleven different sectors. You may not benefit from one
or two stocks because if those one or two stocks
go down, then you've lost all your money, right, you know.
So we recommend instead of picking that one or two

(14:03):
that you look at an SMP index and you put
your money in that index fund. And so an index
fund like that tracks the s and P five hundred,
all of the major companies in the US in the
sm P five hundred. So that would be the recommendation

(14:24):
for someone versus one or two individuals and.

Speaker 2 (14:27):
Somebody tapping and showed how you doing sell y'all? Hear
you work? What's the hot stock? Not even tied to
your account.

Speaker 1 (14:35):
They just want to want some advice and run around
the corner and open up their little app and just
start buying based on what you might recommend. And that's
the that's the danger of being in a professional environment
in a non professional environment. But I know that, you know,
I've been involved personally investing ever since my early thirties,
and and as I've gotten older. You know, different people

(14:58):
I've talked to have advised me, Okay, do you want
to be aggressive? Do you want to be a moderate
or you want to be conservative, and that's those the
sectors you're talking about, are those the way of how
you want to spend your money based on your age.

Speaker 3 (15:11):
So that's risk tolerancelerant aggressive, and people have to understand
their risk tolerance. So if you're the kind that you
can go to Vegas and get on the the what
if that will call you're you're you're putting all your

(15:35):
chips on black right right right? There you go, there
you go. Then then you're aggressive. You're willing to take
chances and you know, you just want to go with it.
And so someone like that would invest in one hundred
percent equities, one hundred percent stocks. If you are more conservative,

(15:57):
right and you're only on that penny slot machine.

Speaker 1 (16:01):
Or that slot machine, you're really conservative slot machine, I'll.

Speaker 3 (16:06):
Tell you, right, you know, So then we want to
put more fixed income in your portfolio, right, and then
we want to put less stocks or equities in your portfolio.
But the sectors that we're talking about are the different
sectors that covers the market. You know. So we have

(16:27):
construction and materials, we have industrials, we have healthcare, we
have reach is a sector now and so that's what
I'm talking about technology.

Speaker 1 (16:40):
Okay, cool, Well, Sadia. We have a call there from
Dave and Buckhead. Hey, Dave, how are you doing?

Speaker 5 (16:47):
Hey, I'm doing pretty good. I'm doing pretty good.

Speaker 2 (16:49):
Dave.

Speaker 1 (16:50):
We have Saya Fears on the call. She's from Morgan
Stanley is one of the financial advisors on the show.
You have a question for her.

Speaker 5 (16:57):
Yeah, thanks for putting me through. You know, when I
turn my video down, I caught the piece of information
that Sony was passed along about Penny Investors, and I
was like, yeah, I got all excited, but you know,
my my question was really really geared towards say, a
person who's middle age or uh, you know that has

(17:19):
some investments in in in the stock market, you know,
with particular and particular stock. But then more so I
thought about, you know, the beginning of the conversation where
you both were talking about how that information is funneled
down and I hate to use that word loosely, but
it's true in my case, funneled down about financial knowledge, training,

(17:40):
understanding how money works. You know, those resources unfortunately weren't
really available to me, you know. And so having said
all that, you know, in terms of why black people
are are, I guess slow end users of these services.

(18:02):
I think are because in my case, like I would
probably want to see an investment come uh quicker than
what i'm I think what I'm hearing is more long term.
Would you say that that's true? Like stocks, there are
more long term investments when you're dealing with somebody like
your fears, right, what you what you're teaching out.

Speaker 3 (18:22):
And it's not just and thank you for that, and
thank you, you know, for even pointing out that you're
you're in the market, and and and that the the
information gets funneled down, you know, so for and I
want to start there, you know. So for a lot
of us are a lot of people that say, I

(18:43):
don't know anything about investing. I don't know anything about
the stock market. And I have to use myself for
as an example. My husband gets on me all the time.
He said, well, if you don't understand, why don't you
just google it, um and and and and look it up.
The information is out there now, right, and so all
of us we can google it, we can look it

(19:04):
up online, and so it's much more available. And so
that's the thing I want to encourage people. You start
googling you start looking up information, you start searching for
financial seminars, because there's a lot of free education out
there on investing and on the market, and so that's

(19:24):
what people need to start looking for the information and
trying to get the knowledge. That's where it starts. And
so when it's at all time highs, there's only one
place for it to go, and it's going to go down, right,
And so we were saying at the end of last year,
we are overdue for a correction in the market. We're

(19:44):
overdue for ten at least ten to fifty percent correction
in the market. We knew that. And so when you
try to time the market, you put your money in
and you think that by yeah, by March or you know,
February next year, I'm going to be rich because the
market is at all time his and you look at
the market now, but that was down eight hundred points yesterday,

(20:07):
and if people are looking at their four one ks
or their retirement it's down significant. So this is the time,
and this is where you know it's so you always
and this is something that we learn. You go. It's
a contrarian theory. They said, you always go against public
sentiments because when the market is like this, and it's

(20:31):
down so significantly, and there's all this volatility. People are
scared and they don't want to get in because they say, oh,
I'm going to lose all my money. This is the
time to get in. It is not the time to
get in when it's at all time has because it's
already gone up.

Speaker 2 (20:48):
Wow.

Speaker 3 (20:48):
So that's the thing, and it can happen overnight. You
have to be willing to leave it in there and
wait till next year.

Speaker 1 (20:58):
This time, I want to get a call right quick.
I know, at the end of the show. But Cynthia,
as she called in Cynthia from Atlanta, how are you doing?

Speaker 2 (21:04):
Sent there? You have a question for Sonya fears, Yes,
I do.

Speaker 6 (21:08):
I want to find out. So I'm a middle aged
person heading close to sixty. My children are grown and
gone now, and I'm wondering is it too late to start?
If not, where do I start?

Speaker 3 (21:25):
It is definitely definitely not too late. And if you're
saying you're close to sixty one, do you have a
financial plan? And two, I mean you're close to sixty
and we anticipate that you're going to live till ninety
ninety five, that's thirty years of investing and being in

(21:47):
the market. And if we put monies in the market now,
regardless of how much it is, I could show you
and model out for you what that would do for
you in thirty years. It's never too late and to
where you start.

Speaker 2 (22:04):
Cynthia, I don't think Cynthia was ready for that. I
think since see.

Speaker 1 (22:09):
You're like, really, Cindy didn't know she's gonna live in
ninety five.

Speaker 2 (22:12):
See she did, see you shocked her right there, cit
this in ninety five. She knows something I don't know.
Ninety five. I gotta start. I gotta start investing. I
gotta get with my full on one.

Speaker 3 (22:22):
K these kids, right, you know?

Speaker 2 (22:24):
She rather cres rather she was.

Speaker 1 (22:26):
She was ready to retire, She's ready to go something.
But she wasn't ready to hear she gonna live in
ninety five. I'm just let you know right right now.
Sign that shocked her. She got real quiet, she said,
ninety five. Man, I'm invested in the stock market at
ninety five.

Speaker 2 (22:42):
But that's what I try to tell on this show.

Speaker 1 (22:44):
Because people they set age limit and age restrictions on
what they can do and what they're supposed to do.
Because at sixty, you're not retiring, You just living. You
continue to keep dreaming, keep investing in vacations, keep investing
in yourself more importantly, because what happens is when you
stop dreaming, when you stop investing in yourself, then guess

(23:07):
what it affects you physically? Mentally, you have no motivation.
So when you get the ninety five, you look ninety five,
you walk ninety five, You have ninety five year old
money which you live.

Speaker 2 (23:17):
If you didn't invest, you have nothing.

Speaker 1 (23:19):
And so that means she's telling anybody who's listening, do
not think there's an age limit. If you seventy you
can still invest. If you're eighty, you can still invest.
But it's the different approach to the investment, the different
approach to what you're trying to get out of it.
What is your financial player, what is your angle? So Cynthia,
she's telling you, yes, you can continue.

Speaker 3 (23:46):
So Cynthia, give me a call so we could talk
about what you can do.

Speaker 6 (23:50):
Yes, sounds great.

Speaker 2 (23:51):
There you go site cit There we revived. Cynthia. She
probably gonna go shopping now. She said, ninety five, I
gotta buy some new.

Speaker 1 (24:03):
I know we have like a couple of minutes left.
I want to squeeze in one question. Dividends stocks that
have dividends tied to it, is that advantageous.

Speaker 3 (24:13):
Absolutely. You find these days that you get more income
from dividends than you do from bonds, from the yield
and bonds. So traditionally a lot of people invested in
bonds or fixed income because they would get income. That's
why it's called fixed income. They would get a set
amount of income from bonds. And the world's changed. Where

(24:39):
you get income these days is from stocks, dividend pain stocks,
and you can earn more income annually from dividend pain
stocks these days from them fixed income and bonds.

Speaker 1 (24:53):
Well, I'm going to tell you sonye and you are amazing.
I hope you find time to come back on money
making conversations.

Speaker 2 (25:00):
Class.

Speaker 1 (25:01):
I know for a fact you changed Cynthia's life. Okay,
she's gonna live eighty five. And Dave, now he's gonna
get off the penny slot machine and realize that the
money's not gonna come back tomorrow. It's gonna come back
over May with a six month period. But more important,
you told everybody when the stock is on fire, wait wait,
because it's gonna calm down.

Speaker 2 (25:21):
And when it calms down, slide down.

Speaker 1 (25:24):
Catch it on the slide down, don't catch it on
the go up, because to go up is when you
want your money been put in at the slide down.
And so again I want to thank you for taking
the time for coming on Money Making Conversations master Class
and again you were fantastic.

Speaker 2 (25:39):
And next time, bring your daughter, bring your daughter on,
come in.

Speaker 3 (25:42):
Studio real Okay, absolutely, it was my absolute pleasure. Ra Sean,
thank you so much for having me.

Speaker 4 (25:48):
This has been another edition of Money Making Conversations Master
Class hosted by me Rashwan McDonald's. Thank you to our
guests on the show today and thank you our listening audience.

Speaker 2 (26:00):
Now.

Speaker 4 (26:00):
If you want to listen to any episode or want
to register to be a guest on my show, visit
Moneymakingconversations dot com. Our social media handle is money Making Conversations.
Join us next week and remember to always leave with
your gifts. Keep winning.

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