My Old-World Perspective on Investing

I am a happy member of two discussion groups: The Mules, a book club, which meets monthly, and Whiskey Wednesdays, a sort of old-fashioned conversation salon, that meets weekly. One of the many topics we come back to on Wednesdays is the current state and future of technology. Last week, we talked about NFTs. SS, my partner in Ford Fine Art, was saying that someone approached her recently, offering to make NFTs out of some of my Central American collection. If you haven’t heard of NFTs, you should know that they’ve become the thing futurists have been talking about almost non-stop for more than a year now. NFT stands for “non-fungible token.” Like cryptocurrencies, they are produced on the blockchain. Unlike cryptos, they are not used as currencies, but as digital assets. (I’ve mentioned them several times here on the blog.) SS knows that NFTs have made their way into the art scene. And she’s heard the stories of overnight riches – including the one about the NFT by the artist known as Beeple that sold at Christie’s for $69.3 million on March 11. But she also knows my approach to buying art – which is skeptical and conservative. So on the one hand, she was tempted by this opportunity. But on the other hand, as she put it, “I don’t know shit about NFTs.” NE, the youngest member of the group, thought it sounded like a great idea. But he sees things from a different perspective than the rest of us. He believes that there’s been a fundamental change in the way the world works. Something that has everything to do with the rapid movement towards the brave new world of the metaverse. “We are at a flexion point,” he said. “It’s like the transition from horse-drawn carriages to gas-powered automobiles. You have to see the writing on the wall. We are now with NFTs where we were with cryptocurrencies 10 years ago. Imagine if you could have invested in Bitcoin back then.” This naturally led to a discussion about investing in general. And, although NE’s confidence in cryptocurrencies and NFTs could prove to be right, I wanted to explain my old-world perspective on investing to him…