Alexander Green - The Gone Fishin Portfolio: Get Wise, Get Wealthy...and Get on with Your Life

1. Chapter 2
2. Chapter 7
3. Chapter 8
4. Chapter 9
5. Chapter 10
6. Chapter 11
7. Chapter 13
8. Appendix A
9. Appendix B

1. Chapter 7
2. Chapter 9
3. Chapter 10
4. Chapter 11
5. Chapter 15
6. Appendix A
7. Appendix B

Second Edition

ALEXANDER GREEN

Copyright 2021 by Alexander Green. All rights reserved.

Published by John Wiley & Sons, Inc., Hoboken, New Jersey.

Published simultaneously in Canada.

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Green, Alexander, 1958- author.

Title: The gone fishin portfolio: get wise, get wealthy and get on with your life / Alexander Green.

Description: Second edition. | Hoboken, New Jersey: Wiley, [2021] | Includes index.

Identifiers: LCCN 2020053702 (print) | LCCN 2020053703 (ebook) | ISBN 9781119795049 (hardback) | ISBN 9781119795056 (adobe pdf) | ISBN 9781119794998 (epub)

Subjects: LCSH: Investments. | Portfolio management. | Finance, Personal.

Classification: LCC HG4521 .G693 2021 (print) | LCC HG4521 (ebook) | DDC 332.6--dc23

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020053702

LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020053703

COVER DESIGN: PAUL MCCARTHY

COVER IMAGES: GETTY IMAGES: VMAKT (WATER) | SKODONNELL (BILLS)

This book is dedicated to the most inspiring and best man Ive ever known, my father, H. Braxton Green.

If a man writes a book, let him set down only what he knows. I have guesses enough of my own.

Source: Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Money was big in my household in the 1950s and 1960s. We didn't have very much and my parents were children of the Great Depression. That meant financial doom was always near because if it happened once, it could happen again. Therefore, having money was ultra-important.

My father worked for Caltex, commuting into New York City for low wages. He worked in the oil company's treasury department. He kept track of money that flowed from the Persian Gulf.

My mother was a housewife on a budget. Tuna, boiled hotdogs, fish sticks and Mallomars were on the weekly menu. On weekends, my father grilled flank steak. The O'Reilly family had a used car, a manual lawnmower and a few chairs on the patio.

We lived in Levittown, New York. It was like communism. Everyone pretty much had the same resources. Which were not many.

I needed money for ice cream. The Good Humor truck. Bungalow Bar, Judy Ann. Occasionally, my mom would slip me a quarter for a toasted almond bar. Life was sweet when that happened.

At age 10, I recognized that my father was not going to give me the cash I needed to live in the style I wanted to become accustomed to. So I went to work. Cutting lawns in the summer, shoveling snow off driveways in the winter. My sister and I did not receive an allowance for chores. We did them gratis in return for Sugar Frosted Flakes.

My father was frugal. He was afraid. A big 6-foot, 3-inch former naval officer, he feared the worst. That he would lose his job and not be able to provide. He saw plenty of Irish go under in 1930s Brooklyn. Until the day he died, he feared financial ruin.

So he saved, rarely spent. When I was 14, we took a bus from Long Island to Fort Lauderdale, Florida, during Easter vacation. About halfway down, in South Carolina, I said, Hey, Dad, next time just shoot me, and you, Mom and Janet go.

I think he felt guilty about the bus ride, because he paid for a water skiing lesson in Fort Lauderdale. I got right up because I knew there would be no second lesson.

My teenaged years were spent playing sports and working. I slung ice cream at Carvel, was a swimming instructor and then hit the jackpot: I began my own business painting houses. Made nice money. Never asked my parents for a nickel. I'm proud of that to this day.

America is an exceptional place, and the socialists are full of it. If you work hard, get educated, and practice self-control and honesty, you will make money. There are more ways to do that here than anywhere else in the world.

But once money flows in, then a different set of problems develops. What do you do with your wages after taxes? Buy stupid stuff? Order $75 steaks? Zip around in a Ferrari?

Not me. Like my father, I saved and, fortunately, the money grew.

Then, my broadcasting and writing career exploded and capitalism paid me a serious visit. The only other neighborhood guy who had made it big was Billy Joel. I used to see him around wearing a leather jacket in July. Billy had that James Dean thing going on, and even dropped out of high school.

But he made huge money after Piano Man. Problem was his manager stole a lot of it.

That didn't happen to me. I had honest representation. So my money accumulated. But I had no idea what to do with it. Because he feared losing money with stocks, my father bought municipal bonds. I bought a few as well. But I knew there was something more out there.