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  • 2020 was one of the toughest years ever.

  • For the past few decades, we have been building a world without borders, creating supply chains

  • across the globe to bring down prices and improve the quality of life everywhere.

  • However, the global pandemic put an end to our dreams and wishes of building a planet

  • without borders.

  • Overnight, everything crashed, and the world was on the brink of an economic catastrophe.

  • However, the absolute opposite has happened.

  • 2020 was one of the best years ever.

  • Companies earned billions of dollars, the business thrived, and nearly 500 people became

  • billionaires during the pandemic.

  • The pandemic created more billionaires than anything else.

  • The wealth changed hands.

  • Industries that were seen as scams like crypto created some of the biggest billionaires ever.

  • Bitcoin skyrocketed 800% between mid-March 2020 and mid-March 2021, while Ripple's XRP

  • rose 200%—nine new members of the three-comma club have emerged.

  • The richest is 29-year-old Sam Bankman-Fried, who has amassed an $8.7 billion fortune as

  • the founder of two crypto firms.

  • The wealth constantly changes hands, even when a single stock is traded.

  • If you purchased a stock low and sold it high.

  • Remember that someone sold it to you when it was low and bought it from you when it

  • was high.

  • This is a small example of how wealth changes hands.

  • A big example is the pandemic when people panicked and sold billions of dollars worth

  • of stocks but ended up regretting it since everything boomed afterward.

  • Or when people got too excited and began to buy crypto, for example, back at the end of

  • 2021 and beginning of 2022.

  • However, people who anticipated the crash closed their positions, made fortunes, and

  • let the rest bleed.

  • When we talk about wealth, most people think of either real estate or the stock market.

  • That's what we usually mean when we talk about investing.

  • These 2 markets are undoubtedly some of the biggest in the country, with a real estate

  • estimated at USD 3.69 trillion in 2021.

  • The New York Stock Exchange, which is one of our many stock exchanges, has an equity

  • market capitalization of just over 27.2 trillion U.S. dollars as of March 2022.

  • That's a lot of money.

  • No wonder why so many people are becoming wealthy through real estate or the stock market.

  • However, if you look at the numbers, private businesses make up over 44 percent of the

  • U.S. economy.

  • As of 2022, the size of the U.S. economy is 23 trillion dollars, with a T.

  • That means private businesses are worth over 10.12 trillion dollars.

  • You don't hear much about them because, unlike public companies, they are not obligated to

  • publish their financial statements every quarter, so no one except those who run the company

  • actually knows how big these companies are and how they are performing.

  • Koch Industries is one of the country's biggest companies that belong to the Koch brothers,

  • who are some of the wealthiest people in the world.

  • If we value Koch industries like we value Apple, for example, the world's largest company,

  • then it is worth 1.2 trillion dollars.

  • In 2020 apple made a staggering revenue of 274 billion dollars and was worth 3 trillion

  • dollars, while Koch industries made 115 billion dollars.

  • If we value the companies based on their revenue then Koch industries made 40 percent of what

  • Apple made.

  • But, that's not how we value companies.

  • At the end of the day, Apple is a tech company that focuses on innovation and theoretically

  • will make much more money in the future than Koch industries that focuses on traditional

  • business.

  • However, at the end of the day, if we take everything at face value, Koch industries

  • made almost half the revenue that Apple made.

  • It is just a small example of how much money is made by private companies that we don't

  • often hear about.

  • Take another example, Cargill, a food conglomerate.

  • From an outsider, it looks like a boring business, but the company made a staggering 134 billion

  • dollars which is almost what Microsoft made in 2021 ( $168.088B), a company that's worth

  • over 2 trillion dollars.

  • These are just 2 examples out of many private companies that are earning dozens of billions,

  • if not hundreds of billions of dollars annually.

  • And according to Forbes, some experts estimate that somewhere between $30 trillion to $68

  • trillion dollars will be shifted from baby boomers, people born between 1946 and 1964,

  • to Generation X (1965-1980) and millennials (1981-1996).

  • Which means we are on the brink of the largest wealth transition in human history.

  • Most of that wealth is about to change hands.

  • The problem is that it's really difficult to pass your wealth to someone when that wealth

  • exists because of your leadership and management.

  • Amazon is worth over a trillion dollars because Jeff Bezos surrounded himself with brilliant

  • people and led the company to dominate e-commerce.

  • Now, since he stepped down and some other top executives, it remains to be seen how

  • the company will perform in the coming future.

  • But if we are to look into the history, most companies stagnate when the charismatic leader

  • leaves the company for one reason or another, except for a few examples such as Apple.

  • Just take a look at the sp500 companies over the years.

  • 40 years ago, at&t was the top Sp500 company, but today is worth just 150 billion dollars,

  • which is a small fraction of the largest sp500 company, Apple.

  • Or G.M., an American icon that was the largest automaker in the United States and was the

  • largest in the world for 77 years until losing the top spot to Toyota.

  • The company represents America's car industry by producing cars such as Chevrolet and Cadillac.

  • Until the 1980s, the company was on the list of the top 10 sp500 companies.

  • However, today, it's a shadow of its former glory, with a valuation of just 50 billion

  • dollars.

  • A fraction of Tesla's 750 billion dollar valuation.

  • These are the largest companies in the U.S. 10 or even 5 years from now.

  • This list is going to be different.

  • Some of these companies won't even be in the list of 100 largest companies because the

  • world is yet again in the brink of another change.

  • The pandemic has already shocked the world.

  • The war in Ukraine is creating supply chain problems, and the unpredictability of the

  • future is creating room for new companies to compete with giants of the industries.

  • I wouldn't be surprised if some crypto companies or more energy companies will join the list

  • but not Exxon, chevron or PB.

  • But rather those that are developing technologies to extract cleaner sources of energy.

  • Energy and money are the two industries that shape our society, and both of these industries

  • are in the middle of the greatest transformation.

  • Oil is witnessing its last golden decade.

  • The war in Ukraine has sent shock waves across the world that if we don't invest in alternative

  • energy sources, we are doomed!

  • So, there is definitely going to be huge investings in solar, nuclear and other sources of energy.

  • That's where the wealth is most likely going to transition to.

  • In fact, it has already started.

  • That's why Tesla alone is worth more than Exxon and chevron combined.

  • Another industry that is reshaping is the financial industry.

  • Once upon a time, the Mayer Amschel Rothschild sent his 5 sons to 5 capitals of the world

  • and built the largest financial institution in the world, which as a result, made the

  • Rothschild family the wealthiest family in the world.

  • But in the late 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century, companies like JP Morgan

  • and Goldman sacks broke that monopoly and replaced them as the leaders in banking and

  • finance.

  • But now, the status quo is challenged again by cryptos that are reshaping the industry

  • and making it possible to move millions of dollars in a pen drive from one country to

  • another without any government's knowledge.

  • Of course, the government is tightening its rules on crypto, but you either adapt to the

  • new reality or fall behind.

  • The world's biggest banks are trying to get into crypto, but they won't be able to stop

  • the newcomers.

  • Coinbase's peak valuation was around 75 billion, almost as much as Goldman sacks today.

  • It's difficult to predict which companies exactly will dominate the world, but they

  • are undoubtedly going to be in these 2 sectors.

  • That's it for this video.

  • Thanks for watching, and until next time.

2020 was one of the toughest years ever.

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