I was fortunate enough to have great luck with finances in my life – most of the time. My father was a goldsmith and my mother was a teacher and also worked in the gold business, so I grew up around a collection of their favorite gold pieces. Some parents teach their kids the value of a dollar, yet mine taught me the value of gold.
private hedge fund and getting double digit returns, which is no easy task. My peers became jealous. They saw that I was making all of the right moves while they struggled to make a basic return on their investments. These hotshot stocktraders couldn’t handle the new guy coming in and stealing their thunder. As they watched me climbing towards the top, little did I know that they were plotting my downfall.
In 2001, I was contacted by a Canadian Securities Commission and then several other tax authorities. They took over my accounts and began what would become a two-and-a-half-year microscope up the “you know where” audit on the over $1 million hedge fund that we invested in legitimate companies all over the world.
I hired 3 accounting firms to evaluate what the accounts value was before the government took it over. We were positive. After the first year of government interference , the account dropped by more than 40%. By the end of the second year another 40% was gone. The government didn’t know what to do with the money. We all lost over a million dollars because it wasn’t being actively invested.
Am I bitter? Absolutely not. That whole experience taught me a valuable lesson, one that I will never forget and one that I would like to share with you throughout the course of this book. The money that you use to buy groceries with, the money in your retirement fund, all of the money in your bank account and the money from your paycheck – it all belongs to your government; it has no real value and it’s in danger of becoming extinct.
Today, the only safe way for people to have control over their financial destiny is by taking it into their own hands. This is true today regardless of what country you live in. Control your assets, or someone will take them away from you.
