I’m a Certified Financial Planner and founder of an investment advisor firm managing millions in client assets. How do I manage our client’s portfolios? It’s the opposite of what most financial advisors preach.
Here’s the uncomfortable truth: conventional investing advice isn’t designed to maximize your wealth. It’s designed to protect advisors and collect fees.
That “safe” 60/40 portfolio? Diversified index funds? “Set it and forget it”? That’s not wealth-building. That’s a playbook built to keep advisors safe while delivering you average returns.
I got my MBA. I got my CFP. I read all the books on modern portfolio theory and efficient markets.
I learned all the rules. Passed all the tests. Then I looked at what those rules actually produce: average returns, delayed retirement, and wealth that arrives too late to matter, and clients shelling out thousands in unnecessary fees.
The Problem With Conventional Advice
If you’ve ever sat with a financial advisor, you’ve heard this pitch: “We’ll build you a fully diversified portfolio. Low-cost index funds. U.S. stocks, international stocks, some bonds. Modern Portfolio Theory. No individual stocks—that’s too risky. Long-term investing, occasional rebalancing, steady growth.”
Sounds smart. Sounds safe, right?
But here’s what they’re not telling you. Your advisor puts you in a large-cap fund, an international fund, a mid-cap fund, a small-cap fund, bond funds for “safety.” They call this smart diversification. The reality? You just bought the entire market sliced into expensive pieces. You’re literally guaranteed market-average returns—minus the fees you’re paying on all those funds.
Now, if you’re happy grinding until 65, and being average is fine, then keep doing what everyone else does.
But what if you don’t have that luxury of time? What if you’re in tech, in your late 30s, and you don’t want to work another 25 years? What if you’ve already maxed your compensation, crushed your savings rate—and now you need your money to work as hard as you did?
That’s where conventional advice completely falls apart. Average returns deliver average outcomes. You can’t get extraordinary results with an ordinary strategy.
What I Figured Out
Some years ago, when I was working as a financial advisor, I helped an investor with a mid-eight-figure balance convert his brokerage account to a trust account. I’d never seen that kind of money sitting in a single account before—it stopped me in my tracks.
That kind of wealth isn’t luck—it’s something else entirely. I had to ask him: “How did you do it?”
He smiled. “Starting in my 30s, I researched stocks. I’d study businesses until I found exceptional ones—companies like Berkshire Hathaway, Monster Beverage, Microsoft, Qualcomm. Then I’d buy shares and keep adding year after year. That portfolio grew enough that I retired by 50.”
Here I was telling clients to own 500 stocks. “Diversify. Play it safe.“
And this guy—retired in his early 50s—did the exact opposite. He concentrated. He invested with conviction.
But he wasn’t alone. I started seeing a pattern: The people who reached financial independence early didn’t diversify into oblivion. They concentrated.
Look at the world’s wealthiest: Musk (Tesla), Gates (Microsoft), Bezos (Amazon), Buffett (Berkshire). They didn’t diversify their way to billions.
Warren Buffett said it best: “Diversification is protection against ignorance. It makes little sense if you know what you’re doing.”
You don’t need 500 stocks. You need exceptional businesses you have deep conviction in. That’s the difference between building wealth and hoping for it.
The Framework That Actually Works
Quality over quantity: You want the disruptors, not the disrupted. Tesla didn’t just make EVs; it forced every automaker on earth to rewrite their strategy.
Amazon didn’t just compete with bookstores; it made entire retail categories irrelevant. Nvidia didn’t just make graphics chips; it became core infrastructure for the AI era. These companies don’t react to change. They cause it.
Visionary leadership matters: Founder-led companies consistently out-execute companies run by career managers. Founders think in decades, not quarters. When the founder is still deeply involved and owns a meaningful stake, that’s a huge signal.
Growth changes everything: A 3% dividend on a flat stock isn’t building wealth—it’s financial melatonin. We want businesses compounding at 15–20% or more a year. At that pace, your money doubles every 3–5 years. At 3%, it takes decades. That’s the gap between “maybe retire at 65” and having real options in your 40s or 50s.
Research comes first: Before a dollar goes in, you answer hard questions. What does this company look like 5–10 years from now? If the stock dropped 30% tomorrow, would we be excited to buy more—or desperate to get out? That last question tests true conviction.
Position sizing matters: High conviction ideas deserve real weight. Moderate conviction gets lower weight. Low conviction? You pass. That’s how several big winners carry the entire portfolio.
The Bottom Line
The conventional playbook works if your goal is to be average. But if you want more—if you want a real shot at retiring years earlier—you need a different approach.
Yes, it’s more work than buying an index and forgetting about it. More research. More discipline. More engagement.
That’s exactly why it works. Because most people won’t do that work.
Whatever you decide—do it yourself, work with a like-minded fiduciary advisor—the core principles don’t change. Stop settling for average and start concentrating on quality.
Build the portfolio—and the life—you actually want.
Ready to move beyond the standard advisor playbook?
At Paraiba Wealth, our focus is on building actively managed portfolios—a strategy designed for greater control, tax efficiency, and tailored to you. If you’re ready to see what this looks like, book a no-obligation strategy session today.