Wow! I didn't write a single post in 2023. I've even forgotten the existence of this blog for a period of time. And what a year that was. I visited Chicago twice as a CompTIA Subject Matter Expert (SME) and travelled so frequently that I became a Finnair Gold member. And the perks are quite decent I must say. Priority queue, free lounge access, additional luggage allowance and more. Although they've now converted to Avios points... which from what I've read, aren't that great. But we'll see.
So I'm now (finally) financially independent 🔥. And it's about time.
I can say a wholehearted fuck you very much to my job anytime. Which is very nice. And probably something that I'll do. As someone working in the bank I can say wholeheartedly that they do not contribute to society in any meaningful way. The bank's profits are loans. Period. > 50%. They have zero innovation and pretty much suck off the tits of society. Heck they don't even have money. It is all loaned into existence. What that means is that for example if you want to borrow 300K, the bank doesn't have that money. The magic of fractional reserve banking is that they have only 30K for example, i.e. assuming 10% reserves, but from that they are allowed to loan 300K. So boom, you borrow 300K, the 300K magically appears in your account from the initial 30K. You have increased the supply of (fake) money. Ain't life grand? What can go wrong from this honestly? Anyway such is the madness of the bank and the legality of it all. Such is the madness of society. People are willing to sell their lives into debt for 30-50-100 years or whatever period to enslave themselves willingly. In my grandfather's time if you didn't have the cash to buy a home, you SAVE and THEN you buy a home. No cash? Sorry, go save! In today's "society of the insane" (tm) you borrow from the future to buy today and enslave yourself. Homes aren't worth the amount they are today, they are worth a lot less than what they're stated because it's all funded by debt.
The finance industry is also the industry that charges fees, again sucking off the tits of their clients. Want to get rich? Buy this fund from us. "Only" 1% per year in fees. If the fund goes down, don't worry, keep holding! Meanwhile we will still suck our 1% fee forever regardless of what happens. Imagine if you hire a handyman to fix your car and he tells you that yeah the car is fixed but if it falls apart don't worry, wait a while and it will fix itself. You'll tell them to take a hike and demand your money back right? Somehow in this mad society we accept that it's ok to give dumbasses dressed in suits money to manage with zero guarantee of success. These bloodsuckers can't deliver anything and I refuse to even give them a cent. Realise that they charge percentages instead of fixed amounts. Why? Because even a paltry 1% over time turns out to be HUGE!
So why did I join the bank in the first place? I joined because there was a special business unit that dealt with modern technology back in 2022, and also I was in a shit company in Sweden. To be fair thanks to covid I never got to move to Canada so here I am but still absolutely nothing has stopped me from achieving my financial goals. But now this business unit has been swallowed by the group and boy, it's such a shit position my brain cells die a little bit every time I talk to a work colleague.
If it's one thing I learnt, banks are even worse and even slower than I thought. The CFO tried to justify his existence in the bank saying they don't make too much profit. Ha! Is that a joke or was he serious?!
So anyway now that I've achieved FIRE status I'm just going to chill for a while, no sudden moves. I need to think about what I really want to do. Which thankfully since I'm not 65 yet I have a lot of time to.
Today is the prelude to Good Friday so I bid everyone who reads this Good Friday!
