Investing With Integrity - Benjamin Bailey
What makes bond investing sexy?
Join us on this episode of the Investing with Integrity podcast where Benjamin Bailey, CFA talks all about bonds. In 2014, Benji was named as a “NextGen Bond Manager” to watch by WealthManagement.com. His knowledge of Green Bonds is amazing.
Listen in as he describes how Everence Financial and Praxis Mutual Funds look at Biblically Responsible Investing more in terms of Stewardship Investing.
Want more information on B.R.I.? Contact the host at jeff@lasallest.com
Transcript
Investing With Integrity Episode 005 – Benjamin Bailey
Jeff Talarico (:Hi, this is Jeff Talarico Welcome to the Investing with Integrity podcast. Our guest today is Benjamin Bailey. He is the vice president of investments and senior fixed income investment manager for Praxis Mutual Funds and Everance Financial, a leading provider in faith-based financial products in the United States. He's also served as co-portfolio manager for the Praxis Impact Bond Fund since 2005 and co-portfolio manager of the Praxis Genesis Portfolios since June of 2013. He also acts as co portfolio manager on internal insurance portfolios and externally managed client accounts. Benjamin joined Everance in 2000, as assisting portfolio managers as a socially responsible investing research analyst. A graduate of Huntington University, he earned his chartered financial analyst designation in 2003. Benji, welcome to the show.
Benjamin Bailey (:Thanks for having me.
Jeff Talarico (:We're glad you were able to join us today. I'm going to start off the same way I start off every podcast and I'm going to ask you a question. Tell us, and the listeners, something interesting about yourself that most people don't know.
Benjamin Bailey (:Yes.
Benjamin Bailey (:Sure, so something that most people that would be listening to the podcast wouldn't know is I have an intense love of ice cream. I mean like I know a lot of people enjoy ice cream or a lot of people appreciate ice cream, but I mean I love ice cream. When I was younger, and we're talking like junior high through high school days, I would have a bowl of ice cream, sometimes probably even two, each night. Every single night I would have a bowl of ice cream.
Sadly, just as I'm getting older, and this is happening faster than I would like, I don't wanna be getting old quite so quickly, I cannot have a bowl of ice cream each night anymore. So if I'm having ice cream, it's probably gonna be more like a cup, or if I'm feeling really rebellious, maybe a milkshake, but when a coworker of mine, Mark Regeer and I, when we travel around, we try to find interesting, different ice cream places. So no offense to Dairy Queen or anything like that, we just want something.
Maybe it has creamery in the name or something that has some flavors that are kind of interesting or intriguing. But ice cream?
Jeff Talarico (:So what's your favorite flavor?
Benjamin Bailey (:I mix it up. So if I, depending on, I mean, if someone can produce a really good strawberry or chocolate, to me, that is just fantastic. But if I want something that's, generally something with peanut butter in it is something that I would prefer probably the most. But I've been to a decent number of places where they have really good strawberry ice cream, maybe some of the pieces of strawberry in there, and I'm like, oh, fantastic, love it.
Jeff Talarico (:Now, I don't know about where you actually live, but here in Texas, we have a brand that is pretty well known for doing a lot of different types of flavors, and they're really good at what they do. It's called Bluebell. Have you ever heard of Bluebell?
Benjamin Bailey (:Okay, yeah, oh yeah, no, I've definitely heard of it. Yep.
Jeff Talarico (:Well, Bluebell has recently come out with a new flavor called Dr. Pepper Float. It's absolutely amazing.
Benjamin Bailey (:Okay, that could be interesting. I'd love to try it. That sounds delightful, really.
Jeff Talarico (:You might have to try it sometime. If you ever get to Texas, you might enjoy it. So tell us a little bit about what you actually do for Everance and for Praxis.
Benjamin Bailey (:Yes, I would.
Benjamin Bailey (:Sure, so as you mentioned, I'm the Vice President of Investments for Everance. Everance Capital Management is the advisor for the Praxis Mutual Funds. So a lot of things that I do on a day-to-day basis would be managing money for the Praxis Impact Bond Fund. It's a bond fund that's managed versus the Bloomberg aggregate. So kind of like the S&P 500 would be used for large cap stocks, the Bloomberg aggregate would be used for...bonds, just kind of general bond investing. And so managed that fund, co-portfolio manager on that. And really just been kind of in bond markets for most of my career and really enjoy it.
Jeff Talarico (:unusual because you know for our side of the house bond investing is kind of boring but when we have someone like yourself who really enjoys it really makes the show go a lot better so the other guests that have been on the show have really stuck to the biblically responsible investing screenings and what we look for there and you guys do things that just a little bit different so why don't you tell us a little bit about that and how impact investing works versus a normal BRI
Benjamin Bailey (:Mm-hmm. Yeah.
Benjamin Bailey (:Yeah, so I mean, I think there's many different terms that people use. And I think biblically responsible investing is fine. Or sometimes people talk about faith-based investing. Actually, we use a couple of different terms. One of the terms that we use quite a bit is stewardship investing. And so when we think about being a steward of the gifts that God has entrusted with us, or being a steward of the, you know, the investments that we have, you know, from clients, we're thinking about that. And in a couple of different ways. One of course is thinking about it from the financial aspect. So we want to make sure that if someone's entrusting us with their kids' college fund, or they're entrusting us with their retirement fund, that we do a good job with that, and that we give them good, solid returns. But as being stewards and thinking about this as God entrusting us with these things, then we also want to think about the impact that we're making on the world, the communities, everyone that's out there.
in terms of the investments that we make. So it is about making a good solid return, but it's also about understanding, in some ways, kind of that impact that we're making with our investments. Part of that, and we'll talk about some of these things, I'm sure, some of that's about screening things out, but it's really about kind of a deeper view of what is the impact that you're having and the difference that you're making while you're getting those solid returns.
Jeff Talarico (:So what you're saying to me that I hear is, is you're getting to display your faith, understanding who God is and that he owns it all, but showing the world that you can do this by honoring him in such a way that makes a difference, impacting, if you will, the stewardship of what he has given us. So working for a company like you do.
Benjamin Bailey (:Mm-hmm.
Benjamin Bailey (:Right.
Benjamin Bailey (:Yep.
Most definitely. It really is that mix of those things. Mm-hmm.
Jeff Talarico (:So working for a company like you do, I'm sure you get to share your faith at work every day. So how is that different? Have you worked in the secular world doing this at all? And what differences are there between that and who you work with today?
Benjamin Bailey (:Yeah, it's an interesting thing, right? So I've been with Everance back even when it was Mennonite Mutual Aid. And this was, I actually began back in 1999 as an intern. So that was my first full-time job out of school was working for MMA.
Before that, I had some kind of summer jobs. Some of them were, what should we call them, interesting, I guess might be one way of putting it. It certainly wasn't necessarily in the area that I am pursuing now, talking about finance, because when you're first beginning, maybe like me, you get a job at Ponderosa, which is a local or maybe it's a little more broad restaurant chain that's around us. Or even some of the factory that I worked in.
It's certainly quite a bit different because what I'm doing now is much more fulfilling because certain people talk about going to their job as kind of like it's a pain or it's something that's frustrating, right, or they're really happy when Friday comes. I actually think about it in a different way because I really enjoy the job that I have and when I can put these two things together because I really loved investing even since I was young and thinking about some of these things when I can put together that challenge of investing, because it certainly is a challenge, because you're competing against many different people all across the United States or across the world that are trying to do good things for their clients also, when you have that mix of those two things, one is good solid performance, but then in really investing with your values, where you get to put those two things together, it really just makes for a completely different work atmosphere. It isn't just about...making money or it isn't just about making a profit. And the people that you work with is so much different. So it was a little more rough when I worked at some of those positions in the past. Some people that certainly needed, that viewed things from a different way. Let's at least go with it at that angle versus the people that I work with now. It's much more fulfilling with this job that I had.
Jeff Talarico (:great. So you brought that up about working different in other portfolio managers that you actually have to, as you say, compete against, if you will, for a better word. So how do proponents of this movement, this biblically responsible investing, this faith-based investing,
Benjamin Bailey (:Hmm.
Jeff Talarico (:stewardship investing, impact investing, how do they reconcile the tensions that are between the financial returns and adhering to our values and our morals when you make investment decisions?
Benjamin Bailey (:Yeah, and so I mean, and there is going to be tension at certain points, right? Because when we think about this idea that we're stewards of our investors' money, or we're stewards of the gifts that God has given us and entrusted us with, sometimes there can be conflicts, right? When we think about, is it about just making a profit, and not thinking about the impact that it has on people, or should you really make decisions that are slightly different and make sure that...we as investors or the companies that we can even influence, that they understand that they can do things differently. Certainly, there's times when you think about things just for the short term and you think about that profit mentality. And we're not denying that making a profit and being sustainable in that way is good. It certainly is. But thinking about things for the longer term is certainly something that's incredibly important to us. And we think about this kind of mix of the financial returns and utilizing our religious values.
And there's some times that people, I think, in the past have talked about and said, this is just so difficult. Let's just kind of say, make as much money as we possibly can, and then we'll give 10% or maybe even be more generous than that. But we think that, and certainly that's going to take that tension off, right? Because it's just then about making money and whatever people's choices are, that's just how it turns out to be. It kind of reminds me, though, of a quote where GK Chesterton said, the Christian ideal has not been tried and found wanting, it's been found difficult and left untried. But so in this case, it's not easy, right? I mean, trying to find this line that you have between certain times, you know, like there's certain areas that are more black and white, which is great, but there's a lot of things in this world that are really kind of in the middle of this gray area. And so we think it's important for people not to just think about, you know, making money and then giving some away, but to be thinking about how they're using those gifts that God has entrusted us with to really make a difference. And so, and there's gonna be times that we're gonna fail, right? There's gonna be times that we're gonna adjust our screens a little bit, you know, as new information comes out. Or maybe there's gonna be times when we say, okay, we thought that this investment was gonna have more of a positive impact, instead it had more of a negative impact. And we might make, we might sell it, or we might actually do some shareholder advocacy and go to the company and say, you know, we think.
Benjamin Bailey (:You might have thought that this was a good move, but we think for long-term sustainability, there's actually a different choice that you can make. So it is difficult work. It's not easy. There's times that some people think that it's best to go one way. Other people might think it's best to go the other way. But just because it's difficult doesn't mean that we shouldn't try. And we really think that it's something that's incredibly important to do. Again, invest. That's important. Try to make good, solid money.
But at that same time, if you can do something where you're trying to also make a difference in the world while you're investing, we think it's just so incredibly important to do both of those things at the same time.
Jeff Talarico (:So you brought up the term on shareholder advocacy. And that's where we as investors, owners of shares of the company, contact the boards and use our voting rights to make a difference. Is there any one particular one that you think that you guys have done that really stuck out that turned out positively?
Benjamin Bailey (:Mm-hmm.
Benjamin Bailey (:Right.
Benjamin Bailey (:Yeah, I mean, there's been, and we've been doing shareholder advocacy for well over 20 years. And we really think that, you know, again, because there aren't perfect companies, there aren't perfect people either, because there aren't perfect companies, you know, we think that it's important for us to use that voice that we have. And we think about this, you know, as shareholders, you know, we are part owners of these companies. And this means that we have the ability to talk with the companies, to ask them about their policies and practices.
So we think it's our, we know that it's our responsibility and we really want to encourage these companies towards more responsible behavior. So, but when we think about shareholder activism or we think about the shareholder advocacy, we think about it in a longer term setting. We don't necessarily think about it as something where we just send a letter to them and then say, don't do XYZ or this is literally part of your business, like sending something to Philip Morris and say, stop producing tobacco, right?
I mean, that's not going to go very far. That's going to hit the investor relations, and it's not going to go much further than that. But if instead they understand that our goal is really to help them in terms of a long-term sustainable business and that we see certain risks out there that maybe they don't see or maybe they see in a slightly different way, that's where you can really have that powerful combination. Again, it's not about just telling them you should do this differently. It's really much more about.
if you do things in a different way, we really think it's gonna be more sustainable for you. So, one example that I think is really powerful is that we've had long-term shareholder advocacy with Delta Airlines. So, certainly modern slavery is an issue that more and more people have heard about, but some people really don't understand how big of a deal that it still is.
ta Airlines, it began back in:Benjamin Bailey (15:24.266)
And it's interesting because it shows that some of these things can actually take a long time. So it isn't just about, again, sending them something and saying, oh, you should change this. And they go, oh, well, that's obvious. We really should change this. Right. Sometimes it really takes a longer time frame where you're interacting with them and they see that there's something that they can do differently. So many people, if they're traveling on Delta Airlines now, they'll see that there are signs that talk about human trafficking or there's signs that talk about things that you can look for. If you think that someone's being trafficked.
Delta has done great work in terms of talking with their employees to see these are the different things that you can look for to see that there might be someone that is being trafficked. And so, again, this takes a long time, and it takes work, and it takes effort. But we think that when we can actually work with the company and help them to understand, you have a role to play in making people's lives different.
It's something that they, I mean, they do appreciate that kind of long-term conversation.
Jeff Talarico (:Well, I'll tell you that, you know, where I am, I'm on the I-10 corridor going from Florida to California. And what you're talking about is a huge thing that we all worry about here. Human trafficking has, it is still going on. And I think that is the next big thing that a lot of organizations and a lot of companies are going to focus on because it's, it's becoming so prevalent in society. We hear about it every day on the news.
Benjamin Bailey (:Mm-hmm.
Jeff Talarico (:either child abductions and this is where it's gone or even people coming out of that were forced into it at one time or another. So I commend you guys for doing that kind of work because it's everywhere. I mean the place I go to cut my hair they even have things on the wall that says if you see something say something and that is just a great focus to have so I appreciate you guys doing that. So let's change gears for a second here and I and I kind of preface this with the questions that I sent you beforehand.
Benjamin Bailey (:Yeah.
Benjamin Bailey (:Mm-hmm.
Benjamin Bailey (:Yeah.
Jeff Talarico (:What we talk about here, our tagline on this podcast is wisdom over worth, principles over profit, morals over money, and integrity over it all. How does that fit in with what you guys do and what do you think about those verses?
Benjamin Bailey (:Mm-hmm.
Benjamin Bailey (:Yep.
Benjamin Bailey (:Yeah, I mean there were a couple things that really stuck out to me. You know, I was thinking it was almost like the bookends of both of those things, thinking about wisdom and then the integrity. And it brought me back to thinking about Solomon and how he asked for wisdom.
Right? So he had this opportunity to ask for really whatever, and hopefully I would be as wise as he was in asking for wisdom. And God gave that to him and gave him even more. And I think, man, wisdom is such an incredibly important thing these days. I'm sure it's always been, but maybe I'm getting nostalgic as I get older, but I feel like there's just more and more difficult things in this world, whether it's talking about me as a husband or as a father of two boys or as being an investor, wisdom is such an important thing. And I also think integrity is also such an important thing. So when we think about this and I think about some of the scandals that some people, obviously in the world, I mean there's some scandals that have been coming up, but even in the even in the Christian sphere. And so I think, you know, really thinking that this integrity above all, I think is such an important thing too. So those two things are the big things that stuck out to me. I mean, I think asking for wisdom, getting wisdom, being thoughtful in the way we think through things, and then making sure that we work through our lives with this high level of integrity, both of those things are so incredibly important because I think that's also one of the ways how people can see that there's a difference between what we're doing and the difference between what they might see from other people. And if they don't see a difference, then shame on us, really. So I really think those kind of both ends of that, the part about wisdom and integrity are so important.
Jeff Talarico (:Thanks for sharing that. I appreciate it. You know, one of the things that being an active advisor, someone who's dealing with clients on a day in and day out basis, I get the question all the time, you know, well, I want to own Amazon or I want to own Apple. And again, I have to step back and say that based on how I run this practice, I follow biblically responsible investing and there are companies that I just won't own. And it gives us that opportunity to educate them on what we believe.
Benjamin Bailey (:Mm-hmm.
Jeff Talarico (:that God wants us to do with his money. And again, we go back to the, he owns it all anyway. So that's great and I appreciate that because I think integrity is something that is lacking with a lot of society today. They'll say the latest and greatest thing just to get somebody to do something without following through on the moral side of it, if you will. So that's good. So let's get back into what we do. So.
Benjamin Bailey (:Mm-hmm.
Benjamin Bailey (:Mm-hmm. Yeah.
Jeff Talarico (:The industry is changing. I mean, I've only been in it about 15 years. You've been in it longer than I have, but I have seen it change massively in the time that I've been in. So what do you think we can expect in the next five, 10 years with what we do?
Benjamin Bailey (:You know, technology is just something that continues to, I think it just speeds things up. When I think about, each day I'm kind of in the markets, looking how, what things are changing, what's out there. And when I look at even how things are different in terms of just the speed at what things are coming at, or the availability of information out there, it's pretty incredible. And so to think about, what things might be coming down the pike, I can think about the last five to 10 years, and how much easier it is to trade bonds, right? So one of the things that I do on a daily basis is look at the fixed income markets. Are these things cheap or are they rich? Are they expensive or are they cheap? What will interest rates possibly do? And then to be able to go out there and make a trade, when you can make a trade in 10 seconds, five minutes, you can go out to 15, 20 brokers and we can go out to...these brokers and ask them for what's the best level you'd buy something or what's left best level that you'd sell something. It's so much faster than when I first started. It's almost incredible at the speed that we're able to go out there. Before I used to like send out emails and then keep a running spreadsheet and then I'd go back to brokers and it could be an hour or two or something like that before I would get these levels back. So the speed at which technology is changing things is just so incredible. And when I, the other thing I think about though too is, I mean, there's more and more people that are moving to put at least some portion of their portfolio into passive investing. And I think sometimes passive gives it a bad term because we do optimize index investing where we take out certain companies and then kind of put that portfolio back into something to try to be close to the public index that's out there. But I think this idea of I think having all your portfolio with active managers I think gets more and more difficult when you see some of the stats.
You can look at Microsoft active passive barometer and see that about 10 ish percent of active managers in the large cap space Really outperform their passive peers and I'm not saying that you shouldn't have any active, right? I mean, I think there are certainly good active managers out there and there's some really good active managers out there in the faith-based space even But I think on some level to not have any of your portfolio in kind of a faith-based Stewardship investing but still a passive
Benjamin Bailey (:type portfolio, again, where you're screening out the things that you don't want to be invested in, but that you're not necessarily just holding 20 or 30 stocks. And the volatility that can come with that just can be pretty treacherous for people. I sometimes joke around with people because I talk about, you know, everyone knows you're supposed to buy low and sell high. I think that is such an incredibly difficult thing to do because when you think about that, just in the mutual fund space, right? So when we think about that...and you're going to be going to someone at church or whatever and bragging about your one-star fund that you're purchasing and that everyone should be so jealous of you because you bought this fund that has been really in a difficult spot, but it's going to be the five-star later on. No, I mean, that doesn't happen, right? I mean, so it's so easy to buy high, essentially buying these things that everyone knows have done well over the past one year, three year, five year. But there are cycles in these markets. I just think it makes it difficult. And one of these things I think people will keep recognizing over this next five to 10 years is it's tough to just have all your portfolio to be active and just have those ups and downs that you have. And it's difficult not to buy high, and then when that manager doesn't do as well, then to sell low, really, when they've started to underperform and buy your next manager that will do amazing things going forward. So I think in each of these things, it's gonna be interesting how it plays out over the next five to 10 years, but I think technology and I think kind of this move really more towards passive investing will continue.
Jeff Talarico (:I don't disagree at all. And again, being active on this side, we get calls all the time. Well, I want to buy this certain fund because it's a five star fund. And then you use some education with them and show them that, you know, two years ago, it was a two star. Will it ever go back to that? Very possibly. So let's find out exactly what it is you want to do. What are your goals? And let's find the appropriate investments based on your goals. Cause when you start chasing something, you're never going to get it.
Benjamin Bailey (:Yeah.
Benjamin Bailey (:Mm-hmm.
Right.
Benjamin Bailey (:Yeah.
Benjamin Bailey (:It is, I mean, right? Cause we've been around for a while and I have a list of Morningstar kind of funds that were either like Morningstar manager of the year or even Morningstar manager of the decade. And it's amazing how some of those funds, and obviously they were, these are very smart people, they were doing great work, but how even some of those, and this is just in the broad investing space, how they've gone through tough times also.
Jeff Talarico (:So let me ask you then, have there been any hurdles on this side of the business that we do this faith-based investing that you have faced that made you question, are you in the right spot?
Benjamin Bailey (:I mean, I think there's just hurdles all the time, right? I mean, these things are challenging, right? Because I mentioned this a little bit, but in this space, I mean, people, and rightfully so, they want to get solid returns, right? They want to be somewhere in the general vicinity of the benchmark. I mean, they don't want to be underperformed by 7% or something like that. But I mean, so I think with that, I mean, because you have so many people that you're competing against, and when we think about bond investing, we're not just competing against individual investors or just mutual fund investors, it's also hedge fund investors, it's other credit investors, things like that. So it is a really competitive, tough thing to do. And so when you think about hurdles, I mean, many times it's people hearing what is out there in the market and what is kind of accepted understanding and then wondering why. Sometimes we agree with it and we do follow that. And there's other times you have to say...
Well, what choices are we going to make that are different than what the market is? Maybe there's a recession call that everyone believes, or that interest rates are going to stay as low as they ever have been, or that we should be like Switzerland and be in a negative race. I mean, any of those different things, I mean, that's what makes a market, right? Is that enough people believe on one side, enough people believe on the other side. And so I think this idea of we're going to have to do things differently than what everyone else is doing.
And that's the way that you're actually going to be able to under or that's where you're going to be able to outperform. I mean, there's going to be times that you also underperform, right? Because we're not going to be right all the time. And we even talk about it. So we have passive optimized equity index fund at the Praxis Mutual Fund family. But I manage an active, the Praxis Impact Bond Fund. And so there's going to be times that we underperform and there's going to be times that we outperform. And we talk about it over market cycles because we don't act like we're going to be able to outperform every...three months, six months, calendar year, that's just not the reality of the way things are. Overmarket cycles, five years, seven years, that's kind of the goal. So, I mean, those hurdles are expectations of people. I mean, I have high expectations of myself and each of these things are difficult. That's what makes it fun too, right? I mean, it's challenging and I like the challenge.
Jeff Talarico (:You heard it here, folks. Bond investing is fun, especially when you let Benji do that for you. So a couple of questions I want to finish up with really gets, get us focused back on to you personally and not so much the markets and what we do. But if you could have a conversation with three people that are alive, who would they be and why?
Benjamin Bailey (:Exactly. Yes.
Benjamin Bailey (:Mm-hmm.
,:Jeff Talarico (29:10.337)
Hahaha
Benjamin Bailey (:At a conference and I was in line, I had already checked in for the conference, and I saw him and I said, Mr. Willard, I completely love your book, Divine Conspiracy, and it's just fantastic. And in this like grandfatherly way, he was like, oh, thank you so much. It's so kind of you. And then he said, hey, if you haven't checked in yet, I'd love to talk with you while we're in line waiting. Of course, I said, oh, I've already checked in. So I can't really. Why I didn't just say.
Jeff Talarico (:Wow.
Benjamin Bailey (:Oh my gosh, I've checked in and I'm just gonna stand beside with you and talk with you for a few minutes. I have no idea whatsoever. He died, I think, a little over ten years ago. But just in terms of humble, Christ-like wisdom, to me he ranks right up there. And so I would love to be able to talk with him more about kind of how he mixes these things of understanding...
The Christian walk in a lot of ways is difficult and there's a lot of humility that needs to come in with that And I think he really just put that he was really able to piece those things together I'm getting even more spiritual with the last one and that would be David And when I think about someone you talk about someone that was described as a man after God's own heart Yet man, he could really sin it was this interesting mix.
So to understand from him how he was able to come some of these drastic sins that he had, that he was also an amazing worshipper of God, doing both of those things, and that he was also willing, like in the Psalms, you read through some of the Psalms and how he was frustrated with God, really, and like expressing those. I think the mix of each of those things, I would love to understand more how he was able to combine each of those, and really then, but then again, end result a man after God's own heart, I mean, it doesn't get any higher of an accomplishment related to that.
Jeff Talarico (:Yeah, I think personally, I think David is one of those that we as men, at least in today's society, can really relate to the things he did, the things he went through. But still that inward desire to be more like Christ, to be God, to be more like God in such a way. That's just a beautiful story. Thanks for that. All right. Last one. What did I know enough to ask you?
Benjamin Bailey (:Mm-hmm.
Benjamin Bailey (:Mm-hmm. Yep.
Jeff Talarico (:What is it that you're really wanting to tell people?
Benjamin Bailey (:I think the conversation was great. I mean, I love conversations like this because I think it's an important thing for people to really be able to understand that they can do both, right? That this isn't just about taking your money, which I mean, at the very beginning, right, it's investing is important, right? If you, especially when you're starting young, I even tell my 16 year old about investing and we talk about it and how important it is. So starting young is so incredibly important, right? So invest put money towards retirement. That's important. And when you can do it while you're still understanding your values that you have and how you put those two things together is so important. One thing I think is important is you may have companies that are in the news at this exact moment that you think, oh my gosh, I don't want to own them. Or you might think, I don't want to own this large swath of companies. So I do think it's important for people to understand the impact that you can have on your portfolio performance. Maybe it isn't necessarily negative each time, but when you think about kind of that volatility, if you're taking out half of the large cap companies because you have something that you feel strongly about, there is balance in each of these things. And so I think I would caution people, again, investing is important, start early, investing with your values is also incredibly important. There are certain times that you need to understand, am I going to be completely out of all public markets because all these companies are falling and they're doing some things that I don't like, or I'm going to say in each of these there's some level of a gray area and so I want to start to balance some of these things out. It isn't just about perfection. I'm going to say one more time, right, there's no perfect companies and we're not going to find any of them, especially when we're talking about public companies, right? So in that we need to have this balance of that we're looking for companies that that actually kind of match the values that we have, and maybe not even perfectly match them, but have these general core values that we want to work towards. They aren't doing largely negative things. Maybe that's alcohol or tobacco, or maybe that's adult entertainment or whatever. Those things that are kind of like, I definitely don't want to be invested in those. And then some of the things that maybe are a little less kind of straightforward or quite as important to you, maybe they're somewhat important, maybe have a little bit of flexibility in those to make sure you're not just taking out.
Benjamin Bailey (:Every mid cap company or every international company or every company that's involved in anything that you might find that has anything negative at all. So a little bit of balance, again, while you're investing with your values is really important.
Jeff Talarico (:Well, and I think all that falls back on having grace, allowing grace. And sometimes we get so caught up in the black and white, this is it. We make bad decisions. So even, even when I screen portfolios, I allow a certain percentage just because of that, because I know things change. They, especially with mutual funds, if it's an actively managed fund, they may be buying and selling the company, you know, once a month and it's something different depending on.
Benjamin Bailey (:Mm-hmm.
Benjamin Bailey (:Mm-hmm.
Benjamin Bailey (:Mm.
Right. Yeah.
Jeff Talarico (:Know, the turnover. So I don't want to throw the baby out with the bath water, if I will. So making this confidence effort. So Benji, I totally appreciate your time. Thank you so much for spending it with us on the Investing with Integrity podcast. Folks, Praxis, Everance, they're great companies to deal with. Again, Benji, hope to see you again at the next Kingdom Advisors Conference
Benjamin Bailey (:Yep. Thanks. Appreciate it. Yep. You bet. It's been great. Bye.
