Justin Pullaro

I'm just here for the memes. No financial advice - sub-optimal takes on TB Lightning and Liverpool FC my own.

[Justin Pullaro @jpullaro]

@Interaxis8 @matthewsniderj @thedukekim @VanessaGrellet_ Couldn't say it any better than @Interaxis8 - the why needs to be clear first.

[Everett Stern @EverettStern1]

Dear Secretary Bessent @SecScottBessent,

My name is Everett Stern. In 2010 I was a compliance officer at @HSBC. From a back office in New Castle, Delaware, I watched billions of dollars move to drug cartels, sanctioned regimes, and terrorist organizations. The enemies of the United States. I documented it, I escalated it, and when the bank would not act, I took it to the @FBI, the @CIA, and eventually the @SECGov.

The result was a $1.92 billion settlement. At the time, it was one of the largest in American history. It was also about five weeks of the bank’s profit. Not one banker was charged. Not one went to prison.

I paid a different price. I lost my career, my savings, and my place in the industry I had trained for. I was blacklisted. Every door in American finance closed at once. I slept on a camping cot in a 300 square foot apartment because I could not afford a bed, and I waited tables at @PFChangs to eat. I tell you this not for sympathy, but so you understand that I know exactly what it costs to do the right thing in American finance, and exactly how little the system does in return.

I made that sacrifice because I believed it would change something.

Yesterday, your department fined @BankofAmerica $1.2 billion for failing to report more than $5 billion in suspicious transactions, some of it tied by your own findings to Chinese laundering networks, narcotics, and the southwest border, alongside 475 apparent sanctions violations touching Russia, Iran, and global terrorism. The bank admitted it willfully violated the Bank Secrecy Act.

Fourteen years after HSBC. A bank with “America” in its name. And once again, not one individual charged.

Secretary Bessent, I want to say plainly what I believe you already know. The fines are not working.

A fine is paid by shareholders, absorbed by the balance sheet, and forgotten by the next earnings call. Bank of America reported earnings this morning. Nobody who set the alert thresholds, nobody who decided the 2024 cease and desist could wait, nobody who chose the backlog over the law will lose a single thing they value. Their lives are untouched. That is the entire reason the behavior repeats.

This is money laundering. This is blood money. Money that reaches a cartel buys fentanyl that kills Americans. Money that reaches a terrorist organization buys the next attack. This country has fought a war on drugs and a war on terror for decades, at enormous cost in lives and treasure, and all the while we have allowed the financing to flow through institutions we charter and regulate. Cut off the money and we win. We have never seriously tried.

There is also a question of equal justice that I cannot let go.

Before I walked into the FBI building to report HSBC, I stopped in front of the Great Seal on the wall and read the words engraved beneath it: “Justice is the defense of our liberty.” I believed that. I still want to. But every day in this country, people go to prison for crimes that are nothing next to moving money for the people who want Americans dead. A suit, a title, and a corporate badge should not be a shield from the consequences that apply to everyone else. If a street dealer goes to prison for what he sells, the banker who moved the cartel’s money should be standing next to him.

I also want to raise something that is rarely said in these conversations. Why has no one inside Bank of America come forward the way I did? The answer is that everyone in American banking knows what happened to me, and to the whistleblowers who came after. The last person who spoke up is the only policy anyone believes. That is a culture problem, and it starts with leadership, in the banks and in the agencies that regulate them.

This is not a political issue. It has spanned administrations of both parties. It is a national security issue, and I am asking you to treat it as one.

Three things would change the math overnight.

Refer individuals for criminal prosecution. Not the analyst in the queue. The executives who set the thresholds and chose the risk. One banker in handcuffs would do more than every fine in Treasury’s history combined.

End “too big to jail.” An institution cannot be too big to fail and too big to jail at the same time. If it is the first, it must be held to a higher standard, not a lower one.

And if Bank of America will not act as America’s bank, review its charter. A national charter is a privilege granted on behalf of the American people. It should be conditioned on not moving money for the people trying to kill them.

Secretary Bessent, you said yesterday that these actions send a clear message that even the biggest institutions are not above the law. With respect, the institution was never the problem. The people inside it are above the law, and they know it. Until that changes, I will keep writing letters like this one, and the next bank will keep paying the next fine.

I gave up everything I had to stop this. I am asking you to use the power you have to finish it.

Respectfully,

Everett A. Stern
HSBC Whistleblower
Founder and Intelligence Director, Tactical Rabbit

[Heegs @RobbieHeeger]

This is so instanely bullish for @endaomentdotorg I can't even figure out what to say.

The nation's fastest growing custodian, @altruist, who was just bought by @Vanguard_Group in a multi billion $ txn, and with 6,000+ RIA users, now offers DAFs using our APIs.

[Justin Pullaro @jpullaro]

@RobbieHeeger @endaomentdotorg @altruist @Vanguard_Group I called this almost a year ago. SO excited for this integration. Bravo, team.
https://t.co/SO8EyCTEHn

[Justin Pullaro @jpullaro]

@altruist - get @jasonwenk in touch with @RobbieHeeger and the team at @endaomentdotorg - lots you could build together for RIAs.

[Joshua @jtok93]

City’s titles

[Peter Dugas @regintel2000]

Commissioner Hester M. Peirce, Looking for Change in Haystacks: Remarks before SIFMA’s Digital Assets Conference: https://t.co/FjPQJLkQn6

[Justin Pullaro @jpullaro]

@altruist @Vanguard_Group

[Justin Pullaro @jpullaro]

The greatest joy in the world is watching this historic player with my boys and just marveling at the play only he sees. Thank you for that Kuch, and @TBLightning

[Tampa Bay Lightning @TBLightning]

Paving his own path.

[Tampa Bay Sports Commission @SportsTampaBay]

BREAKING 🚨 🚨

@premierleague 🤝 Tampa Bay!

Armature Works will be the place to be when Premier League Mornings Live and its spring Fan Fest visit our hometown for the first time this April 18 & 19! ⚽️ 🌴

Stay in the know and pre-register now at https://t.co/61Tm4V8IBK

[Evan Closky @ECloskyWTSP]

Unless there are more disciplinary actions coming down the chute from the NHL DoPS, the damage of 7 games between the Lightning and Panthers have resulted in:

~$8K of fines for Florida
~$135K of fines for TBL with two players suspended for a total of 6 games.

[Justin Pullaro @jpullaro]

Legacy is a financial industry buzzword that often rings hollow and meaningless. It's reduced to just marketing.

How can financial professionals get something so important so wrong.
https://t.co/G1lpOHrPhw

[Darius Dale @DariusDale42]

Here you go, my friends:

Paradigm A: The 2020–21 lurching into fiscal dominance which helped catalyze the geopolitically driven supply-demand imbalance in the US Treasury bond market that is likely to persist – and widen – throughout the duration of this Fourth Turning.

Paradigm B: History confirms that when sovereigns get too indebted – specifically when both the stock and flow of sovereign debt supply increasingly exceed available resources to capitalize the leverage – there are only three options to remedy the issue. Paradigm B is the cut phase of the cut → grow → print sequence required to address the geopolitically driven supply-demand imbalance in the US Treasury bond market. Cutting requires a reduction in fiscal expenditures and a reduction in trade deficits; both outcomes increase net national savings.

Paradigm C: History confirms that when sovereigns get too indebted – specifically when both the stock and flow of sovereign debt supply increasingly exceed available resources to capitalize the leverage – there are only three options to remedy the issue. Paradigm C is the grow phase of the cut → grow → print sequence required to address the geopolitically driven supply-demand imbalance in the US Treasury bond market. Growing requires the adoption of a growth-friendly policy mix featuring tax cuts, deregulation, and credit easing. The goal of the grow phase is to delever the public sector balance sheet by increasing the denominator (e.g., GDP, GDI, domestic liquidity) faster than the numerator (i.e., sovereign debt).

Paradigm D: History confirms that when sovereigns get too indebted – specifically when both the stock and flow of sovereign debt supply increasingly exceed available resources to capitalize the leverage – there are only three options to remedy the issue. Paradigm D is the print phase of the cut → grow → print sequence required to address the geopolitically driven supply-demand imbalance in the US Treasury bond market. Printing requires an erosion of central bank independence that results in the monetary authority monetizing debt – either explicitly via quantitative easing (QE) and/or yield curve control (YCC), or implicitly via reserve management operations (RMOP). The goal of the print phase is to lessen the impact of crowding out by the bloated public sector balance sheet upon the private sector. The Treasury market is atop the global capital structure, so until the US dollar is no longer the dominant reserve currency, it will always attract the capital it needs at the expense of the private sector – particularly low-to-median-income households, small businesses, and interest-rate-sensitive sectors like housing and consumer durable goods.

K-Shaped Economy: A K-shaped economy is an economy where high-income households, large corporations, and cash-rich sectors like technology are incrementally achieving prosperity, while low-to-median-income households, small businesses, and interest-rate-sensitive sectors like housing are increasingly falling behind due to limited availability of capital, too-high interest rates, unfair tax policy that overwhelmingly favors capital over labor income, among other things. In aviation terms, a K-shaped economy features the haves flying privately and safely to fancy vacation islands, while the have-nots are flying low-budget airlines to the middle of nowhere… and the planes crash frequently. The post-COVID business cycle is a clear example of a K-shaped economy.

E-Shaped Economy: An E-shaped economy is an economy where high-income households, large corporations, and cash-rich sectors like technology are incrementally achieving prosperity alongside low-to-median-income households, small businesses, and interest-rate-sensitive sectors like housing and consumer durable goods. E-shaped economies are achieved only when fiscal and monetary policy are appropriately calibrated to “grow the economic pie” and distribute wealth morally – two outcomes that many have been deluded into believing cannot coexist due to the loss of Christian values from American politics and the advent of their replacement: economic liberalism, which ranks growing corporate profits above all other human pursuits, including enriching the lives of the very people that create the profits. In aviation terms, an E-shaped economy features the haves and have-nots flying together on a jumbo jet, whereby upper-income cohorts sit up front in first class, middle-income cohorts sit in economy plus, and low-income cohorts sit in the back in basic economy; each cohort takes off, lands – and, occasionally, crashes – together. The 1990s business cycle is a clear example of an E-shaped economy.

I hope this education blesses you as both an investor and voter in that it inspires you to make wise choices regarding your family's financial future and the future of our society.

Capitalism taken to its (il)logical extreme is no better — perhaps far worse — than socialism. Let's fix our broken form of capitalism with a better version of capitalism before it's too late.

I love you. God loves you too. May God bless America.
—Skipper 💜🇺🇸

[Justin Pullaro @jpullaro]

Had a great talk with Kate Stalter from @USNewsInvesting - big things are coming from Core Planning in the retirement plan space... stay tuned in 2026!
9 of the Best-Performing 401(k) Funds https://t.co/m8YAQ75Th3

[Justin Pullaro @jpullaro]

The Start of Giving Season https://t.co/0Vxv095167

[Justin Pullaro @jpullaro]

@ZachCav You know what to do @Panthers_Safety

[Justin Pullaro @jpullaro]

@altruist - get @jasonwenk in touch with @RobbieHeeger and the team at @endaomentdotorg - lots you could build together for RIAs.

[Endaoment @endaomentdotorg]

Upgrade your platform with Endaoment for Institutions. 🦾

Get next-level auditing, lower your overhead, and deliver international grant-making without having to integrate with additional providers— with our new modular API suite.

[Justin Pullaro @jpullaro]

@nhl_dops @BR_OpenIce @FriedgeHNIC It's more realistic if you also add the fine to John Cooper and/or Brandon Hagel.

[Adam Blumberg, CFP ® @Interaxis8]

Found out today we will not be on a panel for a crypto conference. We were passed over on a tokenization panel for product builders.

Honest question for the crypto community...

Do you think your assets are going to allocate themselves?

RIAs control TRILLIONS of dollars in the US alone. We take away many of the technical, custodial, and compliance risks most investors view as an impediment to adopting onchain assets.

If you have us on board, build with us in mind, your path to trillions onchain will be much quicker.

[Justin Pullaro @jpullaro]

@Interaxis8 @maplefinance Si Senor! What a great pic.
@maplefinance - the hat needs its own travel vlog at this point. Make it happen.