The Zeroes Changed.
The Math Didn't.
"Financial literacy isn't two languages, one for the rich and one for everyone else. It's one language that anyone can learn."
What do the financial experts advising on billion-dollar deals and a homeless 21-year-old have in common? Everything except the zeroes.
I know because I've been both. At twenty-one, I was ten thousand dollars in debt, sleeping in my car behind a grocery store, writing down numbers in a coffee-stained notebook. $60 from a bartending shift, minus gas, minus groceries, minus the overdraft fee. A full day of work and I was back to zero.
A decade later, I was at Google, advising on deals worth billions, using the same framework I'd scratched out in that parking lot. The zeroes changed. The math didn't.
Why This Course Exists
In 2025, I began teaching at San José State University. As I taught finance to juniors and seniors, I noticed that every concept mirrored a part of my own journey. Businesses and people both start from nothing, and each must learn to leverage the laws of finance to build stability, wealth, and opportunity.
The Curriculum
1Where you are now
Accounting & Financial Statement Analysis
- Law 1: You Cannot Fix What You Hide
- Law 2: Displaying Wealth Consumes It
- Law 3: A Number Alone Will Lie to You
2Where you're going
Forecasting, Time Value of Money, & Valuation
- Law 4: Accuracy Emerges From Error
- Law 5: Present Decisions Create Exponential Future Impact
- Law 6: Potential Is a Story; Cash Flow Is Reality
3How to get there
Risk, Capital Budgeting, & Cognitive Biases
- Law 7: The Only Worthwhile Risks Command Incremental Expected Rewards
- Law 8: Concentration Creates Unnecessary Fragility
- Law 9: Every “Yes” Has a Casualty
- Law 10: Success Hardens Into Constraints