Check out the October issue of Black Enterprise!
I really want to say THANKS to you guys! Because of your support, lots of cool things have happened this year!
I was featured in the October issue of Black Enterprise Magazine in their annual “All Star Advice” article. The good folks from BE gathered a group of financial professionals to answer questions on various topics of interest. It was very cool to be in the magazine, and I hope you all heed the great advice in the article.
Tiger still on top of the list of highest paid athletes!
You can’t stop them — you can only hope to re-sign them. Extracurricular scandals, contract holdouts and ugly labor negotiations seem to have rocked professional sports more than any other point in recent memory. And yet financially, athletes seem nearly bulletproof.
For the seventh consecutive year, SI.com has compiled a list of the 50 top-earning American athletes by salary, winnings, endorsements and appearance fees. The average earnings of those on the list have reached an all-time high of $26.2 million (up 11 percent from ’09).
In a year in which Tiger Woods’ image has been forever tarnished — costing the perennial No. 1 tens of millions in endorsement dollars — he still stayed ahead of the curve. Tiger’s earnings were down more than $9 million from a year ago, but he still earned nearly $30 million more than the No. 2 athlete, fellow golfer Phil Mickelson.
Read the full article at SI.com
I stopped by Pittsburgh Today Live and brought along my good friend, former classmate and new Super Bowl Champion Darnell Dinkins from the New Orleans Saints with me to talk about we can all learn about our money from the world of sports.
Jay Z and Beyonce Top List of Highest Earning Couples
My guess is that it was a very Happy Valentine’s Day at the Knowles Carter household seeing as how the couple earned $122 million between June 08 and June 09, putting them at the very top of Forbes’ list of highest earning Hollywood couples. Of course, I’m a little disappointed in them since they slacked off this year. Last year they earned $162 million…step your game’s back up guys!
I suppose Forbes doesn’t consider Steadman a celebrity or doesn’t consider he and Oprah as a couple or those two would have been the Queen and King of this list since she earned $275 million all by herself over the same time period.
Homorable Mention:
Harrison Ford/Calista Flockhart $69 million
Brad Pitt/Angelina Jolie $55 million
Will Smith/Jada Pinkett $48 million
David & Victoria Beckham $46 million
Boy, this was a really nice program and a great honor. The other nine people that we honored are really making things happen, so I was just glad to be up there with them!
To the left is a picture of me receiving my award from Mayor Like Ravenstahl.
[From Pittsburgh Post-Gazette]
About 100 people attended an opening reception Wednesday for the city’s tribute to Black History Month, an exhibit of photographs and biographies honoring 10 local black leaders.
The exhibit, “History in the Making: Honoring our Young African American Leaders of Today,” will be displayed at the City-County Building through Feb. 26.
Among the 10 honorees chosen were Paul Ellis Jr., 40, of the Hill District, a lawyer who helped negotiate a Community Benefits Agreement with the Penguins, and La’Tasha Mayes, 28, of Morningside, a Philadelphia native who founded New Voices Pittsburgh: Women of Color for Reproductive Justice.
Read more here.
Learn from the last decade, make money in the next.
The champagne has been popped, the ball has dropped and now it’s time to get down to business in a new decade. It seems like just yesterday that I was sitting next to my generator with a can of pork-and-beans and a flashlight because the world as we knew it was supposed to come to a halt when all the computers crashed during Y2K. It turns out that Microsoft and Home Depot just decided to play a big joke on us…but what a great way to sell new laptops and plywood!
Though that joke wasn’t very funny, I think that we can learn a lot from Y2K and many of the events of the past decade. Here’s your blueprint for getting your paper right in the ‘10s.
What Goes Up, Must Come Down (then goes back up)
The 2000s were full of ups and downs. We entered the decade riding a wave on which we thought sites like Pets.com would become the next Wal-Mart and any jackass could put “e” in front of anything and raise $100 million in an IPO (why oh why didn’t I start eSocks when I had the chance!). Well, that wave turned into weak ripples when we realized how much it cost to ship pet food (besides, can you really afford to wait for kitty litter to arrive in the mail?) and stocks like eToys.com went from a price of $84 per share down to 9 cents! Lots of people lost their shirts when they didn’t sell as soon as it became clear that those high stock prices didn’t make any sense.
Ahh, but we love a good comeback story, and the market came back with a vengeance. This time instead of the e-geeks, it was the house flippers that led the market to new highs. Inexplicably, banks started loaning homeless bums $200,000 to buy abandoned townhouses and to go on a Home Depot shopping spree in hopes of selling it to the next idiot for $500,000 in six weeks. It worked…until it didn’t, and HGTV almost helped usher in the new Great Depression.
But just before the soup kitchens opened back up, the market decided to rebound…again, by going up over 50% from March ’09 until the end of the year. Way to end on a high note!
The point is, yes, investing can be scary at times, but the market has taken a licking and kept on ticking. You need to be in the game; just don’t run your portfolio like the Detroit Lions.
There’s good, there’s great, there’s freakin awesome…then there’s TIGER!
With his $10 million victory over the weekend in the PGA’s version of the playoffs, the FedEx Cup, the folks over at Forbes have calculated that the win put him over the billion dollar mark in career earnings.
Surely he’s popped a bottle or two over the years and spent a few of those duckets, so I’m not sure if this technically makes him a billionaire, but nevertheless, this is an AMAZING feat. Keep in mind that he only turned pro 13 years ago.
I’m not sure that people who are not golfers or fans of golf really understand the magnitude of what Tiger is doing. He plays a comparatively small number of tournaments, yet tops the money list every year. He beat an entire field of the world’s best players on ONE LEG. The list goes on… I know, he doesn’t get tackled on Sundays or dunk from the free throw line, but for the way he has totally DOMINATED his sport, he gets my vote as greatest athlete ever. Oh, and he’ll probably play another 10 years!
This is excellence people. Yes, he’s been playing since he was two…that’s committment. You too can be the best in the world at something! Now stop reading this and get to work.
If you look beyond 106th and Park, you can learn something from businessmen who happen to be rappers. I wonder if this clip will get as many hits as “Ridin Dirty”???
Listen and learn something. There will be an exam!
Even in a recession, it’s not all about cutting back and being frugal, sometimes you just have to make more money! Are you getting paid what you’re worth? No? Well if Paula Abdul can walk away from a 10 figure deal, certainly you can squeeze a few extra g’s out of your boss. Here’s how.
Yes, I’ve been to Jay’s club in NY, but that’s not the one that I am talking about. And no, I did not have 40 home runs and 40 stolen bases in the Pittsburgh Sports League this season (but next year…watch out).
But, I am really proud to have been selected to the 2009 group of Pittsburgh’s 40 Under 40! Developed by Pittsburgh Magazine and Pittsburgh Urban Magnet Project, 40 Under 40 recognizes 40 talented individuals under the age of 40 who are making a positive impact on the region’s development.
Even though awards are not the reason that you do what you do, it feels great to know that someone appreciates your work.
The 40 winners will be guests of honor at a celebration on Friday, November 6 from 6:00 to 10:00 p.m. at the August Wilson Center.
Jay-Z and Barry Bonds are probably busy that night, but you can check out the list of all of this years winners here.
I appreciate all of your support, and I hope you can join us!
