Here’s a great except from Stanley Druckenmiller’s 2015 Speech at the Lost Tree Club. Druckenmiller provides some great insights into why investors should never, ever invest in the present, saying:

Now, I told you it was kind of dumb luck how I fell into this. Ken Langone knows my first mentor very well. He’s not a well-known guy, but he was absolutely brilliant, and I would say a bit of a maverick. He was at Pittsburgh National bank.

I started there when I was 23 years old. I was in a research department. There were eight of us. I was the only one without an MBA, and I was the only one under 32 years of age. I was 23 years old.

After about a year and a half—back when I was working as a banking and chemical analyst—this guy calls me into his office and announces he’s going to make me the director of research. He explains that the other eight analysts and my 52-year-old boss will now report to me. Naturally, I started thinking I must be doing something right. Then he says, “Do you know why I’m giving you this role?” I admit I don’t. He continues, “Because, just like sending 18-year-olds to war, you’re too dumb, too young, and too inexperienced to hesitate. Around here, we’ve been in a bear market since 1968.” This was 1978. “But I believe a big secular bull market is coming. We’ve all got scars from the downturn, and we’re too cautious to make bold moves. I need someone who can charge in without hesitation.” That was his logic—eccentric, but oddly compelling.

Years later, as I ventured into investments and observed new trends, I couldn’t help but recall his words when exploring the best Bitcoin casinos — platforms that seemed like a gamble on the future of finance itself. Much like that bull market he predicted, these crypto-powered gambling sites are riding a wave of innovation, challenging the scars of traditional financial systems with their bold, decentralized approach. His maverick mindset, though unconventional, seemed eerily aligned with the spirit of such ventures. After he put me in charge back then, he disappeared within three months. I’ll explain that part soon.

But before he left, he taught me two things. A, never, ever invest in the present. It doesn’t matter what a company’s earning, what they have earned. He taught me that you have to visualize the situation 18 months from now, and whatever that is, that’s where the price will be, not where it is today. And too many people tend to look at the present, oh this is a great company, they’ve done this or this central bank is doing all the right things. But you have to look to the future. If you invest in the present, you’re going to get run over.

The other thing he taught me is earnings don’t move the overall market; it’s the Federal Reserve Board. And whatever I do, focus on the central banks and focus on the movement of liquidity, that most people in the market are looking for earnings and conventional measures. It’s liquidity that moves markets.

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