By skyforbes 
Rating: ★☆☆☆☆ (1/5 — Avoid at all costs)
Disclaimer: This review is my honest opinion of a book that I purchased. All thoughts and feelings are my own.
“Hidden Money Rules,” a book aggressively marketed under the moniker “Steve Braveman,” is perhaps the most egregious example of low-effort, high-markup AI-generated content flooding the financial self-help market today. It is not a guide to wealth; it is a meticulously constructed, zero-value scam designed to extract money from genuinely hopeful but vulnerable readers from David over at Magistiq.com Books.
David has been going on YouTube, Medium, and other sites using bots to write favorable reviews of his AI-created scam book, Hidden Money Rules by Steve Braveman.
I was victim to this scam unfortunately. I tried filing a dispute with PayPal to get back my money, but David manipulated PayPal so I lost my money. I’m out $22.68 because I also go the AI voiced audio book and this AI-created drivel that was written by ChatGPT.
The content is an indigestible porridge of tired new-age cliches, outdated manifestation strategies, and meaningless buzzwords, all wrapped up in the pretense of proprietary “codes.” For anyone serious about building durable, sustainable wealth, purchasing this book is financial self-sabotage. It is full of lies, fluff, and dangerous misinformation that will ultimately leave readers poorer in both pocket and practical knowledge.
The Deceptive Art of Authorship: The David West / Steve Braveman Shell Game
The first and most immediate indicator that “Hidden Money Rules” is a calculated scam, rather than a genuine work of literature, is the deliberate obfuscation of its author. The cover is emblazoned with the name “Steve Braveman” — a carefully constructed, aspirational persona seemingly built for social media marketing. This name implies authority, courage, and a secret path to financial success. Yet, one need only turn to the copyright page, the single mandatory legal section of the book, to find the truth: the copyright is held by David West.
This is not a simple editorial oversight; it is a blatant, calculated discrepancy intended to create a layer of distance between the low-quality content and the individual responsible for its production. “Steve Braveman” is merely a front, a non-existent brand name used to peddle generic content. This immediate lack of transparency is the foundation of the scam. If the principles within the book were genuinely powerful and proprietary, why the need for a false prophet? It’s because the content is generic, scraped, and machine-written, and the producers know it can’t withstand the scrutiny an actual author would face. When you buy this book, you are not buying the wisdom of “Steve Braveman” — you are lining the pockets of a manufacturer named David West, who clearly lacks the integrity to put his real name on his product. This act alone should be enough to discourage any discerning consumer.
The Content: A Swamp of AI-Generated Jargon and Empty Fluff
The book’s substance, or rather its lack thereof, perfectly aligns with its deceptive marketing. It reads as though a poorly instructed Large Language Model (LLM) was prompted with: “Write a 100,000-word book about money using only New Age keywords and no actionable finance advice.” The result is a document that is fundamentally unreadable and intellectually void.
The chapters are structured around vague, non-transferable concepts dubbed “The Codes.” Readers are inundated with a vocabulary that is entirely divorced from reality:
“Sovereignty is not perfection. It’s alignment.”
“You don’t chase outcomes — you author them.”
“You command reality through vibration.”
“You are no longer a seeker. You are a codeholder.”
“Whatever you do next, do it from overflow. Speak from overflow. Create from overflow… Overflow is your original setting.”
These phrases — “codeholder,” “vibration,” “overflow,” “geographic wealth portals” — are not tools for wealth creation; they are empty signifiers. They sound profound, but upon any attempt at practical application, they collapse into utter meaninglessness. How does one precisely “command reality through vibration” to land a high-paying job, start a profitable business, or choose a reliable stock? The book provides no answer, because there is none. This is the hallmark of AI-fluff: high-volume text generation designed to maintain a convincing tone while utterly lacking in specific, verifiable, or actionable instruction. The entire 1,000+ words the reader slogs through are simply an extended, recursive argument for “believing harder.”
Outdated Strategies and the Failure of the “Psychological 20%”
The central, dangerous flaw of the book lies in its misguided philosophy on wealth building. It falls back on the tired old self-help trope that “success is 80% psychology and 20% mechanics,” but then takes this to a harmful extreme. Instead of integrating mindset with strategy, “Hidden Money Rules” deliberately ignores the mechanics entirely and dwells exclusively on the supposed 20%.
In the 21st century, wealth is built through practical actions: understanding leverage (financial, technological, or media), minimizing high-interest debt, consistent, diversified investing, and generating scalable business models. This book offers none of that. Instead, it directs the reader to look inward and focus on “Gatekeeper Emotions” and “Invisible Contracts of Self-Worth.”
While mindset is undoubtedly a factor, a healthy mindset alone will not pay a mortgage or fund a retirement account. Relying solely on this book’s “manifestation” and “vibration” strategies is not just ineffective; it is actively detrimental. It encourages a passive, internal focus that distracts the user from the hard, necessary work of skill acquisition and market analysis. It teaches people that if they are poor, it is not because they lack financial literacy or marketable skills, but because they are failing to “live the code” or “speak from overflow.” This form of internal blame is predatory, convincing the victim that the failure of the book’s teachings is their own fault, thereby encouraging them to buy the next “secret code” book.
The Omission of Modern Financial Mechanics (The True 80%)
A legitimate book on financial strategy must, at minimum, cover fundamental concepts like:
Debt Management: Understanding the difference between good and bad debt and strategies for elimination.
Investment Principles: The power of compounding, diversification, and asset allocation.
Taxation and Legal Structures: Basic understanding of how business and investment income is taxed.
Scalability and Leverage: Using code, media, or other people’s time/money to decouple income from time (the true “hidden rule” of modern wealth).
“Hidden Money Rules” systematically omits all of these. There is no mention of index funds, real estate investment, managing credit, or the power of a side hustle using modern tools. It is a time capsule of bad advice from the 1990s, dusted off, fed through a text generator, and wrapped in a pseudo-spiritual veneer. The only thing you can genuinely learn from this book is how to spot a content scam based on vapid, non-committal language.
Final Verdict: Don’t Trade Your Money for Fluff
To conclude, “Hidden Money Rules” is a calculated product of deceit. It is written by a person named David West, hidden behind the façade of “Steve Braveman,” using the cheapest method possible (AI text generation) to create a high-volume product. It promises “secret codes” but delivers nothing but repetitive, non-actionable fluff and an antiquated focus on “vibration” over verifiable action. It is a zero-sum transaction where the reader loses their time, their money, and possibly their motivation by being led down a path of self-blame and mystical thinking. Do yourself a favor: keep your money, avoid this manufactured grift, and instead purchase any recognized guide on personal finance, which will offer ten times the value of this AI-created lie.
This book is not just unhelpful; it is a financial anti-guide. Avoid at all costs.
For a finance book that’s actually helpful, check out “How to Make Money in Any Market” by Jim Cramer here on Amazon: https://amzn.to/4i33SwM
