Investing notes. Business, technology, and strategy. In search of long-term business compounders.
The end of July marks the 2 year anniversary of the Paper Portfolio. During the last two years, the Paper Portfolio has returned 150.42% vs the S&P500’s 52.60%. While the Paper Portfolio has performed well over the last two years, it has occasionally been defined by periods of excess volatility. This includes the first six … Continue reading Paper Portfolio – August 2021 Update
Hello, hello! 👋🏻👋🏻 Welcome back to another edition of Tidbits covering all the recent things worth talking about in business, media, and technology. China Policy Direction and Impact on Capital Markets In recent months, Chinese domestic policy actions have accelerated and seem to embed a sense of urgency. While the Chinese government and regulators have … Continue reading Tidbits #49 – China, China, China…Battle for the Metaverse, BTS, Japanese Toilets, and More
Hello, hello! 👋🏻👋🏻 Welcome back to another edition of Tidbits covering all the recent things worth talking about in business, media, and technology. 🤑 Economics + Markets #1 Ethereum Co-Founder Says Safety Concern Has Him Quitting Crypto “It’s got a risk profile that I am not too enthused about,” said Di Iorio, who declined to … Continue reading Tidbits #48 – A New Thing Called Fiat, Netflix Becoming the Metaverse, Softbank’s Comeback + More
Hello, hello! 👋🏻👋🏻 Welcome back to another edition of Tidbits covering all the recent things worth talking about in business, media, and technology. This is a double issue due to the July 4th holiday last weekend. 🗺 Geopolitics #1 130 countries sign on to global minimum tax plan, creating momentum for Biden push The Biden … Continue reading Tidbits #47 – Didi Gets Pulled Over, Tech vs Govts, But All We Want to Do is…Shop!
Over the past decade, crypto has gone on a lot of adventures. It was originally imagined to be a currency. But now it’s a lot of things. Sometimes it’s a distributed computing platform. Sometimes it’s digital art. Sometimes it’s just a fun asset to scratch that FOMO YOLO urge. Sometimes it’s just for giggles. Sometimes … Continue reading What Crypto Can Learn From MMT
The Paper Portfolio performed well during June. The Paper Portfolio returned 14.87% vs the S&P500’s 2.25%. While the performance for the month was strong, the Paper Portfolio still needs to make up some lost ground in order to match the S&P500’s strong performance year-to-date. The Paper Portfolio has returned 11.90% YTD vs the S&P500’s 15.25%. … Continue reading Paper Portfolio – July 2021 Update
Hello, hello! 👋🏻👋🏻 Summer is officially upon us. And we’re almost halfway through the year. Moving fast! As always, thanks for reading. Hopefully this doesn’t take too much time away from the summer festivities. 🍋🍹🏖😎 Laws in a Digital World Before diving into our usual fare, let’s talk about Law. One of the most under-discussed … Continue reading Tidbits #46 – Laws in a Digital World, Sneaky Fronts, Digital Reality + More
Yesterday I suggested capitalism and the need for growth would eventually lead tech to healthcare. Tech companies already command a greater share of wallet / economy than probably any single industry has ever commanded in history. In order to keep growing, the only options are: 1/ Keep finding new customers (which at this point is … Continue reading Why Tech Needs Low / No-Code
At a fundamental level, business and capitalism are pretty straightforward: You have a product or service that someone wants, and someone else has something you want. Trading products and services makes both of you better off. Of course, you could just barter the products and services directly, but it’s easier to have a common form … Continue reading Tech, Healthcare, and Alignment of Interests
Hello, hello! Have some stuff going on around the house today. Will keep it short and just dive right in. 🗺 Geopolitics #1 Hackers Thrive in Putin’s Russia as U.S. Seeks New Strategy Early in his rise to the pinnacle of Russian cybercrime, Maksim Yakubets, leader of one of the most successful hacking syndicates in … Continue reading Tidbits #45 – Proxies, Titans, Games Games Everywhere + More
The online advertising market increasingly looks like it is ripe for disruption. While a big part of this can be attributed to Apple’s recent aggressive actions to limit data-gathering, a lot of it also seems to simply reflect changing consumer behaviors. The disruption that is coming for advertising is particularly remarkable because, for the longest … Continue reading Gaming and Online Advertising
Hello, hello! 👋🏻👋🏻 Yikes, this one is long…And this is after I cut out a bunch of other clippings I saved already! In any case, hope it is enjoyable, and thanks for reading. The Empire Strikes Back Before jumping into our regular programming, one thing I think worth diving deeper into is what happens when … Continue reading Tidbits #44 – The Empire Strikes Back + Metaverse, Mobility, and More
I have a fascination with everything new. And so…I have had an ongoing fascination with crypto! For years, it always seemed to be just more of an interesting little corner of the digital world, but increasingly it is touching more and more of the mainstream world and sometimes transforming it in the process. For example, … Continue reading Proof of Work…Proof of Stake…Proof of Space…Is Crypto Reinventing the Wheel?
Hello, hello! 👋🏻👋🏻 Hope everyone had an enjoyable Memorial Weekend last week. Three day weekends are magical. We need more of them. In our modern, hyper-speed society, it’s very hard for me to keep up. Three day weekends always seem like those much-needed moments where I get to come up for air after holding my … Continue reading Tidbits #43 – Not “Arming the Rebels”, But “Spawning the Rebels”? + Capital Politics, Gucci Gardens, Doge and More
For everyone in the US, happy Memorial weekend! This is likely the first holiday weekend where a large portion of the population is finally vaccinated and ready to experience the world once again. Hope everyone has a happy and healthy weekend! During the month of May, the markets remained choppy. High-growth / high-multiple stocks reversed … Continue reading Paper Portfolio – June 2021 Update
Hello friends! Welcome to another edition of Tidbits. Summer is almost upon us. Life is starting to return to normal. And the world is healing. All is right with the world! While businesses and communities are starting to reopen, I can’t help but feel that a lot that has changed will remain changed. One of … Continue reading Tidbits #42 – A Globalized E-Commerce Market + More
Hello friends! 👋🏻👋🏻 Hope everyone is doing well. Markets are volatile, but hopefully your personal life is starting to return to some semblance of normal. I’m pretty excited about this edition of Tidbits and to discuss how “everything is becoming everything”. I’ve written a lot over the last few years about mostly convergence in almost … Continue reading Tidbits #41 – “Everything is Everything” + More
This is Part 3. In Part 1, I discuss why rents vs tolls is an increasingly relevant and powerful descriptor of business models (from a revenue generation perspective) and why it matters. In Part 2, I discuss the conditions that allow for the rise of rents, why technology is becoming the new “landlord”, and why … Continue reading It’s All the Same
This is Part 2. In Part 1, I discuss why rents vs tolls is an increasingly relevant and powerful descriptor of business models (from a revenue generation perspective) and why it matters. While rent-seeking behavior is generally not…well received, rent-seeking behavior is a very natural and logical outcome when the conditions allow it. Most people … Continue reading Rents, Rents, Rents
In recent years, the business and strategy world seems to have become increasingly fond of saying “there’s only two ways to make money: bundling and unbundling”. This phrase originally came from Jim Barksdale, the CEO of Netscape during Netscape’s IPO roadshow. And has been highly popularized by Netscape co-founder Marc Andreessen over the years. There’s … Continue reading The Only Two Business Models That Matter?
Hello, hello! 👋🏻👋🏻 I’ve been thinking about how to evolve this format to make it even better. The first few issues of Tidbits were all organized around themes (e.g. E-commerce, retail, etc). In a way, Tidbits began as a low hurdle way of grouping together a bunch of ideas around a common theme when I … Continue reading Tidbits #40 – China’s Third Large Ecosystem + More
Following the challenging month of March, April turned out to be a nice reprieve. Our decision to lean into the March weakness for last month’s Paper Portfolio update also helped support performance. During the month of April, the Paper Portfolio returned 7.44% against the S&P500’s 5.29%. This returns the Paper Portfolio to positive YTD performance, … Continue reading Paper Portfolio – May 2021 Update
What’s amazing about the last 20 years is how many (mostly tech) companies have pursued utterly ambitious visions…bordering on the impossible…and succeeded! Apple with their vision of technology made for humans. Tesla + SpaceX with their visions for saving the world through electrification of cars and reusable rockets (and off-Earth colonies…though this last part is … Continue reading The Future of Identity?
Almost exactly a decade ago, Marc Andreessen famously proclaimed: Software is eating the world. Source: A16Z With hindsight, it’s clear Marc Andreessen was not just right, he was absolutely right. Even before considering the proliferation of software in 2020 in a COVID-driven world, software was already well on its way to dominating most aspects of … Continue reading Gaming is Eating the World and How Gaming Can Can Restore Trust in Society
Hello, hello! Here’s what I found interesting recently. Thanks for reading. 🗺 Geopolitics #1 Peter Thiel- “I do wonder whether at this point Bitcoin should also be thought in part of as a Chinese financial weapon against the U.S.” Peter Thiel: Well, you know, I think there’s sort of a lot of different things that … Continue reading Tidbits #39
This post is part of a series. Part 1 – “The Coming Economic (R)Evolution” discusses the rise of technology and the creation of digital businesses that no longer need labor or capital…and why understanding their impact on the economy is necessary to navigate the shifting investment landscape in the coming decades. Part 2 – “Empire(s) … Continue reading Reshuffling the Geopolitical Deck / How Technology Resets the World
Hello, friends! There’s a lot to talk about. A lot that is interesting. A common theme that I think is becoming increasingly prevalent is the fungibility of technology. Not just software, but all of tech, including biotech, across all industries and aspects of life. What I mean is that technology is increasingly not its own … Continue reading Tidbits #38 – The Pastry AI That Can Detect Cancer
March was a challenging month! The first truly challenging and divergent month for the Paper Portfolio in a while. While I have been anticipating a period of underperformance since at least August of last year given the strength of the Paper Portfolio over the past 12-16 months (I just didn’t know when), the timing did … Continue reading Paper Portfolio – April 2021 Update
It’s been just a little under 3 weeks since Beeple’s 5000 Days sold for a mind-boggling (and highly controversial) sum of $69 million. While NFTs have been around for years, Beeple’s 5000 Days was probably a seminal moment in propelling NFTs to the fore of tech and popular (mainstream?) culture. What’s interesting is that in … Continue reading NFTs, Art, and Tech – Part 2
Hi, friends. 👋🏻👋🏻 I missed the beat last week, but now I’m back. Had some personal issues to attend to as I learned a college friend passed away. Moments like these remind me that life is short. There is never a better time than now (or now + 1) to get started on something that … Continue reading Tidbits #37 – Bottlenecks and Blockages Everywhere