Teach someone to fish, and you feed them for life

You'll need your own fishing boat, top-of-the-line sonar, and plenty of fuel. You should have at least $100,000 in upfront capital before starting. Consider a bigger boat as it reduces your chance of capsizing. Other fishers have big boats, if that matters to you. Bringing a friend helps—for conversation, not for catching fish. Results will vary depending on timing, weather, and luck. Fish are never guaranteed. Seek professional advice before casting your line.

I’ll discuss my investment framework and mental models that help me make better decisions. Let's skip the fluff and dive straight into what matters:

finding ideas with asymmetrical return profiles

Investment Principles and Beliefs

Foundation of Value:

  • Value exists naturally; money estimates it

  • Value resides in solving human needs

  • Companies transform inputs into value

  • Time reveals value; stocks chase expectations

Market Dynamics:

  • Markets seek efficiency, unless obstructed

  • Markets reflect and shape collective behaviour

  • Prices flow from supply and demand curves

  • Competition is constant and pervasive

Investment Mentality:

  • Price is what I pay, value is what I get

  • Volatility and uncertainty creates opportunity

  • Risk is permanent capital loss

  • Relative advantage outweighs absolute

  • Compounding works best undisturbed

  • Accounting measures money, not value

  • Success favors those who outlast failure

  • Failure favors those who ignore its lessons

Investment Process:

  • Refine the process, transcend outcomes

  • Simplicity enables clarity

  • Numbers ground narratives

  • Cash flow signals value creation

Reducing Risk:

  • Avoid weak capital structures

  • Avoid misaligned management

  • Avoid premium valuations

  • Avoid secular headwinds

  • Wait for capital scarcity in cycles

  • Enter commodities near cash cost

  • Don’t make time your enemy

  • Don’t bet against human ingenuity

  • Don’t bet against human stupidity

Enhancing Upside:

  • Find good industries

  • Find optionality

  • Find shifts in narrative

  • Find managers with excellent track records

  • Find managers with shareholder alignment

  • Find uncertainty with low risk

  • Find inevitable long-term outcomes

Analytical Frameworks

These frameworks serve as thinking tools, each offering a different way to examine fundamentals. Their value comes not from rigid application, but from selective deployment to help answer specific investment issues. The goal is to extract useful insights while avoiding analysis that wastes time and creates noise.

INDUSTRY ANALYSIS

Porter's Five Forces:

  • Rivalry - competition intensity in current market

  • Supplier Power - who controls key inputs

  • Buyer Power - who captures value downstream

  • New Entrants - barriers protecting incumbents

  • Substitutes - availability of alternative solutions

Value Chain Analysis:

  • Input Dynamics - raw material to components

  • Process Efficiency - conversion cost advantages

  • Distribution Control - channel power dynamics

  • Customer Access - direct vs indirect

  • Value Capture - where profits concentrate

Industry Life Cycle:

  • Emergence - high investment

  • Growth - rising returns

  • Maturity - peak returns

  • Decline - falling returns

PESTLE - External Forces:

  • Political - government policy and stability

  • Economic - market conditions and dynamics

  • Social - demographic and cultural shifts

  • Technological - innovation and digital change

  • Legal - regulations and compliance rules

  • Environmental - climate and resource impacts

COMPANY ANALYSIS

Durable Competitive Advantages:

  • Network Effects

  • Platform Advantages

  • Brand and Reputation

  • Scale Advantages

  • Switching Costs

  • Customer Integration

  • Distribution Advantages

  • Resource Advantages

  • Cultural Advantages

The most durable competitive advantages are self-reinforcing and structurally embedded, making them difficult to replicate even with significant resources. These advantages tend to compound naturally over time, as each element strengthens the others to create an increasingly defensible market position. Companies that combine multiple advantages - like network effects with switching costs, or brand loyalty with scale efficiencies - build particularly resilient business models.

Less Durable Competitive Advantages:

  • First Mover Advantages

  • Process Advantages

  • Learning Curve

  • Data Advantages

  • Intellectual Property

Less durable advantages are typically execution-based and require constant renewal in dynamic markets. These temporary strengths erode without sustained reinvestment and vigilance, unlike the self-reinforcing nature of structural advantages.

Capital Intensity Characteristics:

  • Return Decomposition

  • Cost Structure Dynamics

  • Working Capital

  • Reinvestment Rate

  • Free Cash Flow

Management Assessment:

  • Strategic Clarity

  • Capital Allocation

  • Incentive Alignment

  • Execution Track Record

  • Communication Quality

MARKET ANALYSIS

Behavioral Analysis:

  • Sentiment Cycles

  • Information Flow

  • Time Arbitrage

  • Consensus Views

  • Narrative Shifts

PORTFOLIO MANAGEMENT

Position Sizing Framework:

  • Conviction Level

  • Loss Potential

  • Portfolio Correlations

  • Liquidity Profile

  • Catalyst Timeline

I’ll fill these out and cover more points over time.