⬇️ Full Transcript with Slides below ⬇️

1/ On April 3, 2024, Sapient Capital's Tom Morgan gave a presentation at the Sohn Conference titled "The Most Offensively Taboo Idea in Western Civilization" where he distilled 10 years of curiosity research into a 5 minute talk.

I found this presentation to be one of the tightest, information-dense, and thought provoking talks I've listened to. I wanted to be able to refer back to it easily, so I transcribed the talk and screengrabbed the slides.

I shared the transcript in A Letter a Day (link in bio), but people enjoyed when I shared my transcript of Bill Gurley's "2,851 Miles" presentation on X, so I thought I would share this one here too.

⬇️ Full Transcript with Slides below ⬇️ 2/ So I'm not going to talk about a stock today. Instead, I'm going to talk about the most offensively taboo idea in western civilization.

⬇️ Full Transcript with Slides below ⬇️

1/ On Sept 12, 2023, Benchmark’s Bill Gurley gave a presentation at the All-In Summit titled “2,851 Miles” where he discussed the past, present, and future of regulatory capture in Silicon Valley.

He received a standing ovation and his presentation was dubbed “an instant classic.”

Former PayPal COO David Sacks immediately called it “the best talk in the history of All-In” and said “we need to get it out there immediately so it can start going viral. And I think it will go very viral.”

First Round’s Chris Fralic thought it was “So good. A Perfect TEDTalk” and “it’s gold.”

Shopify Founder and CEO Tobi Lutke commented that everyone should “definitely watch [Bill’s] incredible talk… once it comes out.”

One audience member liked it so much he yelled at Bill to run for President as the applause died down.

I found the talk full of interesting anecdotes and wanted to be able to refer back to it easily, so I transcribed the talk and screengrabbed the slides.

Thought I might try something new and share it here.

⬇️ Full Transcript with Slides below ⬇️
2/ I'm Bill Gurley. I got to Silicon Valley in about 1997. And was fortunate enough to become a venture capitalist in 98. And the entire first year of my career, I had zero interest in interacting with any form of government. It didn't seem necessary for what I was trying to do. I was working with founders and software and technology. I didn't see what it would bring me.

1/ With a flurry of successful U.S. tech firms absent from China, would you have been above being the one to bring them there?

Wang Xing wasn’t – creating businesses “inspired” by not just Groupon, but Facebook and Twitter too, coming to epitomize the term "Chinese copy-cat". 2/ His clones were so precise that you almost sensed pride when he added “a Mark Zuckerberg Creation” at the bottom of his Facebook clone.

But ironically, it’s actually for his innovative prowess and creating something the world has never seen before, that we know him.

1/ Coupang $CPNG reported 4Q21 and the market seems to be a bit disappointed (-2.5%) as they had a small miss.

But we think the market is focusing on the wrong things. An overview of earnings and their new disclosures below. 2/ Topline slightly missed at $5.1bn vs cons at $5.2bn. This represents +34% y/y growth and a 1,400bps deceleration from last Q’s +48% y/y. However, in constant currency they grew +39% y/y in 4Q vs 44% last Q.

1/ $BABA reported a very soft 3Q21 and the stock is down 6%, reaching lows not seen in almost 5 years. Below we break down 3Q in detail.

Recall, in our last tweet thread (below), we signaled that last Q was a potential thesis breaking point.

https://twitter.com/kevg1412/status/1461410760681148417

2/ 3Q21 revenues were +10% y/y, which is a 1900bp sequential deceleration from 2Q, and missed consensus by ~1.5%. Adj. EBITDA of RMB 51.3bn missed consensus by ~0.5% and is down ~25% y/y.

There are many pieces to this and we will start to unroll it with their China Commerce.

1/ What could you do with 4 square meters of retail space?

Try creating over $100 billion dollars of market value with one of the worlds largest retailers.

The path would not be easy though, and at times you would have to risk it all. 2/ With just a 4 sqm stall in an offbeat Chinese market, after 5 grueling years of battling against purveyors of cheap, faked goods, Richard Liu was able to build a chain of 12 electronics stores.

1/ A tech conglomerate with a leading industry position–if not monopoly–in no fewer than 8 industries with revenues growing ~20% and trading at 24x earnings excl. investments, Tencent is the company you would have tried to create if you had a crystal ball in China in 1998. 2/ But Tencent didn’t need a crystal ball because they had Pony Ma, who led Tencent to grow revenues at an outstanding ~60% CAGR over 20 years, and became profitable years before their 2004 IPO.

1/ When Cyan Banister writes a check, other investors pay attention. Her track record with Uber, SpaceX, Niantic, Postmates (and many more) speaks for itself—and the industry knows it. Her support can make a round.

So, what are the DOs and DON’Ts of pitching Cyan? 2/ DO make sure you’re the right fit. Founders must be genuinely passionate about solving the problem they’re tackling—so if you’re just in it for the money, you should probably go elsewhere.

As she told fellow early Uber investor Jason Calacanis on his podcast:

1/ 3Q21 $BABA earnings were released this morning. The stock is down 11% today, bringing total losses to -36% YTD.

This quarter could be thesis changing and potentially evidence that the bears were right with their concerns. A short thread below. 2/ Aggregate revenue excluding their Sun Art (1P retailer) acquisition is +16% y/y vs +22% y/y last Q. There are many pieces to BABA, but we will split it up into 4: China core commerce, China non-core commerce, international, and cloud.

1/ $BILI reported 3Q21 earnings today ended the day down 9% to $81-- almost half the price it traded at in February. Was this reaction warranted? A quick business update on Bilibili is below. 2/ Net revenues were +61% y/y to $800mn, a slight deceleration from last Q’s +72% and <1% miss vs. consensus. We will walk through their 4 segments: mobile games, VAS, advertising, and Ecom. & other.

But first on platform health...

1/ $SE reported 3Q21 earnings today and is down 5% after opening around flat in early morning trading. A quick business update on how our Sea thesis is holding up and how investors should think about this quarter.

A short $SE thread below. 2/ GAAP revenue was +122% y/y to $2.7bn which is a deceleration from last Q’s +159% y/y rate. However, keep in mind they are working against the law of large numbers, and this still represents a ~$200mn beat vs consensus.

Digging into ecommerce first…

1/ $CPNG was down 7% this morning on 3Q21 earnings.

Is this a case of investors getting ahead of themselves with high expectations or is there something wrong with the direction of the business?

A short update on Coupang below 🧵. 2/ Their 1P business, “Net Retail Sales” was +43% y/y to $4.1bn, down from +65% y/y last quarter. This 2300bps sequential deceleration is on very tough comps though and still good in absolute with $CPNG growing more than 2x as fast as the Korean ecommerce market.

Fun fact: my copy was a preview copy

1/ Society benefits the most when entrepreneurs focus on solving problems before monetizing the solution.

But solving a problem doesn’t equate to creating a great business. 2/ $GRAB has unlocked tremendous consumer value in ride-hail, but their decade-long slog in the most difficult sector in consumer interment has them squeezing out just 6 dimes of revenue out of each ride (optimistically less than 2 dimes of mature profit).

1/ In the early 2000s, The Walt Disney Company was in a bad way…

...It fended off a hostile takeover by Comcast. 2/ Its core business—animation—released commercial flops like Brother Bear, Atlantis, and Dinosaur. Meanwhile, Dreamworks and Pixar churned out hit after animated hit...

...And Michael Eisner—Disney’s CEO of 21 years—was on his way out after a shareholder revolt.

1/ Some say you can pay any price for a great company, but was $CPNG at ~$100bn too high?

Well, one things for certain: you wouldn't have paid that for what it started out as. 2/ It started as a money-losing Groupon-clone that stemmed its losses by pivoting to an eBay model, but failed to develop beyond a mediocre business.

Bom Kim recognized he had to stop emulating what was easy and took on what no one though was possible: out-Amazoning Amazon.

1/ Nintendo $NTDOY, a multi-generational icon, with 26 of the top 50 best selling titles, an IP portfolio 2nd to only Disney, trades at just 12x ex-cash earnings. 2/ Margins have only been improving because of the shift to digital, and they have over 30mn paying online subscribers--their first recurring revenue ever.

1/ $BABA added half an $AMZN of GMV and increased top line by $PDD total revenue just last year…

Investor sentiment?

Competition is going to smoke them... 2/ But wait, I thought they were a monopoly? They were just fined by the SAMR.

Investor response: Regulation is a big concern too

The PayPal Mafia on Hiring

6 stories (and even more insights) from @rabois, @davidsacks, @davemcclure, and @yishan

Including:
The Interview Process
Getting Recruited
Joining
+ More 1/ @yishan on his interview process

(His interview with @mlevchin is particularly funny and insightful)

The PayPal Mafia on Management

5 stories (and even more insights) from @rabois, @davidsacks, and @yishan

Including:
Execution
Anti-meeting culture
Producers vs Product Managers
+ More 1/

https://twitter.com/kgao1412/status/1385019299287355396

The PayPal Mafia on Culture

11 stories (and uncountable insights) from @rabois, @DavidSacks, @peterthiel, @mlevchin, @reidhoffman, and @yishan

Including:
PayPal's Key Values
The Spirit of Entrepreneurship
Building Great Teams
Pranks
+ More 1/ @reidhoffman on the key values that led to early PayPal's culture of entrepreneurship

1) hiring
2) taking no answer at face value
3) intence need to survive
4) entrepreneurial culture
5) luck