“If you want to be a successful investor over time, and you find a handful of great businesses, doing nothing but owning them is an amazing strategy. It’s underappreciated as a successful way to make money.” – Bill Ackman

I once dated a girl and frequently visited her home, where she lived with her mother. Around the corner from their home was a vacant lot. Through the years that followed, I saw that vacant lot slowly get cleared and construction for a house to be built on.

I would occasionally see one person, who I assume was the property owner, doing all the work in the evening or on the weekends. Nearly 10 years later, the house is vacant because it is still unfinished. I’ve driven past that house in the last couple of years, and progress has yet to be made. What happened to the owner? I have no idea, but the result remains the same: He didn’t finish the work on his home.

As an investor, I asked myself, “Have I finished my work on my portfolio? Have I accomplished everything that I needed to when I began investing?” I didn’t need a long time to come up with my answer, “No.” There is still so much more that needs to be done.

Many investors have abandoned their portfolios like that man who never finished his house. The average total investment in a Robinhood account is under $4,000. For many of us, there is fear, anxiety, and uncertainty. When stocks drop, many sell and never return to the market. Economic times are tough, but if you get food delivered on Uber Eats or DoorDash, you likely have enough spare cash to contribute to your brokerage account.

The reality is investing is a lonely journey. An investor’s road is like an acid trip. Your portfolio must fit your specific risk profile and time horizon. Unfortunately, this is typically an experience we learn the hard way during economic downturns. The market becomes a harsh and expensive place to find yourself.

When people start investing, the world and terminology can appear confusing and daunting. How on earth do you analyze a company’s EV-to-EBITDA ratio?

I have said this several times and will continue to repeat the same message: Investing is a simple game if you have the right temperament and can control your emotions. The game is simple- not necessarily easy, but simple.

Warren Buffett is considered the greatest investor, but I suspect many of his colleagues in private begrudge and dismiss his success. Why? I have said that Buffett isn’t the most brilliant investor or trader. He doesn’t have the highest IQ or work harder than everyone else. Buffet invested in companies like Apple for a long time and just held. Nothing too sophisticated or exotic. While others made impressive returns on more “illuminating” investments, Buffett still beat most of them by holding a well-known big-cap company that smart money said was overvalued.

To better understand investing, it is good to know what prospect theory is, a psychological theory that explains decision-making based on perceived losses and gains. Two central tenets of prospect theory are that humans have loss aversion and put a premium on certainty.

Prioritizing certainty over potential: 5-6% interest-saving accounts are popular for a reason. Needing a form of certainty or waiting to buy after a consensus is formed can be an expensive habit.

Loss aversion: The pain of losing is twice as powerful as the pleasure received from a gain of a similar size.

The problem with investors with little risk tolerance is that they will likely lose or barely beat inflation. If the goal is to build generational wealth or get an excellent return, you need a higher tolerance for risk. As Jeff Bezos famously said: “Given a ten percent chance of a one hundred times payoff, you should take that bet every time. But you’re still going to be wrong nine times out of ten. We all know that if you swing for the fences, you’re going to strike out a lot, but you’re also going to hit some home runs.”

My message is repetitive, but since I hear the same questions about stocks being asked repeatedly, it is a message that bears repeating. Humans can be very emotional and irrational. Fear and ignorance have led to distorted opinions on investing. Since most people do not have the right temperament to invest, they become scared and may end up taking low-risk decisions like this:

One of my biggest goals for 2023 has been working on the state of my finances — especially what risks I’m taking. Over the past few years, I’ve infused too much risk into my financial portfolio, investing in individual stocks and cryptocurrency, and faced steep losses. I wanted this year to be a time when I rebuilt my overall net worth and grew my finances back to where they were before I made bad trades in the market.

At the start of the year, I asked a financially savvy friend of mine to eyeball my portfolio. One of the biggest pieces of feedback he had was to move ⅔ of the cash I have sitting in my savings account into a 5% APY CD with a 1-year term.

I decided to follow his advice.

Putting 2/3 of your cash into a 5% APY savings account or CD isn’t a wealth-building activity. This is too conservative of a strategy for most people to make financial sense. Even if you are already wealthy, there are more sophisticated ways to protect your funds while gaining a higher return.

If you cannot handle watching your life savings evaporate 5-10% in a day and have severe anxiety when you go to bed worrying about your portfolio, buying individual stocks or concentrated ETFs may not be something you’re built for. I mainly avoid options because I do not have the appetite for this type of investing (it’s more like gambling.)

Long-term investing in Buffett’s style is often considered the “right” way to invest. In practice, though, very few people have the discipline to follow it. Long-term investing requires you to be a contrarian, which is not in the makeup of the average person. The key to successful investing is having the conviction to hold and buy more when the macroeconomics deteriorates. A stock can soar more than 1,000% from your initial purchase price if you do not let the noise from the market allow you to capitulate.

• There is no such thing as a flashing signal to buy or sell.
• A “brilliant” person can be a terrible investor – See Isaac Newton.
• A “dumb” person can produce greater returns than someone who spends hours analyzing balance sheets or plugging numbers into an analyzer tool. Of course, his neighbors and coworkers will call him lucky, but life isn’t fair.
• Hard work, complexity, and active intervention may provide success in many aspects of your life, but this likely won’t translate in the markets.
• Many investors are obsessed with stock prices and price movements; unfortunately, the price tells you very little about what you’re buying.
• Valuation is important but highly subjective, dynamic, and complicated.

Many analysts thought Netflix was insanely overvalued when its P/E ratio hit 70. Taking gains seemed rational. However, its P/E ratio shot past 400 more than once.

When investors sell because the P/E ratio is “too high,” “too expensive,” or “richly valued,” they risk losing a lot of money, perhaps 10-100 times more than what they sold for.

Investors who can use the right side of their brain and see a company beyond its balance sheets will likely be successful. You likely won’t be able to determine good leadership based on the balance sheet alone. You must invest in a company’s executive team based on contextual factors and sometimes even use…. intuition – something really smart people don’t want to hear.

The market is not static. A surgeon has more control in the OR than an investor in managing his portfolio’s performance. As an investor, you have absolutely zero control over the economy or consumer behavior. Let’s consider box office hits. At the time, Titanic was one of the most costly films ever made, but it also became one of the highest-grossing films ever. In this case, the hype was justified. John Carter had a big budget but lost Disney $200 million, an epic flop.

Despite not getting the best reviews, Grumpy Old Men was a sleeper, bringing in double the box office from its $35 million budget. If the Terminator was a stock, it would be considered a 10x, bringing in ten times at the box office from its $6.4 million budget. However, every Terminator movie released since the original has yielded a lower return. Compare that to the Fast and Furious franchise, which is almost guaranteed to print money. One of the biggest sleeper hits was My Big Fat Greek Wedding, which had a budget of $5 million and brought in a whopping $368.7 million, making that a 70-bagger!

The reality is no one can accurately predict with absolute certainty the next big growth company, just like nobody can predict with absolute certainty the next Pretty Woman. Nobody can accurately predict the future, not Michael Burry, Warren Buffett, or Bill Ackman, no one. But successful investing requires a little luck, a lot of patience to ride out the ups and downs, and a bit of critical thinking to increase the probability of success.

I have no idea where Tesla’s stock is headed in the short or near term. Tesla has slashed automobile prices, which kills its margins. Although they remain profitable and are in far better shape than legacy automakers, cutting prices on their Model 3 and Y is a headwind for the stock. What is not being priced into Tesla is its humanoid “Optimus” robot, which I would bet will bring in significantly more revenue than their cars. If that comes to fruition, the stock is likely massively undervalued, just like Amazon was from 2008-2012, where potential revenue from AWS was not fully priced in.

Take a look at global warming. If the temperature continues to rise, companies like Moncler and Canada Goose, who sell luxurious puffy coats, could see their profits deteriorate. In contrast, companies like Revolve, mainly known for their summer wear and dresses, could benefit.

If the earth continues to get warmer, you likely will see an increase in cases of skin cancer, which could benefit a biotech company like Moderna, who, along with Merck, is developing a personalized cancer vaccine to help treat adults with high-risk melanoma. Such a breakthrough vaccine from mRNA-4157 could bring in similar revenue to what they brought from Spikevax in 2021 or 2022. When you add potential income from an RSV, Flu, and CMV vaccine, combining the profits from all these potential drugs would dwarf the revenue from their lone approved drug, giving Moderna the road map for an accelerated growth path. Time will tell, but I do not believe Spikevax will be known as Moderna’s magnum opus.

But as much as we talk about the potential and possibilities of future growers, investors still must use the left side of their brains and invest in boring companies. Putting all your eggs in a few disrupters can sink your entire portfolio, and a simple goal of investing is survivability.

Companies such as Apple, Meta, Alphabet, and Amazon aren’t likely to sink. In some cases, stocks like Microsoft can go nowhere for over a decade. The company was never in danger of going bankrupt, but they were becoming stagnant. Those patient investors were eventually rewarded as Microsoft appointed a new CEO and shifted priorities. Some investors went from being in the red for over a decade to a 10x gain from this sleepy, boring tech company.

In football, teams sign and draft offensive and defensive linemen. These aren’t considered sexy or flashy moves, but a star quarterback won’t have time to throw the ball if his offensive line cannot block. If a quarterback can’t throw, his receivers won’t get the ball, no matter how fast or talented they are. A poor offensive line could sink the entire offense.

The offensive line is equivalent to investing in ballast companies- those that are not likely to grow 10-20x but provide a foundation for your portfolio. Having these companies in your portfolio would give you stability and sanity. Imagine having all your eggs in Chegg, whose 52-week high is 30.05 and 52-week low is 7.32. I have not researched Chegg, but the company appears too speculative to make a core position. Sure, if it does 10-20x, you will look brilliant, but it initially seems like ChatGPT has fundamentally disrupted its core business. It is prudent to diversify into more sure bets.

Real wealth is made in waiting and having the proper discipline and patience for a long-time horizon. The market constantly deals with uncertainty, but how you harness that uncertainty to find asymmetric opportunities is something a successful investor has to get used to. A stock can do nothing for years, and having conviction when the market doesn’t agree with you is a lonely feeling, but that is how this game is played. The better you can go contrary to human nature and find comfort in volatility, the better odds you create a portfolio similar to the house that was untouched amongst the surrounding wreckage caused by the Maui fires.

What a tremendous experience it was to see Rod Stewart perform at Caesars Palace! Rod’s team’s hospitality was genuinely unexpected and greatly appreciated. I want to thank Micah, Jueying, and Megan for setting up the flight hotel booking and coordinating the meet and greet.

I had the opportunity to join Rod Stewart on stage and sing along to one of his hits, but I cowardly turned it down. I did the over 4,000 fans who paid to attend the concert a favor by not having to listen to my terrible singing voice! If I did somehow gain the courage to sing along, it would have been to my favorite Rod Stewart song, “In a Broken Dream,” which many casual fans have heard of since it was sampled in “Everyday” by ASAP Rocky featuring Miguel and Mark Ronson.

The energy and passion Rod brings to his performance are a source of joy and inspiration. Watching him live in person was truly remarkable. I also want to thank Rod’s incredible band members. These fantastic musicians and singers will likely never get the full recognition they deserve but are as much part of the show’s tapestry as Rod. Meeting them backstage was indeed an honor.

Thanks once again to Rod’s team for this incredible gift. Rod was put on this earth to be a singer, and I’m deeply grateful for the chance to watch and meet a rock legend.

“Investing is a business where you can look very silly for a long period of time before you are proven right.” Bill Ackman

A valuable lesson I learned is to view investing as a probability game, not a possibility game. Jeff Bezos says that if you have a 10% chance at 100x returns, you should always take it. The stock market is full of possibilities, but understanding the probabilities of risk and reward can separate overperformers from underperformers. 10% odds seem low, but for exponential gains, it creates a rare investment opportunity. I will discuss two companies with the infrastructure and platform to net a 100x return. These two companies have better than moonshot odds of becoming global industry leaders. Although many pieces need to come together for either to 100x, both stocks have sold off significantly but are more proven than highly speculative bets. Before investing in these companies, assessing your financial goals and risk tolerance is crucial. Knowing yourself and your investor portfolio is critical to see if these two companies are worth investing in.

Moderna: Ground-breaking technology on the path towards a medical revolution.

Moderna has created a new class of medicine, producing best-in-class drugs at unprecedented speed. The company has proven its technology and has steep financial resources to support a vast pipeline of respiratory, latent, cancer, and rare disease vaccines. While 90% of drug candidates fail in clinical trials, Moderna’s bioplatform is a game changer with a success rate higher than the industry average. Think of bioplatform as the iOs of pharma, which expedites vaccine development with shorter turnaround times. It could be the first company to produce a melanoma or lung cancer vaccine. Even if Moderana doesn’t develop a holy grail cancer vaccine, they have 3-6 drugs that will likely get FDA approval in the next 3-7 years.

Moderna likely has a fair value price of somewhere between $90-120 today based on the COVID-19 vaccine market. Fair value is a fugazi term because it is highly subjective and based on a static environment with no buyers and sellers. Investing in Moderna with their pipeline no longer priced in the stock could be a gift. At peak, Moderna’s stock priced in many assumptions that have yet to happen, and even though a lot of those assumptions have yet to materialize, the company is firing at all cylinders, and the growth story remains unchanged.

Moderna has better odds than most clinical-stage biopharmaceutical companies, and the growth is still early. When I invested in Nvidia in 2016, its data center revenue was just a blip, and most people invested in it because of its growing gaming revenue. Most investors did not have the foresight to know how its data center business would accelerate so quickly. I look at Moderna similarly. The stock trades on lagging Covid shots despite the company being more than just about one vaccine. Nvidia was trading downward based on rapidly declining gaming revenue when it had a skyrocketing data center division. Moderna has a world-class Pipeline matching companies 100 years older than them. I am betting that Pipeline has a data center-like revenue-producing drug that will drastically propel the company’s growth in the future. I have no problem remaining patient until Moderna can transform from a one-hit wonder to a vaccine empire.

Roblox: A new human experience and a potential advertisers dream.

Roblox is a highly volatile stock. Like Moderna, they are both young companies, so investors should expect some hiccups, although Roblox is more combustible. Think of them as more like the Kanye West of growth stocks: Innovative but highly misunderstood and explosive.

Roblox presents the best-in-class growth in the gaming industry. When you look at Activision Blizzard, Electronic Arts, and Take-two Interactive, they have a business model for producing hit games like Grand Theft Auto or Call of Duty. It can take 3-10 years to make a big game, whereas on Roblox, thousands of professional developers generate content. More content will likely equate to more hits, creating a more steady stream of consistent growth. The secret of Roblox is that it isn’t a game; it is an experience. That is the unique property of the company. You see immersive ads or portal ads, which is something other games are not doing.

When you look inside the inner workings of Roblox, you see more than just a video game publisher but a company creating a unique human experience that presents the evolution of a direct-to-consumer platform. Being an investor in Roblox is not for the faint of heart. The company has much to prove to show they can be consistently cash flow positive, but they have a blueprint in place. The platform is similar to a large plot of land, but in this case, a virtual endless plot of land. The potential is there, and although the ride may feel like a roller coaster, the story has a good chance of playing out.

Roblox is a popular game, but lumping it with Fortnite, Minecraft, or other popular games, is a misunderstanding of what it actually is. Roblox is a hybrid gaming and social media platform. Think of it as a combination of Youtube, TikTok, and Twitch.

The consensus is that Roblox has impressive user growth. Regarding popularity (daily and monthly active users), it’s up there with Snapchat and TikTok. Hours engaged on the platform are unreal; users spend about 2.6 hours daily on Roblox vs. 1.5 on TikTok. Let’s put that in perspective. 2.6 hours per day is more than the user engagement on Spotify, a platform many users passively listen to in the background. X (Twitter) has 200 million active users who spend an average of 30 minutes daily on that social media app. The average Roblox user spends more time on the platform in a week than the average X user spends on the app in a month!

I have a small position in Roblox because of its potential. Roblox has the profitability of an addictive video game platform but the total addressable market of a social media company. Of course, anyone investing in Roblox should understand that they spend more money than they make. Infrastructure, trust, and safety costs are increasing and needed to grow the business.

The growing expenses are hard to stomach, but the opportunity is immense. The goal is to eventually support one billion daily active users on its platform. That puts its revenue significantly higher than the likes of Pinterest, Etsy, and Spotify and in the same breath as Mega-Tech.

One key metric analysts use when evaluating Roblox is the average revenue per daily active user (ARPDAU) which shows how well the company monetizes its platform off its users. Consistently rising ARPDAU usually means rising revenue and strong growth. These are typically companies you can invest in for the long term.

I believe Roblox can be an ARPDAU machine with simultaneous strong user growth. Roblox can generate revenue in many ways and not just through ads. In contrast, its competitors will face a cap on monetizing their users.

Roblox checks the marks of a company that can eventually become Netflix on Steroids. I have four main questions about how big a growth monster this can become. Roblox passes all of them, while other entertainment platforms only meet some hurdles.

Is the platform unique, and can it be copied by big tech?

Regarding social experiences and user-generated content, Roblox is years ahead of Minecraft, Decentraland, Horizon Worlds, etc. TikTok offers a similar experience; however, Instagram Reels and, to a lesser extent, Youtube Shorts have closed the gap on TikTok. Roblox wins in providing an AR/VR experience or the Metaverse. It took several years to build this virtual 3D world, and would be difficult to replicate.

Does the platform provide a multi-sensory experience?

Spotify is a big loser as it is audio-only and handcuffs its potential. Roblox’s graphics and backgrounds will improve and be more realistic as technology improves. The Robolox, ten years from now, will look and feel drastically different. This is the bull thesis for the Metaverse. A better sensory experience equates to a more extensive user base. You will know the stock is a winner when you see grandma, grandpa, and the entire family on the platform, just as Facebook went from a small-user base of college students to a platform supporting over 3 billion monthly active users.

Is the experience a pitstop or a destination?

Roblox provides a virtual social experience. Dating apps like Tinder and Bumble are limited in their growth because the aim is to meet people outside of the app in real life. Since the experience of these apps is quite limited, they rely heavily on an ad-based business model. Only two companies (Meta and Alphabet) have proven this model works as a long-term sustainable revenue model. Roblox has much room to grow in ad revenue but other ways to drive revenue growth.

Do users have to be highly engaged in using the platform?

Both Netflix and Roblox provide a world-class user experience; however, viewers on Netflix are not “playing” on the platform; they are limited to only watching the content. Roblox has put itself in a class of its own regarding user engagement levels, even beating TikTok and Twitch.

The better the experience Roblox can provide its users and creators, increases the odds of a higher ARPDAU. Roblox has a significant advantage in this regard. There is nothing like it. The network effects are in play here. The better the infrastructure and platform, the more incentivized developers are to create better games and experiences. This leads to more companies buying ads and users who will spend more on digital items.

All of Roblox’s competitors have similar problems or Achilles heels. Roblox has the juicy monetization possibilities of a game but the scale and user base of a social media company. Again, all of this is based on a thesis that may not come to fruition, but the company is worth a look at its current levels, well below its IPO price.

Expenses will continue to rise, and profitability is more conceptual than mapped out. However, that is the right move in the long term. Roblox CEO and founder David Baszucki needs to be hyper-focused on growth instead of scaling for profitability. The priority right now should be growing market share and creating a strong network effect. If Roblox continues to attract users 17 and older and creates a true metaverse where users can engage in virtual experiences, the growth can be exponential. Scaling now to avoid significant costs could harm the company’s long-term prospects.

The hardest part of building a social media platform is convincing consumers to use and stay on. Suppose Roblox has a network effect and utilizes AI. In that case, it will eventually be able to reduce spending and monetize users more efficiently. When you see the hours of engagement on Roblox, scaling for profitability will be easier, especially if the user base continues to balloon.

I will hold my nose and jump in on Roblox. I call Roblox Netflix on steroids because Netflix has always spent a lot on making & marketing movies and shows. Spending aggressively on content has been necessary to grow and retains subscribers. Similarly, Roblox must do the same by spending on R&D and its growth. It could be a giant cash burn but a necessary one.

The risk is there, but I do see a life jacket. If things go south and my thesis fails, the platform is valuable enough to be bought out at a fair price for investors by one of the bigger tech players. Imagine Meta pairing Roblox with the Quest Pro or Apple with the Vision. I have no idea what price this would take, but the stock going to zero seems highly unlikely and something I am not worried about. If you invest in Roblox before the thesis is proven, you are likely getting in at a phenomenal cost basis. Imagine if you could have invested in Airbnb or Uber in 2013. Those two companies IPO’d several years after proving their business models worked, significantly lowering my interest in an investment. Roblox has the same feel as Netflix in the early 2000s. The brave willing to go risk-on now could look foolish or prophetically bold. I like what I see so far.

Photo courtesy Tapestry and Capri Holdings

As a long-time Tapestry shareholder, I fully endorse the super-merger between Tapestry and Capri Holdings. Uniting these six iconic brands under one company is the closest thing the United States has to a luxury fashion house to rival the European powerhouses.

Minting a new conglomerate with hopefully a new name (I didn’t care for the Tapestry name) will create an underrated value company reinvigorated with unique growth potential. Larger, more diversified, more scale, and more reach. I like it.

Strengths of this deal:

• Using a sum-of-parts valuation, this newly merged company is valuable. Each brand must be valued separately and combined to reach an overall valuation.
• The brands under Capri are worth significantly more now under Tapestry’s leadership, growth strategy, and hyper-digital focus.
• Diversification of assets: Stronger presence in Asia (Michael Kors and Jimmy Choo) and European (Versace) luxury markets and less reliance on the United States.

Capri Holding has brands that attract more consumers to the higher-end of luxury. The appeal for investing in this company was its profit-margin potential. Tapestry does a better job in almost every way operationally: optimizing product inventory, personalizing the consumer experience, maximizing its revenue, etc. Tapestry didn’t have the exciting growth potential compared to Capri due to its lack of a higher-margin portfolio to attract wealthier consumers.

Now it does.

The brands under Capri are still strong. The brands need a refresh but are not distressed. The problem has been a reliance on its wholesale business and bad growth strategy. Tapestry has succeeded in reviving slumping brands like Coach with a DTC/e-commerce-focused model and can do a similar rehab project with Michael Kors. There is no reason for Kors to bring in less revenue ($3.9b) in the last four quarters than Coach ($4.9b) and Versace ($1.1b) to be lagging Kate Spade ($1.4b). Tapestry has a clear 2025 growth strategy to unlock the underperforming Capri brands.

The debt needed to create this merger is problematic; however, the two fashion houses combined are much more robust and resilient against a tough macro economy. Management can address this debt by aggressively slashing corporate headcount, closing underperforming stores, and reducing retail partnerships, which should be under 10%.

The biggest headline for this deal was how much of a coup this was for Tapestry getting Capri at a bargain price. Under the transaction terms, Capri Holdings shareholders will receive $57.00 per share in cash for a total enterprise value of approximately $8.5b. $57 represents a premium of 59% to where Capri was trading the day before August 10th. That sounds like an overpay, but Capri traded above $68 in February and above $70 in the middle of 2018. Typically, acquisitions exceed the company’s fair value price – see Figma or Twitter. If this deal happened during the post-pandemic rebound or even six months ago, Tapestry would likely have to pay anywhere from $9-17b to get a deal done.

The macro is a big reason Capri traded below its estimated fair value. The narrative was different just six months ago. As long as we do not enter into a recession, this is a good deal, and if retail rebounds, which it has historically done in the past, this is a steal. As a Tapestry shareholder, I am excited to see the catalysts ahead for the stock to finally appreciate over 100% in the next 2-4 years. Tapestry was doing well before the merger, and I am optimistic they can integrate six luxury fashion brands to optimize growth and value fully.

The company remains high risk, but the reward, which is potentially exponentially high, is becoming more realistic. Moderna is going through significant turbulence: The growth story is starting, and the future outlook is fantastic, but Covid vaccine sales are abating. Investors that can remain calm and ignore the noise may find this an excellent starting point to invest in one of the most innovative companies in the world.

With any investment, one helpful exercise is asking yourself what you know and what you don’t know.

Knowing the unknowns (which are a lot) will help you understand the risk involved and align your risk tolerance with your financial goals.

Here is what we know about Moderna:

• The fastest vaccine history was the Mumps vaccine, which took around four years. Coronavirus vaccines were developed within months, a true scientific miracle.
• Moderna created the most effective Covid vaccine in the world, beating much more significant players like Janssen Pharmaceuticals and Pfizer.
• The mRNA technology works.
• A biotech’s r&d budget is typically high because drug development has at least a 90% failure rate during clinical development. Luckily though, Moderna is flush with cash.

Here is what we do not know:

• We only know some of the applications for mRNA outside of Covid. It has great potential, but the market size and profitability still need to be discovered.
• How many of the clinical trials will disappoint or fail?
• How valuable is Moderna’s “intellectual property,” and can it be protected and enforced?

Moderna stock is down over 77% from the stock’s highs. This is unbelievable for the opportunity they present. I will take the risk with Moderna because the application with mRNA is so vast many analysts fail to grasp its full potential. Moderna is one of the most disruptive companies in the world. If we enter a potentially exponential growth phase with medicine, it could create a violent run-up for its stock for the next few decades. It has the cash to stay solvent and outlast its smaller competitors. The cash also provides for safety, allowing them ample time to unleash the potential of mRNA technology.

Moderna is stuck in a vicious narrative that the demand for Covid vaccinations needs to be high to drive revenue growth. I do not anticipate another pandemic anytime soon, but Covid-19 will never completely disappear. Moderna will likely capitalize on Covid vaccines as it shifts towards the private market. The government bought vaccine doses at a stark discount, $20.69 per dose, whereas on the market, it could have a price between $110-130 per dose.

Each person’s #cancer is different, which is why it can be difficult to treat. Hear more from @cleoabram about how we’re researching an individualized treatment approach specific to each person's #tumor, with the goal of training their immune system to fight back. pic.twitter.com/XFboEoiiUq

— Moderna (@moderna_tx) August 2, 2023

Most importantly, the government will no longer control the narrative of how these vaccines get advertised on the market. There is a reason why medical & pharmaceutical sales reps exist. Having Anthony Fauci and Joe Biden as the face of the vaccine campaign was embarrassing. The messaging got political, and the spokespeople for the movement needed to be more compelling. The campaign got predictably hijacked by extremists and conspiracy theorists spewing crackpot theories. The government did more harm than good for mRNA vaccines in the short term, but in the extended horizon, it will be more of a bump in the road rather than a giant sinkhole.

Today’s narrative is stuck on Covid vaccines when it will slowly shift over the next six months. Investors need to stay focused on the bigger picture, where future growth is limitless. The attention should remain on mRNA technology and not one vaccine. In the future, we can look at the Covid vaccine similarly to the Apple Computer. Moderna has in its pipeline the iPod, iPhone, iPad, AirPods, and Apple Watch in development. The future consists of 48 mRNA programs with vaccines for RSV, HIV, VZV, Lyme Disease, Zikah, and many more diseases. Even current investors may have tunnel vision and see mRNA vaccines only applicable to infectious diseases. Still, there are potential treatments for food allergies, cancer, heart attacks, strokes, and more. Based on the stock price, the company may appear to be crashing, but this plane has yet to leave the runway and has decades of soaring growth. This is an excellent opportunity to start an investment in the next Apple of Biotechnology.

Why investors should consider an investment in Moderna:

• A technology-first approach, saving time in developing vaccines.
• Tons of cash for acquisitions and legal defense.
• mRNA Proof of concept.
• Ability to speed up clinical trials to get numerous FDA approval.

The story is just beginning as Moderna enters an accelerated growth phase. Moderna is not a traditional biotech company. The best is likely yet to come. Look at Moderna today, where Taylor Swift was in her career from around 2006-2010. The peak has yet to happen.

Before 2012, Taylor Swift was a country artist. Transitioning to mainstream pop music, a significantly more popular music genre, increased her popularity, reach, and earning potential.

The secret sauce for Taylor Swift is that she writes most of her music. Other artists who rely on ghostwriters or songwriters have less control over the direction they want to take their careers. Artists who write their music have great flexibility in experimenting with different genres and connecting to their fans.

Moderna has its proprietary bioplatform. It identifies the genome of a virus or disease, plugs it into its mRNA Design Studio on the AWS cloud, and produces a new or updated mRNA vaccine, creating a system and design to use the same mRNA technology to switch and develop a vaccine for infectious diseases or cancer.

Moderna is as much of a biotech company as Taylor Swift is a country artist. Swift’s reach as an artist is much larger than other artists like Luke Combs or Ashley McBryde. Moderna could vastly grow bigger than AbbVie or Merck. Ten years from now, we may look at Moderna regarding market cap similar to Meta and Nvidia.

What is a bioplatform, and how it’s used in mRNA medicine?

Bioplatforms involve special organizational and technological structures that biotech companies build to make their resources and technology reusable — and even cross-therapeutic. Ultimately, by making minor changes to a bioplatform in the drug discovery pathway, the development of new therapies for very different diseases can be achieved in a short time.

Take COVID-19 mRNA-based vaccines as an example. These vaccines deliver mRNA encoding the viral spike protein. By 2020, when the SARS-CoV-2 genomic sequence was known, some biotech companies working on mRNA vaccines for other diseases already had a bioplatform built. They were able to efficiently switch the specific spike protein mRNA sequence to use on their formulation. The rest of the drug discovery pathway was already implemented, like the mRNA manufacturing protocol, the cargo molecules to use, the delivery method and more.

How Can BioPlatforms Support the mRNA “Revolution”

Moderna is known for its hero Covid-19 vaccine, which almost every knows about, and billions of people have taken. Covid-19 is only one type of infectious disease. Moderna has mRNA vaccines in its pipeline for flu and respiratory syncytial virus (RSV). It also has a single shot/three-in-one vaccine, mRNA–1230, a combined COVID-19, flu, and RSV vaccine. Outside of Covid-19, Moderna has 48 mRNA programs, with 38, in clinical trials for HSV (herpes), Lyme disease, HIV, skin cancer, and many more diseases.

Compared to its peers, Moderna is undervalued, with a lower p/e than Gilead Sciences, Bristol-Myers Squibb, and Biogen. I do not want to make a trade simply because the company is undervalued and is due for a bounce. That may make for a short-term gain, but is it a great investment to hold for 5-10 years or longer?

If you look at Moderna as a technology company, it is dirt cheap and massively undervalued. Moderna has poc, or shown with scientific and empirical evidence that mRNA works with the Covid-19 Vaccine—over 12.7 billion doses across 184 countries. The “experimental” vaccine works. The results have been miraculous and the most significant achievements in modern science.

Investing in Moderna before the pandemic could have been considered speculative, but now the stock is trading around where it was right before the pandemic. That is an absolute steal for a company no longer preclinical. Moderna has roughly x7 more cash than before the pandemic and still zero debt, which can be used on legal counsel to protect its long list of valuable patents and intellectual property. Currently, Moderna is escalating a campaign normalizing and educating the public about mRNA capabilities. Moderna is opening a Seattle office focused on technology and a San Francisco office dedicated to Genomics. They are currently positioning themselves for high growth and expansion.

What is the potential of Moderna? Look at mRNA shots similar to the iPhone and mRNA Design Studio to iOS. The market and demand for these vaccines is incredible.

Moderna is a digital biotech company that utilizes Artificial intelligence AI algorithms to aid drug development. All investors should remember the majority of Moderna’s trials will likely fail. The stock will be volatile. Will they develop a vaccine for every disease or cancer? Highly unlikely, but their cash on hand creates a buffer for failed trials and gives them the luxury for acquisitions like buying Japanese DNA supplier OriCiro Genomics KK for $85 million. Through their technology and process, they will produce exponential results at a higher probability quicker than their peers.

Moderna created the Covid-19 vaccine within 48 hours, whereas developing a safe vaccine takes anywhere from 10 to 15 years historically. Moderna changed the game working at lightspeed efficiency, blowing their competitors out of the water in creating the most effective Covid vaccine in the world. The approach is unique, and a winner has emerged. Johnson & Johnson developed a viral vector vaccine that was not as effective. Novavax created a subunit protein vaccine, a few percentages lower in efficacy than Moderna’s.

Moderna has one of the best risk/reward ratios on the market. If you look at mRNA as a tool to fight several incurable diseases like cancer and Cystic Fibrosis, the opportunity and reward are much more significant. The pandemic is over, but the story for Moderna is just starting.

If you have never heard of Aritzia, it’s one of the fastest-growing fashion apparel brands growing globally. Like Lululemon, it was born out of Canada and has mapped an aggressive growth plan in the United States. With 48 stores in the United States, they project to have over 100 retail stores state-side by 2030.

Artizia has taken a long time to grow its brand. Founded in 1984, the company has gained a cult-like following over the past five years. The brand has been a favorite worn by celebrities like Meghan Markle, Taylor Swift, Ariana Grande, Malia Obama, etc.

Why I like Aritiza over the next seven years:

• Each store is individualized, with a boutique-like feel.
• High-touch personal customer service and shopping experience. To the bags and even how associates fold clothes. Some stores serve coffee and alcohol.
• Explosive growth through social media. Support for Aritizia is cult-like. A Reddit subgroup, r/Aritzia, has over 35k members.
• The brand is fresh and new for many in the United States. The growth so far has mainly been organic via worth of mouth and on social media.

I see no specific competitive edge or moat for Aritiza, but I don’t consider it high-risk. The company is highly profitable and executes better than most of its competitors. The company is in an envious position for long-term profitability and scalability, which doesn’t devalue operational efficiency over future growth. Many newer companies focus on top-line growth: revenue, and sales while letting expenses balloon. This growth-at-all-costs strategy has worked for companies but requires revenue to grow exponentially, making it highly risky. With Aritzia, I don’t see that.

Based on my non-professional opinion, this may be a good window of opportunity to start accumulating shares. The stock trades at an attractive level, to where it was before the pandemic rebound in 2021 and the re-opening in 2022. The weak hands have left the stock, and investors willing to be patient and not looking to speculate will be rewarded. Revenue growth numbers can return and potentially exceed levels from last year.

Gen Z will open their purses on discretionary categories as long as they care about it, even if they do not have the money. If maxed-out “Swifties” are spending thousands on merchandise and nose-bleed seats, that proves spending on non-essentials is not dead. Discretionary companies like Aritiza will get crushed in a recession or worsening economy. However, the growth story is mainly intact; nothing has changed in the past few months.

Retail is still alive, but it is becoming more fragmented and digital. The winners of this space will have to provide a more curated in-store experience and utilize social media to thrive. Aritiza is an early adapter in the changing retail landscape and will continue to win over a younger audience. They have a runway for 5-7 years; if they can continue to execute, I see them growing steadily. As we have seen with the rise of Lululemon, having a dedicated niche following can easily grow to a much larger audience quickly.

I have talked about the term”curated shopping experience.” Let me put more color to that. Gen X and Boomers didn’t need a customized shopping experience because the circle of people they interacted with was much smaller. With the rise of social media and technology, the average person’s friend group is much larger. Gen Z needs to have a more revolving and unique wardrobe. Previously, going to Bloomingdale’s or Macy’s was acceptable, but these companies have seen their brands degrade. Women today have way more options, and Aritzia fills a space where consumers demand a more personable experience.

Most importantly, we have seen a steady rise in women’s earnings. Given that America is a nation of spenders and not savers, women will not spend more on discounted or cheap clothing but on the everyday luxury/luxury category. Aritizia’s target audience will continue to buy more quality apparel, and their spending in this category will increase.

My thesis is relatively simple. The more women earn and spend their time on social media, the better a company like Aritzia does financially. It’s a perfect compliment to my investment in Revolve Group. If either of these two companies can see expanding growth in their men’s segment or products outside of apparel, it can become a real home-run investment.