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Wednesday, September 9, 2026

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Quick Value #330 - Deckers Outdoor (DECK)

Deckers Outdoor has fallen about 60% from its late-2024 peak and trades at 11x earnings as HOKA growth slows. Its net cash balance sheet and premium footwear brands support a value case.

DECK $11B
Value Don't Lie 5 clicks

From X

@HaydenCapital

Fred Liu on X

Happy to share our Q4 2025 letter. Especially at a time when the future of internet and software business models are being questioned. In it, we offer our take on: - The "AI Scare Trade". The market is pricing in fear, not facts. These businesses aren't broken (yet), but investors are selling indiscriminately. - What's still investable? Software faces real headwinds - disruption to terminal value assumptions and forced pricing model shifts. But ~80% of a software company's value is trust, reliability, and headache-free solutions. That doesn't disappear overnight. - Network effects are real moats. Gaming, ecommerce, consumer internet - they're all down substantially from highs. But as AI reduces barriers to entry, the barriers to scale go up. Distribution grows more valuable. - Thoughts on $SE, after a -45% drawdown. We don't think the TikTok boogeyman is as scary as the market fears. In fact, the opposite. - New Oriental $EDU exit. Originally bought near net cash, and business has stabilized since. Time to move on. Full letter linked here: https://t.co/0WPoxoHt7t
@HaydenCapital 1 click

Fred Liu on X

AppLovin - Interview with Xiaochuan (architect of $APP's Axon engine). Thought this was the most in-depth public conversation on AppLovin's business to date. (P.S. Youtube has great subtitle translation) Axon & Technical Philosophy - Axon was built by just 5 people in 3 months - AppLovin was the first to implement models with prediction windows exceeding 7 days - Deliberately avoids developing its own LLMs, preferring to use the best available models on the market — building LLMs in-house wouldn't generate the best ROI E-Commerce Expansion - Decision to enter e-commerce made in May 2024, with the product launching later that year; original team was only 10 people - Entering e-commerce was effectively building a new model from scratch - The gaming and e-commerce algorithms share nothing except infrastructure and accumulated organizational experience Core Competency & Culture - AppLovin's edge isn't industry-specific — it's rooted in how the company approaches problems (the culture itself), which he believes positions them to tackle challenges well beyond gaming and e-commerce - His relish for being called an "underdog" comes through clearly throughout the interview Social Media Ambitions - Already working on building a next-generation social media platform - Strategic logic: Meta started with captive organic traffic and built an ad platform on top; AppLovin is doing the reverse - starting with the ad platform and building toward organic traffic - Owning that organic traffic, if achieved, would be a significant advantage Short Seller Response - When the short reports were published, Xiaochuan personally reviewed the systems and code to assess whether the claims had merit Hiring Philosophy - After 2023, overhauled hiring: moved to paying among the highest salaries in Silicon Valley, and shifted focus away from seasoned veterans toward people with fewer than 2 years of experience - Core belief: experience is overrated, the capacity to learn is underrated; breakthroughs come from willingness to abandon convention - "You can't operate like a large company if you don't have a large company's resources" - Most prominent AI researchers are overpriced — high visibility and intense competition drives salaries beyond their marginal value - Targets talent at the "periphery of the spotlight": technically strong but undervalued by the market, and still carrying the underdog mentality that well-known names often lack (i.e. "Moneyball") - Entire engineering org runs on fewer than 100 people https://t.co/vXaWUZGkZt

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Lululemon: Deep Dive Analysis

Lululemon’s Q2 revenue fell 4% and Americas comparable sales 12%, as markdowns, tariffs and activewear rivals pressure its premium apparel…

LULU $11B
Hated Moats 6 clicks
UBER 2026-09-07

A quick update on Deep Dives

MBI Deep Dives will update prior company analyses through year-end, beginning with Uber, while deferring new work on Micron and S&P Global.

UBER $145B
MBI Deep Dives 5 clicks

Celsius: The Pepsi Put

Celsius holds 20% of the U.S. energy-drink market and 40% of sugar-free sales, but its $1.65 billion Alani acquisition complicates…

PEP $179B
TSOH Investment Research 7 clicks

AppLovin Deep Dive: Not A No Brainer

AppLovin is down 48% YTD after its first guidance miss, with revenue 1% below expectations and EPS 2.5% short, reviving fears of an adtech…

APP $104B
Capitalist Letters 6 clicks

TSOH Weekly Roundup (09/04/2026)

TSOH Weekly Roundup covers Costco’s $4.99 chicken supply chain, Celsius’s 20% energy-drink share, and California utilities’ wildfire…

COST $398B
TSOH Investment Research 5 clicks
FTAI · long

Ftai Aviation LTD

FTAI Aviation, valued near $23 billion at roughly $226 per share, is presented as a long investment.

FTAI $19B
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