The Winners That Get Away | Chris Davis and Robert Hagstrom on Holding Great Businesses

On the AI side, what part of it, what jumped out at you the most with

the

AI conversation? A

couple of things.

One was what Robert pointed out that this investment cycle might not be forever.

I think there's this, when you read and listen to people, people assume that this is forever.

Every single year, the CapEx will be this much, hundreds of billions, whatever, maybe it's a trillion or two.

Meaning that there won't be any free cash flow ever again.

And these businesses will be expanding and expanding and expanding.

And Robert points out, this is for now.

Even the railroads eventually got built, right? And then we got to use them.

And that's a great reminder that it's a cycle.

I don't know how long it's going to last.

And if so, how do these businesses look like on the other side of it? And Chris's point that this is improving those businesses and maybe solidifying the position that they've had.

And both of them sharing this idea that these are great operators, these companies and the folks behind them.

And they've given a lot of thought into putting this kind of money behind this new way of doing business, new way of operating, you know, and they haven't done it lightly or easily.

It's been a big decision to do that.

I'm very curious.

I mean, it's easy to be smart looking back.

It's very hard to be smart looking ahead.

I have no idea how it plays out.

There was a subtle hint that I really liked.

One of them mentioned that, what I heard at least, that the winners of the internet age they were not even around when the first internet excitement happened.

And it's something that I've been thinking about a lot.

The actual AI winners, maybe they're not even, if they are around, I don't know about them yet.

On the AI side, what part of it, what jumped out at you the most with

the

AI conversation? A

couple of things.

One was what Robert pointed out that this investment cycle might not be forever.

I think there's this, when you read and listen to people, people assume that this is forever.

Every single year, the CapEx will be this much, hundreds of billions, whatever, maybe it's a trillion or two.

Meaning that there won't be any free cash flow ever again.

And these businesses will be expanding and expanding and expanding.

And Robert points out, this is for now.

Even the railroads eventually got built, right? And then we got to use them.

And that's a great reminder that it's a cycle.

I don't know how long it's going to last.

And if so, how do these businesses look like on the other side of it? And Chris's point that this is improving those businesses and maybe solidifying the position that they've had.

And both of them sharing this idea that these are great operators, these companies and the folks behind them.

And they've given a lot of thought into putting this kind of money behind this new way of doing business, new way of operating, you know, and they haven't done it lightly or easily.

It's been a big decision to do that.

I'm very curious.

I mean, it's easy to be smart looking back.

It's very hard to be smart looking ahead.

I have no idea how it plays out.

There was a subtle hint that I really liked.

One of them mentioned that, what I heard at least, that the winners of the internet age they were not even around when the first internet excitement happened.

And it's something that I've been thinking about a lot.

The actual AI winners, maybe they're not even, if they are around, I don't know about them yet.