IBM

Building Something of value.

[IBM @inbrightsmind]

I just felt that I had ideas worth writing regardless of whether I had a response - Howard S. Marks

[Jaynit @jaynitx]

Elon Musk literally broke down his 5-step process for applying first-principles thinking to build anything:

[IBM @inbrightsmind]

Do you remember when you joined X? I do! #MyXAnniversary

[Kpaxs @Kpaxs]

Go be excellent or at least go be bad at something on purpose today, which is the same thing eventually.

[PEoperator⚡️ @PEoperator]

“In the language of Winning, there is no talk about motivation. Motivation is entry level.”

- Tim Grover (Michael Jordan’s trainer)

[Kpaxs @Kpaxs]

The enemy of productivity is ambiguity plus infinite optionality plus a phone within arm’s reach.

[Kpaxs @Kpaxs]

The version of you that exists in your head is a prototype, the version that exists in other people’s nervous systems is the shipped product.

[Kpaxs @Kpaxs]

High agency looks like arrogance to people who have mistaken learned helplessness for maturity.

[Incentivising @incentivising]

Game theory explains why working harder inside a broken system is the worst response to that system. Because a system is never truly broken. It's just producing exactly the outcomes its own incentive structures were designed to produce, whether intentional or not. Working harder inside this system increases your output in the payoff matrix, but it simply won't change the actual structure of the system's matrix. Thus, the correct response is not more effort. Instead, you must aim to identify whose interests the current structure serves and position yourself in favor of those interests rather than against them. Change the game, or play the game that is actually being played. Either way, you must stop optimizing for the game you wish it to be and start acting realistically.

[Kpaxs @Kpaxs]

Want to become high-agency?

Stop assuming the world is rigid. It's not. Your assumptions are. Agency is a ladder you climb one rung at a time, and most people are stuck at the bottom.

Here's how to climb the ladder :

[DAN KOE @thedankoe]

If you want a rare life, you have to be delusional. Doubt can enter your mind, and it can sound reasonable, but if you entertain it too much it will slowly drag you down into stagnation. I'd rather reap the lesson from massive failure than do nothing because it's not "realistic."

[Giuliano @Giuliano_Mana]

Buffett: "That's one thing we've never talked about here, but I spend more time looking at balance sheets than I do income statements... There are things that are harder to hide or play games with on the balance sheet."
("Wall Street tends to do the opposite")

I'm currently reading Part 6 of Security Analysis, where Graham thoroughly goes over how important it is to look at the book value of a business because:

- It tells you how much capital is invested in it, - how many dollars you're paying per $ of capital investment.
- Shows you the capital structure - (complicated? share trend, securities outstanding and seniority (costs), etc).
- Estimate of liquidation value (margin of safety?).
- % of assets that are intangible, especially goodwill.
- Write downs? Did they do this once to fuel future earnings?

And so on.
Graham already says in 1940 that people stopped looking at balance sheets to focus on income accounts. Management can lie everywhere, but it's way easier to do so in income statements. Just assume a new method for inventory or d&a, or recognize sales that haven't occurred, capitalize expenses instead of g&a.

The accounting department can become a great profit center.

Balance sheets show you a business's history. They show buried mistakes. How long have receivables been outstanding? Are they really current assets? Did they overbook sales? Are they recording bargains on m&a or always paying in excess of book value? how much in leases till end of contract? is net ppe stable (capex cancels out depreciation)?

Sure, new economy companies live on intangibles, outsource manufacturing/production, and ROICs are as fat as they've ever been. But is growth coming at the expense of dilution? What is that growth worth if a dominant position is likely to be lost?

But sometimes, instead of just looking at headline numbers, you can look at the balance sheet and find out that a business might be trading at:

Mkt cap of $40M and EV of $50M ($10M net debt).
But business has $25M in highly-likely-to-collect-receivables. Maybe total current assets of $50M with total liabilities at $25M. How much does the price you're paying for the business change after just one glance?

The farther a business trades from its book value, the farther from its hard cushion.

Is balance sheet investing really dead? How could it be?

[Reads with Ravi @readswithravi]

“The secret of genius is to carry the spirit of the child into old age, which means never losing your enthusiasm.”

— Aldous Huxley

[Kpaxs @Kpaxs]

School is a 12+ year conditioning program in "wait for instructions, ask before you act, there's a right answer and someone else knows it".

The hard part is deprogramming the voice that says "you need permission first".

[IBM @inbrightsmind]

@Manu_Sisti Claude

[GREG ISENBERG @gregisenberg]

sequoia put out a blog post called "services is the new software"

look at this map of over $1T in services being replaced by AI agents

[Alex & Books 📚 @AlexAndBooks_]

Umberto Eco, who owned 50,000 books, had this to say about home libraries:

"It is foolish to think that you have to read all the books you buy, as it is foolish to criticize those who buy more books than they will ever be able to read.

It would be like saying that you should use all the cutlery or glasses or screwdrivers or drill bits you bought before buying new ones.

There are things in life that we need to always have plenty of supplies, even if we will only use a small portion.

If, for example, we consider books as medicine, we understand that it is good to have many at home rather than a few: when you want to feel better, then you go to the 'medicine closet' and choose a book.

Not a random one, but the right book for that moment. That's why you should always have a nutrition choice!

Those who buy only one book, read only that one and then get rid of it. They simply apply the consumer mentality to books, that is, they consider them a consumer product, a good.

Those who love books know that a book is anything but a commodity."

[IBM @inbrightsmind]

❤️

[The Shift Journal @TheShiftJournal]

Ray Dalio gives a 39 minute master class on wealth creation.

[Boring_Business @BoringBiz_]

Buffett at the age of 31 was sharper than most people you will ever come across