Ryan Callaghan, PE

PE. Founder, RP Constructors + CEC. We design and build heavy civil, water/wastewater, food, industrial & data-center site work. 30 years, Midwest + Texas.

[Ryan Callaghan, PE @rcallpe]

I’ve got thousands of photos. These I keep looking at.

Not because they’re pretty — because they show guys who refused to walk away from a hard day. Whether it’s working through the weekend around the country, figuring out how to get pipe that’s heavier than expected off a truck, or getting sprayed in the face with sewage.

You can’t hire that. You either build it into the company or you don’t have it.

[Ryan Callaghan, PE @rcallpe]

I’m a believer in AI. We use it every day in our businesses. I’m less certain what investors should pay for it.

Everyone hopes they’re buying the next Google or Amazon. Nobody thinks they’re buying the next Webvan or WeWork. Eventually, the cash flow has to justify the optimism.

[Leshka.eth ⛩ @leshka_eth]

Anthropic valuation - $2 trillion
Samsung valuation - $1.35 trillion

Anthropic 2025 revenue - $4.6 billion
Samsung 2025 revenue - $236 billion

[Ryan Callaghan, PE @rcallpe]

@leshka_eth We use AI daily in our engineering and construction businesses. I see the value. Google and Amazon show what betting on future growth can deliver. https://t.co/0UQEHw0VLa, Webvan and, more recently, WeWork show how badly it can go. How much future success is already priced in?

[Ryan Callaghan, PE @rcallpe]

I like engineers who get mud on their boots and builders who ask questions about the plans.

At RP/CEC, they work together every day. Our engineers help build what they design, and our crews help make the designs better. Pretty rewarding way to work.

[Ryan Callaghan, PE @rcallpe]

@chigrl The real problems are refining capacity, crude quality, and war-related disruptions abroad. An export ban addresses none of them and makes both the price and the long-term supply picture worse.

[Ryan Callaghan, PE @rcallpe]

@AndyKimNJ @JoJoFromJerz From the construction side, expensive fuel and expensive money are a rough combination. One raises the bid. The other makes the owner less able to afford it. There’s only so much a contractor can fix by sharpening his pencil.

[Ryan Callaghan, PE @rcallpe]

@KobeissiLetter Housing gets squeezed twice by higher borrowing costs. The builder has to finance construction, and the buyer has to afford the mortgage. Needing more homes and being able to deliver homes people can afford are two different things.

[Ryan Callaghan, PE @rcallpe]

@nickgerli1 You can have the land, the plans and people ready to build. If the financing doesn’t work, none of it moves. That’s why a developer pays attention to the bond market.

[Ryan Callaghan, PE @rcallpe]

@KobeissiLetter This reaches well beyond the bond market. When a project gets shelved over financing costs, the excavator, concrete supplier and pipe crew lose work too. That’s how this makes its way into the local economy.

[Ryan Callaghan, PE @rcallpe]

@RpsAgainstTrump Baby looks scared to death

[Ryan Callaghan, PE @rcallpe]

@Harry__Faulkner Lower fertilizer costs would be welcome. Does this price include all the freight? And if Belarus replaces a substantial share of Canadian supply, what leverage are we giving a close Russian ally over an input our food production depends on?

[Ryan Callaghan, PE @rcallpe]

@Kasparov63 I’m all for farmers paying less. But show me the price delivered to their local co-op. Then explain why we should be comfortable leaning more on Russia’s ally for something we can buy from our neighbor to the north.

[Ryan Callaghan, PE @rcallpe]

@P_Kallioniemi “Substantially less” delivered where—and does that include all the freight? And if we’re replacing Canadian supply, are we comfortable becoming more dependent on a close Russian ally for fertilizer our farmers need to grow our food?

[Ryan Callaghan, PE @rcallpe]

@RonFilipkowski I buy materials for a living. “Cheaper” needs to include freight to where it’s used. Does this price? And how much of our fertilizer supply do we want dependent on a close Russian ally? Those seem like fair questions before calling this a win.

[Ryan Callaghan, PE @rcallpe]

@KobeissiLetter Does “substantially less” include getting it all the way to a Midwest farmer? Before shifting purchases from Canada to a close Russian ally, I’d want to see the delivered cost and understand the food security tradeoff.

[Ryan Callaghan, PE @rcallpe]

@chucktodd Skol

[Ryan Callaghan, PE @rcallpe]

@SteveScalise 442 fewer hard passes after Biden tightened the rules in 2023. Only 1 application was denied. Most people just didn’t reapply or didn’t meet the new criteria. Day passes stayed available. “Cut off 440 journalists” overstates it.

[Ryan Callaghan, PE @rcallpe]

Always interesting to me that America produces plenty of oil, just not always the grade its biggest old refineries were built for. A couple of new light-crude plants are planned. Most listed exposure is still producers, midstream, and existing refiners that added some light-oil capacity. Venezuela oil is light.

[Ryan Callaghan, PE @rcallpe]

In construction, higher fuel prices show up in equipment costs, deliveries and material prices. Then higher borrowing costs hit the owner financing the job. Eventually a project that made sense gets put on hold.

[Republicans against Trump @RpsAgainstTrump]

BREAKING: The national average for diesel hit a record $6.49 a gallon today

That’s up 75% from $3.71 a year ago.

MAGA

[Ryan Callaghan, PE @rcallpe]

@RpsAgainstTrump In construction, higher fuel prices show up in equipment costs, deliveries and material prices. Then higher borrowing costs hit the owner financing the job. Eventually a project that made sense gets put on hold.