Investors / stance tracking
What Guy Spier is saying
FollowFollowingUnfollowManaging Partner, Aquamarine Fund
17 dated public stances tracked since 2010-10-05, most recently 2023-09-09. Each line carries the date and the venue it came from; quotation marks mean verbatim. Methodology.
The stances below are c8alpha's editorial distillation of Guy Spier's public commentary — television, podcasts, and interviews — compiled by automated transcript analysis and dated to the episode they came from. They may lag the speaker's current view and may contain extraction errors. Text in quotation marks is verbatim from the episode; everything else is our paraphrase. Guy Spier is not affiliated with c8alpha and has not endorsed this page. Nothing here is investment advice.
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17
tracked stances
15
themes
0
side flips
2023-09-09
last heard
Returns 90d +9.6% 88% correct · 8 calls · 180d +23.1% 75% correct · 8 calls · 1y +16.0% 75% correct · 8 calls
Raw direction-aware returns on public statements — long calls credited when the price rose, shorts when it fell, shorts capped at −100% — in a rising market this mostly measures who was long, not who has skill. Returns run from the stance date; calls are rarely closed publicly, so fixed 90-day / 180-day / 1-year horizons are used. A horizon shows only once it has fully matured, and only at 5+ scored stances. “% correct” is the share of those scored calls whose direction-aware return was positive at the horizon — in a rising market a bullish call is correct by default, so read it beside the market, not alone.
Scored calls
Every tracked call with at least one matured horizon: the rows behind the Returns line above. A dash is a horizon that has not matured yet.
| Date | Name | Call | 90d | 180d | 1y |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2023-09-09 | India Equities | bullish | +4.1% | +15.0% | +25.3% |
| 2023-09-09 | BANKS | bullish | +14.3% | +21.2% | +39.4% |
| 2023-09-09 | AXP | bullish | +7.2% | +42.6% | +61.1% |
| 2023-03-30 | NFLX | bearish | -27.0% | -12.1% | -81.5% |
| 2023-03-30 | India Equities | bullish | +11.8% | +14.3% | +32.8% |
| 2023-03-30 | BYD | bullish | +9.5% | -3.0% | +9.5% |
| 2023-03-22 | BABA | bullish | +5.1% | +4.0% | -10.6% |
| 2022-06-27 | SRG | bullish | +51.6% | +102.6% | +51.9% |
Most-argued themes
| Theme | Stances | Lean | Mix | Last |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| BRK | 2 | 2 bullish | 2023-09-09 | |
| India Equities | 2 | 2 bullish | 2023-09-09 | |
| AXP | 1 | 1 bullish | 2023-09-09 | |
| BABA | 1 | 1 bullish | 2023-03-22 | |
| BANKS | 1 | 1 bullish | 2023-09-09 | |
| BYD | 1 | 1 bullish | 2023-03-30 |
Tracked stances
bullish / bearish is a view they argued; owns / short is a position they said they hold.
2023-09-09
India Equities
bullish
Guy Spier · video
Indian energy market penetration stands at only 6% versus 70-80% in Europe, creating a multi-decade volume growth runway even as per-trade fees compress over time
“it could easily go to 70 or 80 which is where Europe and some markets from North America are at”
90d +4.1% · 180d +15.0% · 1y +25.3%
Guy Spier Talks Investing In Our Current Economic Climate
2023-09-09
BRK
owns
Guy Spier · video
After 25+ years attending Berkshire meetings and paying for deep personal due diligence on Buffett, concerns about premium-to-book and succession are resolved within his circle of competence
“I feel very supremely comfortable with my investment in Berkshire Hathaway which very significantly sized position in my fund”
Guy Spier Talks Investing In Our Current Economic Climate
Banks benefit in a rising interest rate environment as net interest margins expand when the spread between deposit funding costs and loan yields widens, boosting earnings without additional capital outlay
90d +14.3% · 180d +21.2% · 1y +39.4%
Guy Spier Talks Investing In Our Current Economic Climate
2023-09-09
NSRGY
owns
Guy Spier · video
Held as a core 'back of cave' safety anchor because consumer staple giants with durable everyday demand can sustain the portfolio through even severe economic dislocations without requiring fresh capital investment
“I've got things like uh Nestle in there as the best example that I'd like to give”
Guy Spier Talks Investing In Our Current Economic Climate
Credit card networks capture a percentage of nominal transaction value, making revenues naturally inflation-protected without needing to explicitly raise prices, while a secular decline in the discount rate drives volume growth
“they take percentage of nominal amounts spent so they kind of like they don't have to go and ask for price increases”
90d +7.2% · 180d +42.6% · 1y +61.1%
Guy Spier Talks Investing In Our Current Economic Climate
2023-09-09
CARE RATINGS
owns
Guy Spier · video
Applying the Moody's-style credit agency moat thesis to India's growing economy by owning the current non-leader that could compound into the #2 rating agency over a 50-year horizon as Indian credit markets deepen
“I've actually an investment in a company that's not the leading company but I think you know over a 50-year time period it could become number two”
Guy Spier Talks Investing In Our Current Economic Climate
2023-03-30
India Equities
bullish
Guy Spier · video
Management is aggressively repurchasing shares at depressed prices, signaling high insider confidence in intrinsic value despite near-term headwinds
“they're repurchasing shares right now in quite a large number—that feels great”
90d +11.8% · 180d +14.3% · 1y +32.8%
With William Green: Investing with Stability: Strategy & Emotional Intelligence
China's leadership is demonstrably rational and pragmatic (lifted COVID restrictions when it stopped serving the population), and what is good for behemoths like BYD is good for China, making the Chinese government an aligned stakeholder in the company's…
“what's good for BYD is good for China... they are rational”
90d +9.5% · 180d -3.0% · 1y +9.5%
With William Green: Investing with Stability: Strategy & Emotional Intelligence
2023-03-30
BRK
bullish
Guy Spier · video
Buffett's Occidental Petroleum investment demonstrates he is still on top of his game—he identified OXY's carbon-neutrality strategy before the market did—and owning BRK is like hiring a world-class capital allocator at effectively zero cost
“I have hired the CEO of these assets who cost me next to nothing”
With William Green: Investing with Stability: Strategy & Emotional Intelligence
Netflix funds content growth via external capital (bond issuances) rather than internally generated cash flows, and its library valuation rests on heroic amortization assumptions—violating the key checklist principle that a great business should be able to…
“I see more danger than opportunity”
90d -27.0% · 180d -12.1% · 1y -81.5%
With William Green: Investing with Stability: Strategy & Emotional Intelligence
Alibaba's interests are so deeply aligned with China's national interests that an outside investor can make reliable inferences about its trajectory without needing on-the-ground expertise, and that alignment attenuates expropriation and governance risk the…
“what's good for China is good for Alibaba, what's good for Alibaba is good for China”
90d +5.1% · 180d +4.0% · 1y -10.6%
Guy Spier, how would you invest 1 million $ in China?
2023-03-09
TURKISH EQUITIES
bearish
Guy Spier · video
Erdogan's authoritarian populism has shifted control from the military to an Islamic populist base, foreign property rights are poorly protected, the country's rupture with Israel signals unreliable macro governance, and Turkish micro-caps can never be pulled…
“Turkish companies are not on my wish list for where I want to end up”
What happened to the drunk in the bar, Guy Spier? A talk about honesty, givers, and meditation
2022-06-27
SRG
bullish
Guy Spier · video
Strategically located real estate at major suburban intersections provides durable inflation protection and owns an economic high ground whose value is near-inevitable over time, analogous to Berkshire's Burlington Northern rail rights-of-way through emerging…
“own a bunch of rights away through the middle of all these emerging cities it's got to be good in one way or another”
90d +51.6% · 180d +102.6% · 1y +51.9%
How To Run A Hedge Fund (An Interview with Guy Spier of Aquamarine Capital)
The US and European central banks are printing money at an unprecedented pace and will likely fail to withdraw it when recovery arrives, making gold the natural inflation hedge
“gold is going through the roof”
Aquamarine's Spier Expects `Very Little Return' in Cash
Aggressive global money-printing will erode real returns on cash to near zero, making it a poor store of value over the coming years
“if you want to hold cash you're going to get very little return on it”
Aquamarine's Spier Expects `Very Little Return' in Cash
The political blowback from the Gulf of Mexico spill will constrain future US drilling, tightening supply and making the disaster net bullish for oil prices
“the oil spill is actually extremely bullish for the oil market”
Aquamarine's Spier Expects `Very Little Return' in Cash
2010-10-05
Em Equities
bullish
Guy Spier · video
Branded consumer goods companies in emerging markets possess defensible moats (e.g. genetic fit, local brand loyalty) yet trade at steep discounts to Western peers due to obscurity, creating a structural inefficiency
“there are companies like that that one can find that are extremely inexpensive”
Guy Spier: How Value Investing has changed -- new strategies of successful value investors (1)
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