Warren Buffett On Elon Musk's Statement: 'Moats Are Lame'

The clip was taken from Berkshire Hathaway's 2018 Annual Shareholder's Meeting.

[VVattonEarth]

statler and waldorf age like fine wine

[josereyes]

I learned "pace of innovation" is a moat.

[determinedlyunmotivated]

The 90 yr olds are still kicking butt and taking names! 😂

[CaptainMatteo]

Charlie and Warren sharper than ever !

[wiskasIO]

I'm on Berkshire team, legacy speaks for itself.

[stevengreidinger]

Remaining the low-cost producer often requires technological innovation.

[JWarrenPhilly]

Simply put, Warren invests in things that he understands, which are things that tend to not change fast. Moats exist there in a more visible way, which is how he understands them.

Fast-moving tech uses patents to have moats that protect short-term (pharmaceuticals), and you can see that in how Abbvie was hit for Humira.

They are both right in the context of their businesses. Tesla can not just live off the name (submit criticism here). Tesla has to be better as they fight for market share against old names in a newish sector. Cadillac sells on name as much as features. The same cannot be said for Tesla to the broader market. No moat there yet.

[valetudo]

What Elon described what a company should do is well, creating a moat. If you are innovating faster than your competition and that allows you to have and maintain a competitive edge - well that is your "moat"....the rate at which you innovate.

And even besides that...moats don't hurt... and it's not either or in regards to what Musk said. Why not do that, Elon, AND have an advantage in another area that protect your business from 'invasion'? It's not like those things are mutually exclusive.

[deanjohnson]

Should have said “wide moat company’s stock don’t drop 70% in a year so if Elon was saying Tesla is not a wide moat company he is correct “

[ArturoGarzaID]

Warren and Charlie are probably the coolest dudes ever.

[vidalskyociosen]

All of these are basically gambling, that’s the bottom to all, but it’s legal and fun.

[John-thinks]

Being a faster innovator IS a moat. A competitive innovation system counts. Not sure why Warren didn't just say that.

[myphone]

Every period of "exponential growth" in history was an S-curve bending back down at the end. Running faster than the competition is a time-limited strategy that _always_ runs out.

The smartphone s-curve bent down 10 years ago because you can't sell more than a couple billion units a year to a population of 8 billion people: everybody already has a phone and keeps it for multiple years.

You can raise the price, try to take market share from competitors, xut costs, or replace them faster, but the market itself is saturated, not growing.

Substitute in any product or service for this, it's _always_ an s-curve.

[bobshagit]

look up who Buffett's dad was when he started trading
ill help you, he was a representative for Nebraska....
giving his son insider trading info making him rich
he is no different than these politicians using their influence and insider knowledge to gain wealth

[arigutman]

An investor's scoreboard is his or her brokerage account. Whatever strategy allows for an investor to reap success is what matters most...

[gregorysagegreene]

Captions really bad. These two always remind me uncannily of the old guys in 'Trading Places' .

[shethkaushal]

..it might be easier to go to Mars than putting technology inside a chewing gum..

[moon]

Pfft I’d give him credit if he hadn’t kill twitter and Tesla’s stock value back in last year

[markr]

It’s all about perspective. Building a company in an established industry (cars) through sheer innovation and consistently picking winning companies to invest in are very different angles. Elon needs to be right once, Berkshire needs to be right again and again (on average).

[cjmllvv]

Warren isn't just gonna give you the info shareholder conference or not