Jeremy Deal – Use Differentiated Insight to Evaluate an Investment

<p><strong>BIO: </strong>Jeremy Deal manages the Survivor &amp; Thriver Fund LP, a private investment partnership for high-net-worth families globally.</p><p><strong>STORY:</strong> In 2012, Jeremy bought Tesla for about $2 a share and sold it eight months later for 50% more. He didn’t have a real differentiated insight to continue believing in Elon Musk’s ability to convince consumers to keep buying Teslas even though the product was of mediocre quality initially.</p><p><strong>LEARNING:</strong> Use differentiated insight to evaluate an investment. When evaluating a company, see the bigger picture and look at it for what it is, not just how expensive or cheap it is.</p><p>&nbsp;</p><blockquote class="ql-align-center"><strong>“My mistake was not having any insight into the business other than why I think the OEM contracts made this business look relatively cheap.”</strong></blockquote><blockquote class="ql-align-center">Jeremy Deal</blockquote><p>&nbsp;</p><h2>Guest profile</h2><p><a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/jeremy-deal-5b334b1/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><strong>Jeremy Deal</strong></a> manages the <a href="https://jdpcap.com/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Survivor &amp; Thriver Fund LP</a>, a private investment partnership for high-net-worth families globally. The fund makes multi-year investments in companies with substantial unrecognized earnings potential. Fund investment criteria are rooted in four basic tenets around business quality.</p><h2>Worst investment ever</h2><p>In 2012, Jeremy bought Tesla for roughly what would be about $2 a share today and sold it eight months later for 50% more. Looking back, Jeremy sold what would today be worth around $100 million for less than a million dollars.</p><p>Jeremy didn’t understand how bad the competition was for Tesla at the time. He didn’t have a real differentiated insight to continue believing in Elon Musk’s ability to convince consumers to keep buying Teslas even though the product was mediocre to low quality initially a