📈 Adobe/Figma at $20B is a good deal - the 15-20% selloff is an overreaction
The market's ~15-20% haircut to Adobe on the Figma announcement is an overreaction: Figma's ARR ramp (700k -> 4m -> 23m -> 77m -> 210m -> ~450m est. 2022, ~800m guided 2023) means 50x current ARR is ~25x forward and 1.5-2B of ARR within a few years, and the deal removes the existential cloud/collaboration threat to Creative Cloud while turning Adobe back into a growth story. Chamath takes the other side: the premium implies Adobe's existing revenue base is under more pressure than models assume, and between the cash, the dilution and the 20% re-rating the real price tag is $30-40B against decaying core earnings.
0
CONVICTION
peaked 59.0 WATCH
DORMANT
band · contested
▲ LONG ADBE
expression · bullish equities
RIGHT
result · return +78.6% · vs SPY +62.7%
2023-09-17
born 2022-09-17 (E96) → window closed
⚖ Why this result
fully deterministic — computed from daily closes on the scoring date; nothing below is editable or hand-set
- Window: 2022-09-17 → 2023-09-17 — first mention + 12-month horizon, then the window locks.
- The call: ▲ LONG ADBE (primary play). ADBE rose 78.6% over the window → return (sign flipped for a SHORT) = +78.6% (the call made money).
- Benchmark: holding SPY over the same window returned +15.9% → vs SPY = +78.6 − (+15.9) = +62.7% — what this call made or lost against just owning the index. This is the number the result uses.
- Rule fired:
▶ RIGHT — return ≥ +10% AND beat SPY by 5+ ✓ (return 78.6, vs SPY 62.7)· HALF — return ≥ +5% OR beat SPY at all· WRONG — everything else
- Credit: supporters of a RIGHT earn 1.0 each, opposers the opposite — this feeds the scoreboard. supported: Friedberg, Jason, Sacks | opposed: Chamath
Conviction timeline
bands: green ≥ 65 · watch ≥ 45 · ember ≥ 15
Plays vs SPY · % since first mention (2022-09-17)
Plays
| expression | symbol | kind | relevance | rationale |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| ▲ LONG | ADBE | stock | PRIMARY | the acquirer whose stock the besties argue was oversold on the announcement |
Mention log newest first
Chamath
equities 42% · n=163
· E108 (2022-12-16) · explicit_prediction · strength 3
▶ 1:07:24
OPPOSE
“Because if you take those three things, I mean, oh my God, they just absolutely top ticked before any of this stuff was known. So today Adobe could probably buy this thing for like 7 billion instead of 20 billion.”
Chamath
equities 42% · n=163
· E96 (2022-09-17) · explicit_prediction · strength 3
▶ 10:21
OPPOSE
“you have this sort of parade of terribles for Adobe that they're going to have to navigate, right? They have a very large portion of cash. They have a large portion of stock. They have decaying earnings in their core business that they now have to explain.”
Sacks
equities 44% · n=96
· E96 (2022-09-17) · explicit_prediction · strength 3
▶ 6:39
SUPPORT
· horizon 18mo
“And so, okay, so yeah, so Adobe is paying 50 times current ARR. But if you believe this, they're only paying divided by two, they're paying 25 times end of next year, so like 18 months from now. And then you figure, you know, within say two years after that, they're going to be, you know, at somewhere between one and a half and two billion of ARR. And as you guys know, there just aren't that many SaaS companies that even get to a billion of ARR. So I don't think Adobe is making a bad deal here.”
Who built this conviction
each voice's total push on the score, in conviction points across every mention — supports and opposes · share = % of all mention-driven movement
⏳ decay drained -30.6 over the idea's life — that's time passing, attributed to no one
Score events
| episode | kind | Δ | after | note |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| E96 2022-09-17 | init | +42.0 | 42.0 | E96 born by Sacks (explicit_prediction x3) |
| E96 2022-09-17 | oppose | -14.4 | 27.6 | E96 Chamath opposes x3 |
| E96 2022-09-17 | reinforce | +19.5 | 47.1 | E96 Jason support x3 (new voice) |
| E96 2022-09-17 | reinforce | +11.9 | 59.0 | E96 Friedberg support x2 (new voice) |
| E97 2022-09-23 | decay | -2.4 | 56.7 | E97 silent |
| E98 2022-10-01 | decay | -2.3 | 54.4 | E98 silent |
| E99 2022-10-07 | decay | -2.2 | 52.2 | E99 silent |
| E100 2022-10-14 | decay | -2.1 | 50.1 | E100 silent |
| E101 2022-10-22 | decay | -2.0 | 48.1 | E101 silent |
| E102 2022-10-29 | decay | -1.9 | 46.2 | E102 silent |
| E103 2022-11-05 | decay | -1.8 | 44.4 | E103 silent |
| E105 2022-11-19 | decay | -1.8 | 42.6 | E105 silent |
| E106 2022-12-03 | decay | -1.7 | 40.9 | E106 silent |
| E107 2022-12-10 | decay | -1.6 | 39.3 | E107 silent |
| E108 2022-12-16 | oppose | -14.4 | 24.9 | E108 Chamath opposes x3 |
| E109 2022-12-24 | decay | -1.0 | 23.9 | E109 silent |
| E110 2023-01-06 | decay | -1.0 | 22.9 | E110 silent |
| E111 2023-01-13 | decay | -0.9 | 22.0 | E111 silent |
| E112 2023-01-20 | decay | -0.9 | 21.1 | E112 silent |
| E113 2023-01-27 | decay | -0.8 | 20.3 | E113 silent |
| E114 2023-02-04 | decay | -0.8 | 19.5 | E114 silent |
| E115 2023-02-11 | decay | -0.8 | 18.7 | E115 silent |
| E116 2023-02-17 | decay | -0.7 | 17.9 | E116 silent |
| E118 2023-03-03 | decay | -0.7 | 17.2 | E118 silent |
| E119 2023-03-11 | decay | -0.7 | 16.5 | E119 silent |
| E120 2023-03-17 | decay | -0.7 | 15.9 | E120 silent |
| E121 2023-03-24 | decay | -0.6 | 15.2 | E121 silent |
| E122 2023-03-31 | oppose | -9.6 | 5.6 | E122 Chamath opposes x1 |
| E123 2023-04-07 | decay | -0.2 | 5.4 | E123 silent |
| E124 2023-04-14 | decay | -0.2 | 5.2 | E124 silent |
| E125 2023-04-21 | decay | -0.2 | 5.0 | E125 silent |
| E126 2023-04-28 | decay | -0.2 | 4.8 | E126 silent |
| E128 2023-05-12 | decay | -0.2 | 4.6 | E128 silent |
| E129 2023-05-19 | decay | -0.2 | 4.4 | E129 silent |
| E130 2023-05-26 | oppose | -4.4 | 0.0 | E130 Chamath opposes x2 |
| E131 2023-06-02 | decay | · | 0.0 | E131 silent |
| E132 2023-06-10 | decay | · | 0.0 | E132 silent |
| E133 2023-06-16 | decay | · | 0.0 | E133 silent |
| E134 2023-06-24 | decay | · | 0.0 | E134 silent |
| E135 2023-07-01 | decay | · | 0.0 | E135 silent |
| E136 2023-07-09 | decay | · | 0.0 | E136 silent |
| E137 2023-07-14 | decay | · | 0.0 | E137 silent |
| E139 2023-07-27 | decay | · | 0.0 | E139 silent |
| E140 2023-08-04 | decay | · | 0.0 | E140 silent |
| E141 2023-08-11 | decay | · | 0.0 | E141 silent |
| E142 2023-08-18 | decay | · | 0.0 | E142 silent |
| E143 2023-08-25 | oppose | · | 0.0 | E143 Chamath opposes x2 |
| E144 2023-09-01 | decay | · | 0.0 | E144 silent |