📈 FedEx's warning is competitive, not macro - Amazon is eating the parcel business
Friedberg's read on the FedEx guidance cut and 25% single-day drop: blaming a global recession is 'hiding the cheese'. Three things are structurally working against FedEx - Amazon has built out local delivery to ~25% share (ahead of both FedEx and UPS) and keeps investing to replace whatever shippers use FedEx for, physical shipping volumes are being substituted by digital, and then the cycle on top. FedEx's share has declined eight or nine years running and the business has no diversification to expand into, so all three keep compounding against it. Chamath endorses the competitive explanation over the macro one.
0
CONVICTION
peaked 48.4 WATCH
DORMANT
band · contested
▼ SHORT FDX
expression · bearish equities
MISS
outcome · R -59.6% · α -75.5%
2023-09-17
window closed
⚖ Why this verdict
fully deterministic — evaluate.py replays this from daily closes; 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: ▼ SHORT FDX (primary play). FDX rose 59.6% over the window → direction-adjusted R = -59.6% (the call lost money).
- Benchmark: holding SPY over the same window returned +15.9%
→ α = -59.6 − (+15.9) = -75.5%
— what this call made or lost against just owning the index. This is the number the verdict uses.
Stock-selection read: -43.7% — did FDX move the predicted way relative to the market. The two only differ on a SHORT: this call was right about direction relative to the index but still cost money versus holding it.
- Rule fired:
· HIT — R ≥ +10% AND α ≥ +5· PARTIAL — R ≥ +5% OR α ≥ 0▶ MISS — everything else
- Credit: supporters of a MISS earn 0 each, opposers the inverse — this feeds the scoreboard weights. supported: Chamath, Friedberg | opposed: Jason | proxy-sensitive: UPS→PARTIAL (+7.5%)
Conviction timeline
bands: green ≥ 65 · watch ≥ 45 · ember ≥ 15
Plays vs SPY · % since first mention (2022-09-17)
Plays
| expression | symbol | kind | relevance | rationale |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| ▼ SHORT | FDX | stock | PRIMARY | the named loser of parcel share to Amazon's in-house network |
| ▼ SHORT | UPS | stock | adjacent | the other legacy parcel incumbent Amazon's 25% share passed |
Mention log
Friedberg
equities w=0.87 · n=120
· E96 (2022-09-17) · explicit_prediction · strength 3
▶ 1:07:14
SUPPORT
“And I would guess that all three continue to work against them. It's not like they have a lot of diversification in the business and other ways to expand out into. So you've got a key vertically integrated player, namely Amazon, that is investing heavily to replace whatever they use you for.”
Chamath
equities w=0.84 · n=160
· E96 (2022-09-17) · sentiment · strength 2
▶ 1:08:32
SUPPORT
“And to blame a recession is sort of a little bit of hiding the cheese. It's probably fair to say that their lunches get eaten by Amazon. So I could understand why FedEx is under a lot of pressure because of that.”
Who built this conviction
each voice's total force on the score — supports and opposes from every mention, weighted exactly as the replay applied them · share = % of all mention-driven movement
⏳ decay drained -32.6 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 | +36.4 | 36.4 | E96 born by Friedberg (explicit_prediction x3) [w=0.87] |
| E96 2022-09-17 | reinforce | +12.0 | 48.4 | E96 Chamath support x2 (new voice) [w=0.84] |
| E96 2022-09-17 | oppose | -9.3 | 39.1 | E96 Jason opposes x1 [w=0.97] |
| E97 2022-09-23 | decay | -1.6 | 37.5 | E97 silent |
| E98 2022-10-01 | decay | -1.5 | 36.0 | E98 silent |
| E99 2022-10-07 | decay | -1.4 | 34.6 | E99 silent |
| E100 2022-10-14 | decay | -1.4 | 33.2 | E100 silent |
| E101 2022-10-22 | decay | -1.3 | 31.8 | E101 silent |
| E102 2022-10-29 | decay | -1.3 | 30.6 | E102 silent |
| E103 2022-11-05 | decay | -1.2 | 29.4 | E103 silent |
| E105 2022-11-19 | decay | -1.2 | 28.2 | E105 silent |
| E106 2022-12-03 | decay | -1.1 | 27.1 | E106 silent |
| E107 2022-12-10 | decay | -1.1 | 26.0 | E107 silent |
| E108 2022-12-16 | decay | -1.0 | 24.9 | E108 silent |
| E109 2022-12-24 | decay | -1.0 | 23.9 | E109 silent |
| E110 2023-01-06 | decay | -1.0 | 23.0 | E110 silent |
| E111 2023-01-13 | decay | -0.9 | 22.1 | E111 silent |
| E112 2023-01-20 | decay | -0.9 | 21.2 | 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 | 18.0 | E116 silent |
| E118 2023-03-03 | decay | -0.7 | 17.3 | E118 silent |
| E119 2023-03-11 | decay | -0.7 | 16.6 | E119 silent |
| E120 2023-03-17 | decay | -0.7 | 15.9 | E120 silent |
| E121 2023-03-24 | decay | -0.6 | 15.3 | E121 silent |
| E122 2023-03-31 | decay | -0.6 | 14.7 | E122 silent |
| E123 2023-04-07 | decay | -0.6 | 14.1 | E123 silent |
| E124 2023-04-14 | decay | -0.6 | 13.5 | E124 silent |
| E125 2023-04-21 | decay | -0.5 | 13.0 | E125 silent |
| E126 2023-04-28 | decay | -0.5 | 12.5 | E126 silent |
| E128 2023-05-12 | decay | -0.5 | 12.0 | E128 silent |
| E129 2023-05-19 | decay | -0.5 | 11.5 | E129 silent |
| E130 2023-05-26 | decay | -0.5 | 11.0 | E130 silent |
| E131 2023-06-02 | decay | -0.4 | 10.6 | E131 silent |
| E132 2023-06-10 | decay | -0.4 | 10.2 | E132 silent |
| E133 2023-06-16 | decay | -0.4 | 9.7 | E133 silent |
| E134 2023-06-24 | decay | -0.4 | 9.4 | E134 silent |
| E135 2023-07-01 | decay | -0.4 | 9.0 | E135 silent |
| E136 2023-07-09 | decay | -0.4 | 8.6 | E136 silent |
| E137 2023-07-14 | decay | -0.3 | 8.3 | E137 silent |
| E139 2023-07-27 | decay | -0.3 | 7.9 | E139 silent |
| E140 2023-08-04 | decay | -0.3 | 7.6 | E140 silent |
| E141 2023-08-11 | decay | -0.3 | 7.3 | E141 silent |
| E142 2023-08-18 | decay | -0.3 | 7.0 | E142 silent |
| E143 2023-08-25 | decay | -0.3 | 6.8 | E143 silent |
| E144 2023-09-01 | decay | -0.3 | 6.5 | E144 silent |