📈 Take-rate decay caps the GTV marketplaces — model Instacart down, not up
Chamath's underwriting frame for the newly listed Instacart: businesses that intermediate large gross transaction values have never historically defended their take rate, because either competition or supplier pricing power erodes it. In grocery specifically Walmart and Amazon will do the same job for much cheaper, so the honest model is a declining take rate against growing share. Layer on contracted advertising multiples — the market discounts ad revenue as too levered to rates and the economy, and Facebook/Google take an increasing share of it — and the ad-led revenue mix does not rescue the valuation. Airbnb is the same shape one step further along, with regulatory capture (New York) doing the take-rate damage.
⚖ Why this verdict
fully deterministic — evaluate.py replays this from daily closes; nothing below is editable or hand-set
- Window: 2023-09-22 → 2024-09-22 — first mention + 12-month horizon, then the window locks.
- The call: ▼ SHORT CART (primary play). CART rose 40.5% over the window → direction-adjusted R = -40.5% (the call lost money).
- Benchmark: holding SPY over the same window returned +33.8%
→ α = -40.5 − (+33.8) = -74.3%
— what this call made or lost against just owning the index. This is the number the verdict uses.
Stock-selection read: -6.7% — did CART 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
Conviction timeline
bands: green ≥ 65 · watch ≥ 45 · ember ≥ 15
Plays vs SPY · % since first mention (2023-09-22)
Plays
| expression | symbol | kind | relevance | rationale |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| ▼ SHORT | CART | stock | PRIMARY | the company Chamath is underwriting — flat GTV, ad-led revenue, take rate the swing variable |
| ▼ SHORT | ABNB | stock | adjacent | he names it as having long-term take-rate issues from competitive pressure and regulatory capture |
Mention log
“for these businesses that drive huge GTVs, gross transaction values, is I think most people, when they try to find what they're worth, are very sensitive to the take rate ... take rate tends to decay. So said in, you know, in grocery land, I think it's because Walmart and Amazon will try to do it for much, much cheaper ... I think that you have to model the health of the business with a declining take rate and growing share.”
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 -25.0 over the idea's life — that's time passing, attributed to no one
Score events
| episode | kind | Δ | after | note |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| E146 2023-09-22 | init | +29.3 | 29.3 | E146 born by Chamath (explicit_prediction x2) [w=0.84] |
| E147 2023-09-29 | decay | -1.2 | 28.1 | E147 silent |
| E148 2023-10-07 | decay | -1.1 | 27.0 | E148 silent |
| E149 2023-10-13 | decay | -1.1 | 25.9 | E149 silent |
| E150 2023-10-20 | decay | -1.0 | 24.9 | E150 silent |
| E151 2023-10-27 | decay | -1.0 | 23.9 | E151 silent |
| E152 2023-11-03 | decay | -1.0 | 22.9 | E152 silent |
| E156 2023-12-08 | decay | -0.9 | 22.0 | E156 silent |
| E157 2023-12-16 | decay | -0.9 | 21.1 | E157 silent |
| E158 2023-12-23 | decay | -0.8 | 20.3 | E158 silent |
| E159 2023-12-29 | decay | -0.8 | 19.5 | E159 silent |
| E160 2024-01-06 | decay | -0.8 | 18.7 | E160 silent |
| E161 2024-01-13 | decay | -0.7 | 18.0 | E161 silent |
| E162 2024-01-19 | decay | -0.7 | 17.2 | E162 silent |
| E163 2024-01-26 | decay | -0.7 | 16.6 | E163 silent |
| E164 2024-02-02 | decay | -0.7 | 15.9 | E164 silent |
| E165 2024-02-09 | decay | -0.6 | 15.3 | E165 silent |
| E166 2024-02-16 | decay | -0.6 | 14.6 | E166 silent |
| E167 2024-02-23 | decay | -0.6 | 14.1 | E167 silent |
| E168 2024-03-01 | decay | -0.6 | 13.5 | E168 silent |
| E169 2024-03-08 | decay | -0.5 | 13.0 | E169 silent |
| E170 2024-03-15 | decay | -0.5 | 12.4 | E170 silent |
| E171 2024-03-22 | decay | -0.5 | 11.9 | E171 silent |
| E172 2024-03-29 | decay | -0.5 | 11.5 | E172 silent |
| E173 2024-04-05 | decay | -0.5 | 11.0 | E173 silent |
| E174 2024-04-12 | decay | -0.4 | 10.6 | E174 silent |
| E175 2024-04-19 | decay | -0.4 | 10.1 | E175 silent |
| E176 2024-04-26 | decay | -0.4 | 9.7 | E176 silent |
| E177 2024-05-03 | decay | -0.4 | 9.3 | E177 silent |
| E178 2024-05-10 | decay | -0.4 | 9.0 | E178 silent |
| E179 2024-05-17 | decay | -0.4 | 8.6 | E179 silent |
| E180 2024-05-24 | decay | -0.3 | 8.3 | E180 silent |
| E181 2024-05-31 | decay | -0.3 | 7.9 | E181 silent |
| E182 2024-06-07 | decay | -0.3 | 7.6 | E182 silent |
| E183 2024-06-14 | decay | -0.3 | 7.3 | E183 silent |
| E184 2024-06-20 | decay | -0.3 | 7.0 | E184 silent |
| E185 2024-06-29 | decay | -0.3 | 6.7 | E185 silent |
| E186 2024-07-04 | decay | -0.3 | 6.5 | E186 silent |
| E187 2024-07-12 | decay | -0.3 | 6.2 | E187 silent |
| E188 2024-07-19 | decay | -0.2 | 6.0 | E188 silent |
| E189 2024-07-26 | decay | -0.2 | 5.7 | E189 silent |
| E190 2024-08-02 | decay | -0.2 | 5.5 | E190 silent |
| E191 2024-08-09 | decay | -0.2 | 5.3 | E191 silent |
| E192 2024-08-16 | decay | -0.2 | 5.1 | E192 silent |
| E193 2024-08-23 | decay | -0.2 | 4.9 | E193 silent |
| E194 2024-08-30 | decay | -0.2 | 4.7 | E194 silent |
| E195 2024-09-06 | decay | -0.2 | 4.5 | E195 silent |
| E196 2024-09-20 | decay | -0.2 | 4.3 | E196 silent |