The Business Brew

Chris Cerrone, a Partner at Akre Capital Management, stops by The Business Brew for a discussion about his investment philosophy, simplicity, the definition of quality, and much more.  Chris’ paper, The Art of (Not) Selling, really made an impression on Bill.  This discussion follows up on that paper, among other topics.

Prior to joining Akre Capital Management in 2012, Chris served as an equity research analyst for Goldman Sachs & Co. in New York from 2010 to 2012. In that position, he covered restaurant and retail companies. He began his investment management career in 2007 as a junior equity research analyst with Century Capital Management in Boston. Chris graduated summa cum laude with a B.A. in economics from Tufts University.

Bill really enjoyed listening to Chris talk about how Mr. Akre would push Chris to find the essence of a business.  That enables an analyst to then focus on THE most important question.

Books mentioned include:

https://www.amazon.com/Zen-Art-Motorcycle-Maintenance-Inquiry/dp/0060589469

https://www.amazon.com/Lila-Inquiry-Robert-M-Pirsig/dp/0553299611/ref=pd_lpo_2?pd_rd_i=0553299611&psc=1

https://www.amazon.com/The-Art-of-Learning-Josh-Waitzkin-audiobook/dp/B00JE2WEEK/ref=sr_1_1?crid=3DQ5DXHBNOWB7&keywords=the+art+of+learning&qid=1643803876&s=books&sprefix=the+art+of+learning%2Cstripbooks%2C83&sr=1-1

Detailed show notes below the Stream by Mosiac sponsor copy and thank yous.

Please leave us a rating in your favorite podcast player!

This episode is brought to you by Stream by Mosaic, a product that is integral to any fundamental research process.  Stream has developed an extensive library of expert interviews that cover a variety of industries.  https://streamrg.co/BB features over 300 expert interviews per week.  70% of Stream's experts are found exclusively on https://streamrg.co/BB.  Visit

Andrew Freedman stops by The Business Brew for a discussion about the ever changing media landscape.  In this discussion, Andrew articulates how he views valuation, what makes stocks good “long” and “short” candidates, and how his process has evolved over time.  There’s a lot of company specific discussion here.  We hope it is beneficial, educational, and entertaining.

Andrew’s official bio reads as follows:

Andrew Freedman, CFA, is a Managing Director and Communications Sector Head at Hedgeye. In addition, he holds Senior Analyst responsibilities on the Health Care Team where he specializes in Information Technology. Before joining Hedgeye in 2014, Andrew worked for an institutional consulting firm where he was responsible for client asset allocation and investment manager due-diligence. Andrew is a CFA® charterholder and holds a Bachelor of Science degree from Marquette University in Finance and Business Economics.

Hedgeye is an independent investment research firm covering 10 fundamental/industry sectors, macro and policy. We provide actionable long/short ideas to institutions (hedge funds, mutual funds, and family offices) and RIAs/Individuals. Institutional research includes access to deep dive fundamental reports (black books) on individual stocks, thematic/industry analysis, proprietary and third party datasets, industry thought leader calls, company models, one-on-one analyst access and more. We do not have a broker dealer and don't do banking. Please contact [email protected] if you are interested in learning more about Hedgeye's research offerings.

Detailed show notes below the Stream by Mosiac sponsor copy and thank yous.

Please leave us a rating in your favorite podcast player!

This episode is brought to you by Stream by Mosaic, a product that is integral to any fundamental research process.  Stream has developed an extensive library of expert interviews that cover a variety of industries.  https://streamrg.co/BB features over 300 expert interviews per week.  70% of Stream's experts are found exclusively on https://streamrg.co/BB.  Visit

Troy Lavinia, founder of Stream by Mosaic, stops by The Business Brew to discuss creating Stream, building teams, and strategic thinking.  Troy is a really interesting thinker, approaches life with an abundance mentality, and is always looking to find the right partners to grow a business.  Interesting tidbits about Troy include his time at Elliott Management and playing football fullback and tight end at University of Pennsylvania.

At one point in the conversation Bill asks Troy how he got comfortable delegating work.  Troy responded by saying something to the effect of “You have to associate joy with creating a meaningful job for someone else.”  That answer struck Bill as a very positive association for delegation. 

We hope you enjoy this conversation.  It is a peek into the financial services industry and an introduction to the person behind our sponsor. 

Please leave us a rating in your favorite podcast player!

This episode is brought to you Bill. 

Stream by Mosaic is a product that is integral to any fundamental research process.  Stream has developed an extensive library of expert interviews that cover a variety of industries.  https://streamrg.co/BB features over 300 expert interviews per week.  70% of Stream's experts are found exclusively on https://streamrg.co/BB.  Visit https://streamrg.co/BB for a 14 day trial.

Album art photo taken by Mike Ando.  Please see https://www.mikeando.com/

Thank you to @mathewpassy (on Twitter) for the show production.

Detailed Show Notes

3:00 – Troy’s background, including time at Elliott Management

6:00 – How Stream was incubated within Mosaic and then spun out for growth reasons

8:00 – How Troy thought about partnering with AlphaSense

11:30 – Why expert transcript libraries are similar to media streaming services

16:15 – Did COVID “help” Stream by Mosaic as a business?

19:00 – Why does Troy like running startups vs. more mature businesses?

21:20  - Team building and the power of delegation

33:00 – Listening to the interviews on Stream by Mosaic

35:00 – Troy’s association with selling St

Will Thomson stops by The Business Brew to discuss his approach to real asset investing.   Will is the Founder and Managing Partner of Massif Capital, LLC.  He has experience in private equity and credit/political risk insurance, in addition to having served as a strategic and economic adviser to NATO/ISAF in Afghanistan.

Before starting Massif Capital, Will worked in the New York office of Chaucer, a Lloyd’s of London insurance syndicate, serving as the co-portfolio manager for a $750 million portfolio of credit and political risk insurance policies. He is a Graduate of Trinity College and holds a Masters in Government from Harvard University.

Detailed show notes below the Stream by Mosiac sponsor copy and thank yous.

Please leave us a rating in your favorite podcast player!

This episode is brought to you by Stream by Mosaic, a product that is integral to any fundamental research process.  Stream has developed an extensive library of expert interviews that cover a variety of industries.  https://streamrg.co/BB features over 300 expert interviews per week.  70% of Stream's experts are found exclusively on https://streamrg.co/BB.  Visit https://streamrg.co/BB and use promo code BREW for a 14 day trial.

Album art photo taken by Mike Ando.  Please see https://www.mikeando.com/

Thank you to @mathewpassy (on Twitter) for the show production.

Detailed Show Notes

Will Thomson –

4:05 – Being able to present at Grant’s

5:05 – Will’s background and his experience watching government intervention change an industry

8:30 – What Massif focuses its time on

10:30 – Everyon

Muji stops by The Business Brew to discuss modern internet infrastructure.  Muji has extensive technical knowledge about internet infrastructure, network security, and high growth companies such as Snowflake.  He shares his knowledge via a paid newsletter, found at hhhypergrowth.com, which Bill subscribes to and enjoys very much.  Our discussion mostly focuses on how information travels over the internet to end up being consumed by everyone.  This is a very interesting discussion and we hope you enjoy.

Detailed show notes below the Stream by Mosiac sponsor copy and thank yous.

Please leave us a rating in your favorite podcast player!

This episode is brought to you by Stream by Mosaic, a product that is integral to any fundamental research process.  Stream has developed an extensive library of expert interviews that cover a variety of industries.  https://streamrg.co/BB features over 300 expert interviews per week.  70% of Stream's experts are found exclusively on https://streamrg.co/BB.  Visit https://streamrg.co/BB for a 14 day trial.

Album art photo taken by Mike Ando.  Please see https://www.mikeando.com/

Thank you to @mathewpassy (on Twitter) for the show production.

Detailed Show Notes

4:30 – What is an edge network and a CDN

9:45 – How Fastly and Cloudflare attacked Akami

15:40 – Cloud Infrastructure vs. CDNs

18:50 – Fastly strategy

21:30 – The rise of software defined networking

23:15 – Fully programmable app stacks vs. monolithic app stacks

Denise Shull is Founder and CEO of The ReThink Group (see https://therethinkgroup.net/).   She developed the Shull method, which relies on the latest brain research on how humans perceive, judge and decide. Understanding this on a practical level routinely allows The ReThink Group to resolve the mysterious mental challenges of slumps, burnout, motivation and resilience. Denise’s distinctive approach produces results that are unmatched in the performance and risk-taking fields.

We start off jumping into the conversation.  Denise learned from modern psychoanalysts. This conversation begins talking about anger, but it is more about managing emotions.  Managing emotions is extremely important in life and investing.  Yet, it is underdiscussed on many investment podcasts.  Hence this interview.

While this a bit different, we think this podcast could meaningfully improve your results if you take it seriously.

We hope you enjoy the discussion.
 Detailed show notes below the Stream by Mosiac sponsor copy and thank yous.

Please leave us a rating in your favorite podcast player!

This episode is brought to you by Stream by Mosaic, a product that is integral to any fundamental research process.  Stream has developed an extensive library of expert interviews that cover a variety of industries.  https://streamrg.co/BB features over 300 expert interviews per week.  70% of Stream's experts are found exclusively on https://streamrg.co/BB.  Visit https://streamrg.co/BB for a 14 day trial.

Album art photo taken by Mike Ando.  Please see https://www.mikeando.com/

Kristi Ross stops by The Business Brew to discuss her career, leading companies through M&A, and two notable exits exceeding $1.7Bn (the most recent of which was valued at $1Bn https://www.bizjournals.com/chicago/inno/stories/news/2021/01/21/chicagos-tastytrade-acquired-in-1b-deal.html).  Kristi is the co-CEO of tastytrade, which launched in 2011. She also co-founded dough, a visual front-end trading technology platform that launched in 2014 and ultimately merged with and rebranded as tastytrade when the team launched their own online brokerage firm, tastyworks, in 2017.

Kristi is an award-winning entrepreneur who believes in empowering the do-it-yourself investor to engage more with their finances. She also uses her time to interview innovative entrepreneurs on her show, Bootstrapping in America. She also walks through the ins and outs of taxes for traders in Kristi’s Tax Bursts.

Kristi started her career in public accounting, specializing in financial services industry clientele including individual traders, proprietary firms, market makers, and advisory firms. After her run as a public accountant, Kristi acted as CFO of Automated Trading Desk Specialists, a stock specialist on the Chicago Stock Exchange. She then partnered up with Tom Sosnoff to serve as CFO of thinkorswim Group where she led numerous mergers, acquisitions and integration. thinkorswim sold to TD-Ameritrade for $750M in 2009.

You can find her information here: LinkedIn, Twitter, and  tastytrade. 

We hope you enjoy the discussion.
 Detailed show notes below the Stream by Mosiac sponsor copy and thank yous.

Please leave us a rating in your favorite podcast player!

This episode is brought to you by Stream by Mosaic, a product that is integral to any fundamental research process.  Stream has developed an extensive library of expert interviews that cover a variety of industries.  StreamRG.com features over 300 expert interviews.  70% of Stream's experts are found exclusively on StreamRG.com.  Visit StreamRG.com and use promo code BREW for a 14 day trial.

Album art photo taken by Mike Ando.  Please see https://www.mikeando.com/

Thank you to @mathewpassy (on Twitter) for the show production.

Detailed Show Notes

3:30 - Kristi’s background

5:05 - How Kristi growing up formed her views on entre

Jillian Jaccard Murrish stops by The Business Brew to discuss co-founding and running Pier Asset Management; an alternative credit firm.  Pier delivers fixed income yield by investing in alternative credit, which they define as all nonbank lending.  Typical loan sizes in Pier’s portfolio are loans less than $250,000.

This was a fun conversation and touches on an asset class that hasn’t been discussed much on this program.  As always, nothing is investment advice and do your own due diligence!  Jillian’s credentials are as follows:

Mrs. Murrish is a co-founder and Chief Executive Officer of Pier Asset Management. Prior to founding Pier, she was Executive Vice President of Capital Markets at Patch of Land where she built one of the first institutional whole loan sale programs in the real estate marketplace lending industry, secured $750M in loan purchase commitments, managed the firm’s warehouse funding, and lead equity capitalization efforts. Prior to her time in marketplace lending, Mrs. Murrish worked with technology clients in the Capital Markets group at a leading middle market investment bank, Houlihan Lokey. She has completed the Series 7, Series 63, Series 65, and Series 79 examinations. She is a graduate of the Loyola Marymount University Honors Program and has a B.S. in Accounting and a B.B.A. in Finance.

We hope you enjoy the discussion. 

“The investment strategy discussed in this podcast is only suitable for eligible investors and there is no guarantee that the investment strategy will be successful or meet its goals.  Any discussion of targeted returns reflects the intended interest rates paid by borrowers and is not reflective of returns to investors. Also, nothing in this discussion should be regarded as a representation, warranty or prediction that any specific transaction will reflect any particular performance or that it will achieve or is likely to achieve any particular result or that investors will be able to avoid losses, including total loss of their investment. Inherent in any investment is the potential for loss. This podcast discussion is solely for informational purposes only and is not a solicitation or an offer to buy any security or instrument or to participate in any trading strategy.”

Detailed show notes below the Stream by Mosiac sponsor copy and thank yous.

Please leave us a rating in your favorite app store.

This episode is brought to you by Stream by Mosaic, a product that is integral to any fundamental research process.  Stream has developed an extensive library of expert interviews that cover a variety of industries.  https://streamrg.co/BB features over 300 expert interviews per week.  70% of Stream's experts are found exclusively on

NOTE: For 20% off of KOYFIN please use the following link: https://www.koyfin.com/?utm_campaign=BusinessBrew20off&utm_medium=referral&utm_source=rewardful&via=business

The discount will be applied at checkout. 

Rob Koyfman stops by The Business Brew to discuss his background, starting a Fintech business, building teams, and much more. Rob’s experience includes stints and Goldman Sachs, Citigroup and macro roles at Luxor Asset Management and Tekne Capital Management.  This was a fun conversation for Bill. We hope you enjoy meeting the person behind our first sponsor.


Audio time stamps (note - YouTube will not sync to these).

0:00 - Rob’s career at Goldman

~2:00 - How Goldman staffs and why that’s smart

~4:40 - Building culture at Koyfin

~6:00 - Living in London

~10:50 - Starting Koyfin

~14:30 - Rob the investor and how it influenced Koyfin’s homepage


~19:00 - Walk through Koyfin homepage

~ 23:00 - Some technical talk

~32:00 - Technicals signaled a reversal in 2009

~35:00 - Rate & yield curve discussion

~38:00 - Rob’s data visualization beginning

~40:16 - Koyfin has transcripts too!

~44:30 - Getting the word out about Koyfin

~47:40 - The importance of having a team to accomplish bigger things

~50:30 - Moving to a paid model and what that’s like for Koyfin’s business

~56:30 - The breadth of Koyfin’s offering