A Conversation with Charlie Munger & John Collison - [Invest Like the Best, EP.355]

Today, we’re releasing a conversation between John Collison and Charlie Munger. We've had this interview with Charlie scheduled to air for a while, coinciding with Stripe Press's launch of the amazing reprint of Poor Charlie's Almanack, which is released today. We were all stunned last week when we heard the news of Charlie's passing, but having consulted with those close to him, everyone agreed that he'd want us to release this interview. I'm thankful to be able to learn from him just one more time in this interview. Please enjoy, and may Charlie Rest in Peace. Order your copy of Poor Charlie’s Almanack Worldly wisdom episodes in honor of Charlie Munger: Daryl Morey: Systems Thinking in Sports Boyd Varty: The Art of Tracking Sam Hinkie: Find Your People David Senra: Passion & Pain Priya Parker: The Art of Gathering Charlie Songhurst: Lessons from Investing in 483 Companies For the full show notes, transcript, and links to mentioned content, check out the episode page here. ----- This episode is brought to you by Tegus. Tegus is the modern research platform for leading investors. Tired of running your own expert calls to get up to speed on a company? Tegus lets you ramp faster and find answers to critical questions more efficiently than any alternative method. The gold standard for research, the Tegus platform delivers unmatched access to timely, qualitative insights through the largest and most differentiated expert call transcript database. With over 60,000 transcripts spanning 22,000 public and private companies, investors can accelerate their fundamental research process by discovering highly-differentiated and reliable insights that can’t be found anywhere else in the market. As a listener, drive your next investment thesis forward with Tegus for free at tegus.co/patrick. ----- Invest Like the Best is a property of Colossus, LLC. For more episodes of Invest Like the Best, visit joincolossus.com/episodes. Follow us on Twitter: @patrick_oshag | @JoinColossus Show Notes (00:03:52) - (First question) - The fixation on evaluating business quality (00:05:58) - Learning the big ideas across various disciplines (00:10:03) - The issue of adverse selection in legal services (00:11:42) - Societal solutions for the opioid crisis (00:17:34) - Reasons for not investing in Amazon (00:20:38) - Explaining Costco's model (00:29:08) - Discussing the increasing challenges in investing (00:32:08) - Ingredients for long-term success in business (00:33:18) - Debating cryptocurrency (00:37:37) - Offering guidance for navigating a potential recession (00:38:56) - Reflecting on the state of American society (00:45:20) - Sharing a passion for architecture (00:54:13) - “Win-win” business (00:57:53) - Countering arguments against capitalism (00:60:42) - The origins of Poor Charlie's Almanack (01:05:14) - Building a productive partnership (01:08:55) - Opining on the SEC (01:12:22) - Highlighting investment concerns (01:16:31) - Reasons for optimism about China (01:32:14) - The unique aspects of Berkshire Hathaway