The Unshakeable Allure of the Bottleneck
Think of it like this. You can have a hundred different taxi apps, but if they all have to cross the same bridge to get into the city, the person who owns the bridge is the one with the real power. They don’t care which car is winning the race, they just collect the toll. In the world of investing, these bridges are called supply chain chokepoints. They are companies that control an irreplaceable part of a process, a unique resource, or a piece of technology that an entire industry depends on.
This creates a rather wonderful situation for an investor. When your customers literally cannot operate without what you sell, you have a defensive moat that a castle would envy. Economic wobbles might see people buying fewer fancy gadgets, but the fundamental components needed to make those gadgets, or to power the factories, remain essential. It’s a quiet, stubborn kind of strength.