Wall Street Legend Jim Chanos is famed for bringing a skeptical eye to a credulous world. In this episode, he delivers a compelling bear case for the legacy data center market and the commercial real estate market.
Watch and learn as a master picks apart a business model with data and logic.
Show Notes
(00:00:00) – Introduction
(00:03:30) – (First question) – His counter-narrative thesis of shorting traditional data centers
(00:09:34) – How data center hyperscalers have been shifting the industry since 2016
(00:12:14) – The size, margins, and depreciation profile of the data center industry
(00:16:14) – The cash burn problem with digital REITs
(00:18:30) – How he thinks about interest rates, liquidity, and leverage in the space
(00:20:25) – More on why the value of these data centers is so elusive
(00:21:57) – The extent to which macro tech slowdowns intersect with his thesis
(00:23:13) – What investors see in these businesses that he discounts
(00:26:59) – Risks for the short and the bull case for data centers
(00:29:04) – Big concerns about the broader commercial real estate market
(00:36:34) – The best way for operators to handle a short thesis about their company
(00:39:49) – Critical mistakes he recommends managers avoid