Business thesis / Causal mechanism
Write the mechanism that must remain true and the economic result it should produce.
Complete: “The thesis depends on ___ because it should produce ___.” Add a horizon and primary source.
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Thesis review worksheet
Monopoly Thesis Kill Sheet
Write down twelve conditions that could weaken a monopoly or moat thesis, then record evidence and dates as they change.
Reviewed by Monopoly MOAT · August 26, 2026 · Sources and dates are listed below
SHORT ANSWER
A thesis breaks only when predefined observable evidence contradicts the mechanism expected to produce the result.
For an ETF, test the businesses, the fund's selection process, and the vehicle separately. Missing evidence is untestable—not a pass.
Starting documents: MPLY prospectus MOAT index rulebook TOLL prospectus
YOUR WORKSHEET
Write the threshold before the observation.
Nothing typed here is transmitted or included in analytics. Reloading clears the worksheet; use Print if you need a personal record.
EVIDENCEIncomplete
TRIGGERSNot assessed
EVIDENCE COUNTS0 complete · 12 incomplete
TRIGGER COUNTS0 breach · 0 watch · 0 not breached · 12 unassessed
Fund implementation / Evidence coverage
The evidence covers enough of the portfolio to support a fund-level conclusion.
Record top-N holdings, covered NAV weight, exclusions, and the minimum acceptable coverage. Below it: untestable.
Fund implementation / Mandate fit
Holdings continue to reconcile to the current prospectus or index rules.
Precommit an unreconciled-NAV threshold and persistence period; treat objective or 80% policy changes as hard events.
Business thesis / Pricing power
Pricing still preserves unit economics rather than masking volume, share, or retention loss.
Choose margin, volume, retention, churn, take rate, or ROIC-spread thresholds and a persistence requirement.
Business thesis / Competition
Substitutes or entrants have not crossed the prewritten erosion threshold.
Use market share, churn, customer losses, switching behavior, new capacity, or entrant economics—not anecdotes.
Business thesis / License to operate
Binding regulation or litigation has not removed the rent-producing mechanism.
Define qualifying final orders, price caps, access rules, patent loss, license changes, or structural remedies in advance.
Business thesis / Hidden gatekeeper
The apparent moat is not critically dependent on one supplier, platform, payer, or distributor.
Precommit the exposed NAV cap and the counterparty event—loss of access, repricing, shortage, or rule change—that breaks it.
Business thesis / Investability
A conservative operating case still meets the hurdle written before checking the current price.
Record cash-flow, growth, margin, dilution, terminal, and valuation ranges. A breach is about investability—not proof the moat vanished.
Fund implementation / Process drift
The manager or index process still behaves as the original thesis specified.
Monitor personnel, supplements, index-rule revisions, turnover, off-criteria holdings, and rebalance behavior.
Fund implementation / Economic concentration
Common drivers have not pushed true concentration above the precommitted limit.
Test top-ten and sector weight, repeated holdings, and common platform, regulatory, supply-chain, or valuation dependencies.
Fund implementation / Private exposure
Private or unlisted positions remain sufficiently transparent, current, and exit-capable for the thesis.
Record NAV weight, legal vehicle, valuation method and age, fees, restrictions, disclosure cadence, and a hard exposure cap.
ETF vehicle / Vehicle viability
The ETF remains viable and delivers the implementation the thesis actually requires.
Test AUM, spread, premium/discount, closure or delisting filings, active trading, and matched-basis tracking difference.
Anti-goalpost rule: changing a threshold after observing the result creates a new version. Keep the original criterion and explain the change.
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An eight-page quarterly workbook covering thesis mechanism, evidence coverage, hard and soft triggers, fund drift, private exposure, vehicle viability, and a threshold-change log.
- Printable US-Letter edition
- Definitions, sources, and dates included
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Download the PDFCOMMON QUESTIONS
Questions readers usually ask.
What is an investment-thesis kill criterion?
It is an observable condition, defined before reviewing the latest result, that would contradict the mechanism expected to produce the investment outcome. A useful criterion names a metric, baseline, threshold, persistence period, source, and review cadence.
Does underperformance mean a monopoly thesis is broken?
Not by itself. Underperformance can reflect valuation, market regime, implementation costs, or vehicle behavior. It falsifies a thesis only if it crosses a relevant, precommitted condition on the same basis and horizon that the thesis specified.
Why is missing evidence not a pass?
A claim cannot be supported merely because contradictory evidence is unavailable. This worksheet marks missing, stale, ambiguous, or insufficiently broad evidence as untestable and keeps evidence completeness separate from trigger status.
Can I change a kill threshold after it is breached?
You can revise a thesis, but the original threshold should remain in the change log. Record a new version and explain the change rather than retroactively moving the prior boundary.
SOURCES AND DATES
Check the sources behind the result.
Each figure keeps its source date. Unknowns and derived calculations are labelled rather than filled in.
- 01MPLY SEC prospectusUS SEC
- 02MOAT index rulebookMorningstar Indexes
- 03TOLL summary prospectusUS SEC
- 04Research standardsMonopoly MOAT