About Groundbreaker Research
Long-form research on hard-asset investing - infill industrial, water rights, timberland, life science real estate, mineral rights, and the underfollowed physical-economy positions that institutional money has yet to find.
The framework here is simple and consistent: look for hard assets trading at meaningful discounts to readily ascertainable Net Asset Value, with cash-rich balance sheets, recession resilience, and overlooked positioning. The assets that interest me are the ones that cannot be recreated - senior water rights, contiguous timberland, irreplaceable urban real estate, perpetual mineral rights, life science campuses in core innovation clusters. The companies that own them are usually small, often boring, occasionally OTC, and almost always priced as if the underlying assets do not exist.
I write about each position the way I would underwrite it for a private acquisition: asset-by-asset, with cap rates derived from observed private market transactions, replacement cost analysis where relevant, and explicit bear cases that stress-test the central assumptions. The output is long-form by design - every thesis runs five to fifteen thousand words because the work doesn’t compress.
What you’ll find here:
Asset-by-asset Net Asset Value analyses on individual REITs and small-cap operating companies
Long-duration thematic theses on physical scarcity in water, power, timber, and minerals
Contrarian positioning frameworks for assets the market has filed under the wrong industry tag
Honest stress tests, including the assumptions that would invalidate the thesis
About the Founder
I’ve spent over a decade in institutional real estate and equity research. I began my career covering public equities at Bank of America Merrill Lynch - then the #1-ranked firm in Institutional Investor’s annual research rankings. From there, I moved to a ~$50 billion AUM private equity and infrastructure firm. I hold an MBA from the Wharton School (an expensive piece of paper).
The Substack is the public version of the research I’ve been writing privately for years - the body of work that piled up on a hard drive while I was supposed to be doing something else. Groundbreaker Research is published independently with a small team, on no schedule, and is not affiliated with any employer.
Stay up-to-date
Never miss an update—every new post is sent directly to your email inbox. For a spam-free, ad-free reading experience, plus audio and community features, get the Substack app.
Join the crew
Be part of a community of people who share your interests. Participate in the comments section, or support this work with a subscription.
To learn more about the tech platform that powers this publication, visit Substack.com.
