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Brad Gerstner

Founder & CEO, Altimeter Capital · 1 appearance on the record, plus 1 compilation re-air.

computed by AI from the episodes · how this works → · full disclaimer →

investorfounderexecutivehost@altcap ↗LinkedIn ↗altimeter.com ↗

Gerstner leads Altimeter Capital, managing crossover investments across public equities and high-growth technology startups, with prominent investments in companies such as Snowflake, Grab, and Meta. Beyond investing, he co-hosts the business and technology podcast BG2Pod alongside Bill Gurley and founded the policy initiative Invest America.

42statements → 14claims → 6claims resolved → 33%fully supported → 3.98/5average certainty → 2.62/5average debate potential → 4.3/5argument clarity · the sources → 27said about them ↓

2 supported 3 partly supported 1 contradicted 3 not yet assessed 5 not checkable as stated how the 14 claims stand · each chip opens the sources

7 predictions · 7 assertions · 4 opinions · 16 insights · 8 disclosures · every statement was checked. The predictions and assertions are the 14 claims: statements the public record can support or contradict. 6 are resolved, 3 are not yet assessed, and 5 name no date, number or outcome precise enough to check. Everything else (opinions, insights, what ifs, disclosures) can never be settled by the record, so it carries no assessment.

The record, in short

What the tape says about how Brad argues and how the claims held up. Everything they said, and everything said about them, is in the tabs below.

Their most notable supported claim

Prediction Held up
Gerstner: Snowflake will eventually surpass its peak market valuation
“The truth of the matter is, I think Snowflake will be worth a lot more in the future than it is today, and even more in the future than it was then.”
Brad Gerstner Oct 10, 2022 ▶ 38:05 Brad Gerstner: How I Pick Companies; Lessons from Warren Buffet; Chamath vs Gurley | E935 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings

Their most notable contradicted claim

Assertion Contradicted
Gerstner: The 2022 growth stock crash merely returned valuations to 2020 baselines
“This is not a blood in the streets moment. It feels catastrophic because we have growth names that are down 40, 50, 60, 70% in the public markets. But look at where they are compared to where we were in January of 2020. For most of these companies, it's just g…”
Brad Gerstner Oct 10, 2022 ▶ 34:28 Brad Gerstner: How I Pick Companies; Lessons from Warren Buffet; Chamath vs Gurley | E935 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings

Expressed certainty vs assessment result

none yet certainty 1
none yet certainty 2
100% certainty 3
50% certainty 4
none yet certainty 5

weighted support: a fully supported claim counts one, a partly supported claim counts half. Each filled bar is clickable and opens exactly those claims; "none yet" means nothing said at that certainty level has resolved yet

Argument clarity: do they answer the question? how? →

4.3 / 5 directness 4.3 · coherence 4.5 · precision 4.2 · compression 3.8

redirected or did not address 5 of 42 assessed questions (12%). Watch them ▸

This is a score against a rubric. It is not a rank. Every host question → answer exchange is scored with names hidden on directness, coherence, precision and compression, 1–5 each, on meaning alone: disfluencies are ignored, and only raw unedited episodes count. This is the score that measures thought. Every scored exchange, scores shown → · The rubric and its checks →

How they sound: speaking style how? →

257 words/min while actually speaking · 14.8 um and uh per 1k words · 11.5 false starts per 1k · 25.7% of pauses land inside a clause

Measured by listening to the audio itself: 13,073 words across 1 episode of raw-level tape, transcribed verbatim with every um and uh kept, each one attributed only where the alignment onto our timed stream is unambiguous. These are measurements of speaking style. We do not rank them: across this corpus, fluency and argument quality are nearly uncorrelated (ρ≈0.2), and smooth talking does not signal clear thinking. How it's measured →

How the interview went all their pushback → series average →

Across 3 rated episodes:

host pushback ▾ 2.3/10
pushed back at the host ▾ 2/10
setup questions received 67%

Everything Brad Gerstner said on 20VC that made the record, most notable first. Filter by type, assessment or year in the ledger →

Insight
Gerstner: LPs should mark down 2020-2022 late-stage venture portfolios by 50%
“I said, I would take everything in your portfolio that received a valuation over the last two years, over five hundred million dollars, and I'd mark it down by 50%. What do you mean? And I said, well, if I look at the average gross stock in the NASDAQ, it's do…”
Brad Gerstner Oct 10, 2022 ▶ 39:23 Brad Gerstner: How I Pick Companies; Lessons from Warren Buffet; Chamath vs Gurley | E935 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Insight
Gerstner: Venture capital funds of $10B or more cannot generate alpha
“Deploying a ten billion dollar fund or, God forbid, a fifty billion or a hundred billion dollar fund like Masa tried to do, right? You already know you will not generate alpha in that. You are getting the beta of the global tech industry when you're investing …”
Brad Gerstner Oct 10, 2022 ▶ 42:38 Brad Gerstner: How I Pick Companies; Lessons from Warren Buffet; Chamath vs Gurley | E935 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Insight
Gerstner: Portfolio diversification is a myth that fails to mitigate risk
“I think diversification in many ways is the greatest myth perpetrated on the investing public. The idea that risk mitigation is the equivalent of diversification.”
Brad Gerstner Oct 10, 2022 ▶ 47:01 Brad Gerstner: How I Pick Companies; Lessons from Warren Buffet; Chamath vs Gurley | E935 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Disclosure
Gerstner: Altimeter invested over 30% of its debut fund into Snowflake
“Our first fund VC won hell. I couldn't even raise it. I was 20 or 25% of the fund. And I put, we put over 30% of that fund in Snowflake at a point in time that the world thought we were crazy.”
Brad Gerstner Oct 10, 2022 ▶ 49:07 Brad Gerstner: How I Pick Companies; Lessons from Warren Buffet; Chamath vs Gurley | E935 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Insight
Gerstner: The bottom 20-40% of tech and VC workforces dilute results
“I would say the vast majority of organizations, ok, and I'm talking from Facebook and Twitter, all the way down to, ah, GPs. They would be well served, right, to be much smaller, to be essentialists in the people that they have. Because it's very likely that y…”
Brad Gerstner Oct 10, 2022 ▶ 1:02:23 Brad Gerstner: How I Pick Companies; Lessons from Warren Buffet; Chamath vs Gurley | E935 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Assertion Partly supported
Gerstner: Average VC returns over 10-20 years underperform public market indexes
“And the fact of the matter is, I mean, if you look back 1020 years, average VC returns are not that compelling. In fact, they're worse than the indexes.”
Brad Gerstner Oct 10, 2022 ▶ 10:28 Brad Gerstner: How I Pick Companies; Lessons from Warren Buffet; Chamath vs Gurley | E935 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Assertion Partly supported
Gerstner: Sequoia's early Figma investment yielded 100x while late-stage yielded 2x
“If you look at the difference between the Sequoia round in Figma or the durable round in Figma, right? It's the difference between, you know, having a hundred plus X outcome and a two X outcome.”
Brad Gerstner Oct 10, 2022 ▶ 16:36 Brad Gerstner: How I Pick Companies; Lessons from Warren Buffet; Chamath vs Gurley | E935 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Prediction Open · timeframe Oct 2027
Gerstner: Investors will lose massive capital on low-revenue $1B+ software rounds
“Listen, these 1,000,000,002 1,000,000,003 billion dollar software rounds that are done with very little revenue, you have to assume a tremendous amount goes right. And then you probably have to assume an absurd multiple and everybody's counting on the greater …”
Brad Gerstner Oct 10, 2022 ▶ 28:26 Brad Gerstner: How I Pick Companies; Lessons from Warren Buffet; Chamath vs Gurley | E935 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Assertion Contradicted
Gerstner: The 2022 growth stock crash merely returned valuations to 2020 baselines
“This is not a blood in the streets moment. It feels catastrophic because we have growth names that are down 40, 50, 60, 70% in the public markets. But look at where they are compared to where we were in January of 2020. For most of these companies, it's just g…”
Brad Gerstner Oct 10, 2022 ▶ 34:28 Brad Gerstner: How I Pick Companies; Lessons from Warren Buffet; Chamath vs Gurley | E935 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Prediction Not checkable as stated
Gerstner: More Tech Value Created Over Next Decade Than Prior 10 Years
“The secular curve around value creation and disruption, all data moving to the cloud, ML and AI applications like that, there will be more value created over the next 10 years than over the last 10 years.”
Brad Gerstner Oct 10, 2022 ▶ 35:18 Brad Gerstner: How I Pick Companies; Lessons from Warren Buffet; Chamath vs Gurley | E935 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Insight
Gerstner: VCs must distribute shares unless projecting 3x-5x returns over 3-5 years
“So for us, when I think about distributing is, do we still have venture returns left in this over a reasonable period of time? And if the answer is we don't see a three to five X over the course of the next three to five years in that deal, then we're obliged …”
Brad Gerstner Oct 10, 2022 ▶ 37:08 Brad Gerstner: How I Pick Companies; Lessons from Warren Buffet; Chamath vs Gurley | E935 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Prediction Held up
Gerstner: Snowflake will eventually surpass its peak market valuation
“The truth of the matter is, I think Snowflake will be worth a lot more in the future than it is today, and even more in the future than it was then.”
Brad Gerstner Oct 10, 2022 ▶ 38:05 Brad Gerstner: How I Pick Companies; Lessons from Warren Buffet; Chamath vs Gurley | E935 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Prediction Open · timeframe Oct 2027
Gerstner: VC returns will compress as the industry scales
“The industry is going from highly fragmented to much more industrial scale. Returns are going to compress.”
Brad Gerstner Oct 10, 2022 ▶ 45:30 Brad Gerstner: How I Pick Companies; Lessons from Warren Buffet; Chamath vs Gurley | E935 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Insight
Gerstner: Altimeter analysts will be fired for unvetted FOMO pitches
“If you are an analyst who walks into my office with an idea a day because, you know, Johnny Mac down the street did the deal, like, you will be fired. Right? You better come in prepared, not with Dribbble, but you better have done your work because we're going…”
Brad Gerstner Oct 10, 2022 ▶ 1:05:35 Brad Gerstner: How I Pick Companies; Lessons from Warren Buffet; Chamath vs Gurley | E935 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Opinion
Gerstner: Silicon Valley Investors Are Driven by FOMO Over Independent Work
“People love to take signal, follow others into deals because others did deals. It is very hard to resist. And I would say young analyst associates partners in Silicon Valley are filled with FOMO and follow too many others rather than doing their own work.”
Brad Gerstner Oct 10, 2022 ▶ 1:20:37 Brad Gerstner: How I Pick Companies; Lessons from Warren Buffet; Chamath vs Gurley | E935 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Opinion
Gerstner: Unchecked VC valuation frenzy severely damaged founders
“What has happened over the last 24 months has been a great disservice to founders and is the worst example, I think, of lack of discipline.”
Brad Gerstner Feb 9, 2024 ▶ 21:26 20VC: Doug Leone, Bill Ackman, Bill Gurley and Orlando Bravo on "Does Price Matter"; When to Pay Up vs When to Stay Disciplined, The Biggest Lessons on Price Discipline from 8 of the World's Best Investors
Insight
Gerstner: Starting a restaurant takes as much effort as building Google
“And the truth of the matter is it probably takes as much effort, emotional and intellectual to start a restaurant as it does to start Google.”
Brad Gerstner Oct 10, 2022 ▶ 11:36 Brad Gerstner: How I Pick Companies; Lessons from Warren Buffet; Chamath vs Gurley | E935 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Insight
Gerstner: Spray-and-pray venture strategies produce uninspiring index-like returns
“If you have a diversified portfolio across hundreds of hundreds of investments, you will have an index like return, which as we started off by saying, it's not very compelling in this category.”
Brad Gerstner Oct 10, 2022 ▶ 16:22 Brad Gerstner: How I Pick Companies; Lessons from Warren Buffet; Chamath vs Gurley | E935 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Insight
Gerstner: VCs Must Give Honest Feedback Directly in Boardrooms
“I'm not being a good friend to the founder if I'm blowing smoke up their ass in the boardroom, and then the second they walk out of the boardroom, all the investors have a different conversation. Right? So I think that being willing to tell the truth as I woul…”
Brad Gerstner Oct 10, 2022 ▶ 22:36 Brad Gerstner: How I Pick Companies; Lessons from Warren Buffet; Chamath vs Gurley | E935 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Disclosure
Gerstner: Altimeter passed on pro rata rights multiple times in 2021
“Sometimes you know, we'll have to pass on our pro rata in those rounds because we think that the price, like we did many times last year, the price has just gotten too far ahead of itself.”
Brad Gerstner Oct 10, 2022 ▶ 25:18 Brad Gerstner: How I Pick Companies; Lessons from Warren Buffet; Chamath vs Gurley | E935 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Disclosure
Gerstner: Altimeter underwrites exits at 20% below pre-COVID average multiples
“Everybody on my team, for example, knows that we're applying a 20% discount To the pre-COVID ten-year average, right? So that is the exit multiple that we use.”
Brad Gerstner Oct 10, 2022 ▶ 27:54 Brad Gerstner: How I Pick Companies; Lessons from Warren Buffet; Chamath vs Gurley | E935 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Opinion
Gerstner: Series C, D, and E Venture Valuations Remain Overvalued
“I still think that valuations are full. I think valuations in venture and CD&E are still overvalued.”
Brad Gerstner Oct 10, 2022 ▶ 35:12 Brad Gerstner: How I Pick Companies; Lessons from Warren Buffet; Chamath vs Gurley | E935 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Disclosure
Gerstner: Most of Altimeter's $6B LP distribution in 2021 came from Snowflake
“Most of that distribution, right, not all, but most of that distribution was Snowflake.”
Brad Gerstner Oct 10, 2022 ▶ 37:59 Brad Gerstner: How I Pick Companies; Lessons from Warren Buffet; Chamath vs Gurley | E935 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings
Disclosure
Gerstner personally provides 20% of the capital in Altimeter's funds
“I'm 20% of the capital in altimeter.”
Brad Gerstner Oct 10, 2022 ▶ 41:24 Brad Gerstner: How I Pick Companies; Lessons from Warren Buffet; Chamath vs Gurley | E935 · 20VC with Harry Stebbings

Show 18statements(18 left)

The other half of the tape: Brad Gerstner's own voice is left out of every number here. Other people bring the name up 27 times in 19 episodes on 20VC. every mention, with the transcript →

Who brings them up most Harry Stebbings 16Jeff Wang 4Chad Peets 4Vlad Tenev 1Everett Randle 1

Every mention by year

tap a year for its mentions
0085151020222023202420252026episodesmentions
051020222023202420252026episodes it came up in
001521020222023202420252026episodesmentions per episode
2026 6 mentions in 3 episodes 2 per episode
2025 3 mentions in 2 episodes 2 per episode
2024 13 mentions in 9 episodes 1 per episode
2022 5 mentions in 5 episodes 1 per episode

Appearances (2)

EpisodeDateSpeaking time
20VC: Chris Sacca, Chamath Palihapitiya, Gary Vee, Brad Gerstner and more on Their Relatio compilation Oct 28, 2022 2m
Brad Gerstner: How I Pick Companies; Lessons from Warren Buffet; Chamath vs Gurley | E935 Oct 10, 2022 1h 4m

Played on the show (1)

Episodes where a recording of Brad Gerstner was played rather than Brad taking part, or where the tape carries an address with nobody putting questions to them. Listed because the words are on the record, kept out of every score on this page because they were not said on this show. We read this off the tape: who was spoken to, who was asked something, who answered whom.

EpisodeDateOn tapeWhat it is
20VC: Doug Leone, Bill Ackman, Bill Gurley and Orlando Bravo on "Does Price Matter"; When Feb 9, 2024 35s clip played
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