Buffett’s favourite advantage is dead

Note: This extract was taken from Livewire Live 2025’s panel: 'How to embrace the chaos clouding markets' filmed 12 September 2025.

At Livewire Live 2025, Macquarie Capital’s Viktor Shvets took aim at one of investing’s most enduring ideas: the 'moat' - the economic notion that barriers to entry, scale, or coveted products can protect a company from competition.

Yet, business cycles are shortening. Technology is breaking down barriers between industries, multiplying competitors overnight. Meanwhile, abundant capital is flooding markets, accelerating both growth and decline.

“The same forces that create large companies can destroy them equally as quickly. Warren Buffett liked to have moats. Those moats increasingly no longer exist.”

Shvets argues that investors must rethink what “durable advantage” means in a world where size and dominance can evaporate almost overnight. Unlike past cycles, where it took years or decades for companies to reach the top, today’s mega-caps can emerge in less than a year.

Consider AI company Palantir (NASDAQ: PLTR), which has become a 12-bagger since 2024. Or Oklo (NYSE: OKLO), a mini-nuclear technology company with no profits or commercialised products. Despite making no money, its stock has surged 17x.

But Shvets cautions: the very forces driving these meteoric rises can also bring them crashing down.

To hear more from Shvets, watch the full Livewire Live interview here.