Every few years, the market finds a new obsession.
AI stocks, meme stocks, crypto, EVs — there’s always something driving headlines and social feeds.
But when the dust settles, one thing never changes: fundamentals.
Revenue. Cash flow. Margins. Debt. Valuation.
They might sound boring, but they’re the foundation of every company that actually lasts. The problem is, in a world where information travels faster than ever, long-term investing often feels slow — and slow rarely trends.
Platforms like X, YouTube, and TikTok have reshaped how people learn about investing. Everyone’s talking about the next 10x opportunity, the new AI breakout, or the stock “about to explode.”
The problem isn’t that excitement is bad — it’s that attention spans have shrunk. Investors start treating the market like a content feed, constantly scrolling for the next shiny idea instead of focusing on what drives real returns.
Great businesses don’t need to trend to create wealth. They just need time, execution, and strong fundamentals.
That’s why so many investors end up disappointed — they confuse excitement with opportunity.
The Danger of Chasing Headlines Over Numbers
Markets reward what lasts, not what’s loudest.
When everyone piled into growth-at-any-price during the 2020–2021 bull run, very few cared about valuation or profitability. Companies with no earnings were trading at 40x sales. Investors convinced themselves “this time is different.”
But it never is.
Fast-forward to 2025 — and many of those high-flyers have yet to recover, while businesses with consistent cash flow and strong balance sheets have been compounding quietly.
$PYPL is a perfect example. It’s not a “hot” name right now, but the fundamentals are there. Billions in free cash flow. Share buybacks. A clean balance sheet. Real products that millions of people use every day.
Hype fades. Numbers stay.
Why True Value Is Built on Fundamentals
The best companies don’t just grow revenue — they grow efficiently. They generate profits, reinvest wisely, and compound over time.
Take $GOOGL. For years, people called it “boring.” But boring has worked. The company continues to grow double digits in revenue, all while sitting on over $100 billion in cash and running margins north of 25%.
That’s what strength looks like.
You don’t need excitement to make money. You need predictability. You need quality. You need businesses that can keep performing even when the market mood changes.
Because the truth is, fundamentals outlive every hype cycle — they always have.
How I Analyze a Company
Whenever I research a stock, I start with five key metrics:
Forward P/E — what I’m paying for future earnings.
ROE (Return on Equity) — how efficiently management uses capital.
Free Cash Flow Growth — the real engine of compounding.
Operating Margin — how much control the company has over pricing and costs.
Debt-to-Equity — how resilient the balance sheet is.
Those numbers tell you everything you need to know about a company’s durability.
For example, $PYPL trades around 12–14x forward earnings while producing billions in free cash flow. $GOOGL trades near 21x forward earnings with massive cash reserves and top-tier margins.
Neither needs hype to deliver results. Their fundamentals speak for themselves.
The Bottom Line
You can’t control what the market does. You can control what you own.
In a market full of noise, the edge belongs to those who focus on what matters — revenue growth, profitability, and balance sheet strength.
That’s why my entire investing approach, and the strategy I’m building on Surmount, is rooted in one thing: fundamentals.
It’s built to find quality companies trading below fair value — the kind of stocks that don’t just survive hype cycles, but thrive after them.
Because hype fades. Fundamentals don’t.
