Seven months ago, we published an analysis of Crocs (CROX) titled "Is the Ugly Shoe That Ugly?" The stock was trading at around $89, the market narrative was poisonous, and the numbers were screaming something different from what the consensus wanted to hear/believe. The forward P/E was around 7x, the FCF yield was a staggering 16-17%, and a Sum-of-the-Parts valuation that assigned zero value to HEYDUDE still produced a fair value of $127 per share. The implicit perpetuity growth baked into the stock price was -4%, which essentially meant the market was pricing a company in permanent decline. Seven months later, with the stock trading around $137, hitting a new 52-week high, the answer appears to have been the former. But that answer, paradoxically, is precisely the reason this follow-up article exists, because the same discipline that told us to look when nobody wanted to now tells us to be cautious when everyone is suddenly interested.
Stocks
THE «BERKSHIRE OF SOFTWARE» IS AT A TURNING POINT?
The enterprise software landscape of 2026 is defined by a profound tension between the disruptive potential of generative artificial intelligence and the enduring resilience of mission-critical systems of record. At the epicenter of this conflict is Constellation Software Inc. (TSX: CSU), a Canadian-based holding company that has spent three decades refining a decentralized model of capital allocation that many now refer to as the "Berkshire of Software". As the organization navigates its first year under the leadership of President Mark Miller following the resignation of legendary founder Mark Leonard, the market is grappling with a fundamental question, Can a model built on the acquisition of thousands of small, niche software businesses survive an era where AI promises to commoditize code? Analysis of the firm’s operational trajectory, financial architecture, and recent strategic acquisitions suggests that the "Architecture of Permanence" is not only intact but is being fortified by the very technological shifts that skeptics feared would destroy it.
Irrational Investors 