| Account | Shares | Price | Value | % of acct | Cost/sh | Gain $ | Gain % | Target |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 401K | 9 | $367.65 | $3,309 | 0.14% | $153.56 | $1,927 | +139.4% | — |
In short: Used as the valuation comparable rather than a pick: TPL at ~50× P/E vs LandBridge's ~35× history is why Aurelion owns LB instead — "not that it's a better operator." Flags the shared risk of concentrated long-term holders (Horizon Kinetics) and a thin float. The host discloses he is a TPL holder.
Texas Pacific Land is the best-known Permian landlord: it collects royalties and water and easement fees from companies drilling on its huge Texas acreage. Boyer uses it as the yardstick. He doesn't say it is a worse business than LandBridge; he says both are good. But TPL trades around 50 times earnings, while LandBridge was bought well below its ~35-times history. The cheaper of two similar businesses has more room to rise.
He also names a risk the two share: a small group of big long-term holders (Horizon Kinetics) own a lot of the stock. That keeps the price calmer day to day, but a large holder deciding to sell is an unknown.
38:10They earn so much, you can trade at a premium because it's less risky, you know, and everything. But actually, that's why we have LandBridge in the portfolio because it's a company that if you compare it to TPL, we think it's not that it's a better operator. Maybe they are even and as good both, but it used to trade when we entered maybe at 20 or PE or 25, but historically it's like 35 and you see TPL is at like 50.
In short: Referenced as a company SoftVest (the group restructuring PBT) has long been a big investor in — the land-plus-royalty template the new PBT resembles.
32:26And it was structured as a net profit interest. So instead of a royalty, yes, you as a shareholder are getting the cash flow associated with these wells, but it's after you net out the operating expenses, the taxes, and the capex. Mhm. — So, a group that we know very well, SoftVest, who has been a big long-term investor in companies like Texas Pacific, they sought to restructure the trust along with the operator Blackbeard into an NPRI, which is a straight royalty. So
In short: Named as the template for what he wants from forestry land: "what I like about land is especially if you look at like the TPL model or the LandBridge model is optionality" — timber revenue, then development, solar/wind leases, hunting leases or mineral rights on the same acres. A model reference, not a new call on the shares.
26:53And what I like about land is especially if you look at like the TPL model or the LandBridge model is optionality. If you own a large tract of land, for example, if I own a bunch of land, I'm a big forestry land holder and there are several publicly traded companies that can put you in this. They realize this also and you can look at, I can cut down a portion of a forest and if it's near a freeway or near a development I can say okay I get the
In short: Same land/water/gas thesis as LandBridge, with the provenance attached: "Murray Stahl is my hero. He's the guy that ran Horizon Kinetics… probably the smartest man I've ever listened to or read… and how he found TPL and was like the best holding." (Polomny refers to Stahl in the past tense here — recorded as his statement, not verified.) The asset's origin story is the moat: "TPL was basically railroad land that got amalgamated. Railroad that failed and they had these land and they didn't really do anything with it and then oil and gas took off." He points readers at the free work: "if you go on the Horizon Kinetics website and read some of their previous research they put it out for free. They explain all this and how much water is needed per megawatt."
Texas Pacific Land is the older, larger version of the same idea, and its existence is a historical accident: a railroad went bust in the 19th century and its creditors were left holding a vast quantity of West Texas dirt nobody wanted. Then oil was found under it. Today TPL collects royalties on production from that land and sells water services, with very few employees and almost no capital spending.
Polomny credits the insight to Murray Stahl of Horizon Kinetics, whom he calls his hero and the smartest person he has read. (He speaks of Stahl in the past tense; that is recorded here as his statement rather than as established fact.) He also points people at Horizon Kinetics' free published research, which works through the physical arithmetic — how much water a megawatt of data centre actually needs.
The general lesson he is drawing is about where to stand in a boom. Rather than pick which AI company wins, own the non-reproducible thing every winner needs. Nobody can manufacture more West Texas land with water rights under it.
1:16:40So, what are they doing? Where are they at? West Texas. — TPL was basically railroad land that got amalgamated. Railroad that failed and they had these land and they didn't really do anything with it and then oil and gas took off. So they realized and these LandBridge guys, they bought all these ranches out there in West Texas.
In short: In Terranova's energy adds — the royalty/land name on the list ("Texas Pacific Land — I know Jenny likes that"). Part of the across-the-board 10% weight taken at the end of July, now the day's best-performing sector.
Texas Pacific Land owns enormous acreage in the Permian Basin and collects royalties and water fees from the companies that drill on it — a landlord rather than a driller, so it has very little of the cost and much of the upside. Terranova read it out among his energy additions ("I know Jenny likes that").
In short: A four despite the stock having done very well. "The thing that's changing in Texas Pacific is they are not merely leasing land… they are increasingly a water producer and water storer in West Texas. Their water revenues have grown from effectively zero five years ago to $160 million this year. I expect that to continue." He has owned it close to 30 years — "for people who don't have my patience, people who are traders, probably Texas Pacific is not the right name."
Texas Pacific Land owns an enormous acreage position in West Texas and doesn't drill anything. It collects rent: royalties from oil and gas produced on its land, plus grazing and surface leases. Rick has owned it for close to 30 years and ranks it a 4 even after a big run.
The change he's paying for is water. Fracking consumes and produces vast quantities of water in a desert, and Texas Pacific is turning into the region's water supplier and water-storage landlord — "water revenues have grown from effectively zero five years ago to $160 million this year. I expect that to continue." That converts a pure commodity-royalty stream into an infrastructure toll.
His warning is about temperament, not value: this is a decades-long compounding holding, "for people who don't have my patience, people who are traders, probably Texas Pacific is not the right name."
31:52They are increasingly a water producer and water storer in West Texas. I note that their water revenues have grown from effectively zero five years ago to $160 million this year. I expect that to continue. Texas Pacific is something I've owned for close to 30 years and for people who don't have my patience, people who are traders, probably Texas Pacific is not the right name.
In short: The anchor holding and the answer to "what is the matter with TPL?" — the shares are 30% off their all-time high, but TPL has fallen 40–53% on four separate occasions in the past eight years and is still up 4-fold from that eight-year-ago high; a decade and a half ago it dropped almost 75% in about a year. The original recommendation over 30 years ago was for the land, not the oil: own the frictionless compounding of buybacks raising per-share acres. Disclosed as a large holding across HKAM accounts and by its officers and employees.
Texas Pacific Land owns about 900,000 acres of West Texas surface and mineral rights and collects royalties from whoever drills, pipes, or builds on it. It employs almost nobody and spends almost nothing, so the money comes in as close to pure profit, and it uses that cash to buy back stock — which means each remaining share owns more acres every year. That is the entire idea, and it was the idea in the original recommendation more than 30 years ago: buy the land, not the oil.
The commentary uses TPL as the emotional test case for its whole theme. A client complained the stock was 30% below its high and that the pain had lasted longer than usual. Horizon Kinetics looked it up: TPL has fallen between 40% and 53% four separate times in the last eight years, and about 75% over a year some fifteen years ago — and it is still up four-fold from that eight-year-ago high. The lesson is that a long-term chart flattens old crashes into invisible squiggles, which fools you into thinking today's decline is unprecedented. If you own something that compounds, the price path is noise; the only question is whether the business still compounds.
Full passage: premium transcript (PDF).
In short: The other land-optionality exemplar (with LandBridge) — land acquired cheaply generations ago (railroad rights-of-way) that owners "don't have to sell… you just sit there," monetizing hidden assets over time.
Texas Pacific Land owns enormous West-Texas acreage it acquired for almost nothing generations ago (old railroad rights-of-way) and now earns royalties, water and surface-use fees on it. Polomny's point: an owner like this "doesn't have to sell the land… you just sit there" while its value compounds — the purest version of the hidden-asset, land-optionality play he likes.
53:36Like the particular one we're talking about, you got the activists in there and they're actually like you always talk about in these companies, they have optionality. Well, you see that expressed with like LandBridge and TPL. They kind of know how to exploit the optionality of there's huge land. Now these other companies I think the bulbs turned on.
In short: The land/royalty layer for the data-center scramble: dump them in West Texas (Loving County, ~100 people) where there's stranded gas + water and "nobody's going to complain." Power scarcity → backlash everywhere else makes the unopposed land owner the winner.
TPL owns a huge swath of West Texas and collects royalties and fees from whatever happens on it — it builds nothing itself. The data-center boom is hitting a wall everywhere people live: not enough power, not enough water, and angry neighbors blocking projects (industrial power prices are up ~50% in five years). The solution is to put data centers in the middle of nowhere — places with stranded natural gas and water and almost no residents to object (he notes one county has ~100 people).
That makes the owner of that empty, resource-rich land the quiet winner of the AI buildout. Polomny wants the land/royalty layer, not the data-center operators — the toll-collector that gets paid no matter who wins.
51:06But this is something I predicted would happen. There's not enough not enough electrons. Not enough water. And so this is another reason why I like TPL and why I like LandBridge and things like that because you can dump these things in West Texas in the middle of nowhere where there's plenty of water, there's plenty of natural gas, it's stranded, there's plenty of nobody's going to complain because nobody lives out there.
In short: His way to own the data-center buildout indirectly: West-Texas players "have the water, the natural gas, and the base" (near the Fermi/Amarillo site), where you can build "and nobody's going to complain." Own the land/royalty layer where the buildout is unopposed, not the operator.
Texas Pacific Land owns a vast amount of land (plus water and royalty rights) in West Texas. AI data centers need three things in one place — electricity, water and somewhere nobody will object to a giant power-hungry building. West Texas has stranded natural gas and water and very few neighbors, so Polomny wants to own the landlord/toll-collector rather than the data-center operator. He thinks money will increasingly flow toward sites like the new Fermi project near Amarillo.
17:08We're seeing something also like this up in Amarillo, Texas at the Fermi site. Huge site. This is one of the takes that I think is bullish for companies like Texas Pacific Land and LandBridge. I've mentioned this before. They have the water, the natural gas, and the base out in West Texas. I think you're going to see movement towards that also.
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Verbatim excerpts from the public transcripts (auto-pulled at each mention's timestamp, lightly cleaned). Timestamps link into the video; "source page" opens that commentator's full analysis at this row. Click a mention's header line to expand it (one open at a time). For personal study — not investment advice.