If nothing else but by not being REALLY early. And it’s not fair to whomever they are to suggest that the letter lacks little detail other than  “x group trades a lot higher and so should Viasat” because it is a true statement.

It is also true that there are MULTIPLE ways to think about VSAT being a lot higher:

• L Band Spectrum Value
• moving $800mm in assets from a warehouse into space and earning a return
• a legitimate change in capital allocation and spending habits resulting in actual free cashflow
• deleveraging – Ligado deal and then some

And, the math and math + intangibles in regard to VSAT’s long term IP in ALL the cool defense sectors which are difficult to develop by a third party within a career lifetime.

Is anything worth “20 to 40 times” pre-capex cashflow for anything longer than an ephemeral capital markets moment? I tend to doubt it. I also would not underestimate the difficulty in parsing out where VSAT IP lives -i.e – it is self-evidently not easy to separate out the defense business.

But, Viasat by definition and sadly by execution, has always been lousy at highlighting its strong points and value. So we raise our glasses to the fine people at Carronade. Being directionally right is money good.

And yes, we still own VSAT in size. See the usual disclaimers.