Memo #17: The company that owned a third of Canada

Plus: ASML, Zaz, Saks, and more

ASML makes digital magic

You can forgive us for not understanding every intricacy that goes into making one of ASML’s machines — we’re investors, not rocket scientists. So, when we stumbled upon this video in the weekend, we watched with wrapt attention at their recent High NA EUV — for $400mn just one of these babies can be yours (a bargain!)

Long story short, they allow the production of faster, smaller chips. It's lightyears ahead of the competition, which goes to explain why ASML more or less has a monopoly in the space (and why the Elevation Capital Global Shares Fund owns a position in ASML). Reminds us of Arthur Clarke’s third law — “Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.”

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Oh, Canada

RIP to the Hudson’s Bay Company (HBC), which controlled the about a third of Canada from 1670 due to a royal decree (It was not a joint stock company). Unlike other enterprises of the time e.g. The East India Company, The South Sea Company, etc) HBC has improbably survived under 2025. See the chart below to see the land HBC once controlled — “Rupert’s Bay” — effectively making them de-facto government of the area and having control over the fur trade, etc.