AI AIQUY AIA Group Ltd Loading... : Bullish and Bearish Analyst Opinions

"Over the past 25 years, the market share for the top three players has gone from around 40% to over 60%... The other two big players in the industry are Air Liquide and Air Products." While Clay prefers Linde for its superior capital discipline, his thesis on the *industry structure* applies to its peers. He notes that industry consolidation has driven Return on Capital Employed (ROCE) from 10% in 2000 to 16% today. The "local monopoly" dynamics and the impossibility of transporting gas economically over 100 miles benefit the entire oligopoly, not just Linde. Therefore, the peers (Air Products and Air Liquide) are also beneficiaries of the secular trends in clean energy and semiconductor manufacturing. LONG (Sector Play). Execution risk on large capital projects (specifically for Air Products, though not explicitly detailed in the text, implied by the preference for Linde's discipline).