Starcast Join the waitlist
Odd Lots

Odd Lots

Brad Jacobs on His Big Bet on Building Insulation

Apr 21, 2026 · 41m

Coming soon to iPhone. Already have it? “Listen in Starcast” takes you straight there.

On this episode

About this episode

He's done it again. On Sunday night, building supply company QXO announced that it would be acquiring TopBuild for $17 billion. TopBuild sells and installs insulation for both the residential and commercial markets. For Brad Jacobs, the CEO of QXO, this is just the latest in a lifetime of deals he's made. In fact, he's made over 500 deals in his life across numerous public companies that he's founded, most of which have XO somewhere in the ticker. Brad's companies all tend to be highly focused on the so-called "old economy" or real physical world, but of course, as we've seen with the datacenter boom, the old economy is still hot and crucial. So we talk about the logic behind this deal, how…