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Bitcoin has a way of faking its own death, and this past week delivered another such instance with theatrical flair. After flirting with the once-unthinkable level of $120,000, the world’s most famous digital asset promptly face-planted to around $62,000 at its recent lows on Thursday.

Even for crypto, a 50% drawdown in months isn’t just a bad couple weeks. In a nascent asset like Bitcoin it’s always a bit of a spiritual test. More than that, this drawdown looks and feels like yet another Bitcoin “moment of truth,” the kind that forces believers and skeptics alike to confront what this asset really is—and what it isn’t.

For veterans of Bitcoin, the pattern is familiar. Exuberance builds. Headlines turn breathless. Group chats fill with laser-eye emojis. Then, without warning, gravity reasserts itself. Prices collapse. Influencers go quiet or get ornery on social media. Everyone suddenly remembers that “number go up” is not, in fact, a law of physics. But then Bitcoin always does — back to new highs over and over.

These moments of truth are supposed to be Bitcoin’s specialty. The “maxis,” sometimes proudly, sometimes ironically—have spent more than a decade preaching the same sermon. Volatility is not a bug, it’s a feature. Pain is purification. Weak hands must be shaken out. Michael Saylor once famously framed volatility as “Satoshi’s gift,” a kind of built-in psychological stress test designed to separate true believers from tourists. If you can’t stomach 50% drawdowns, you don’t deserve the upside. That’s the doctrine. Eat a dick, Sharpe ratio.

This time, though, the crash is being framed slightly differently by skeptics. Peter Schiff, Bitcoin’s longtime nemesis and professional eye-roller, has been quick to argue that this is not just another routine purge. In his view, this is not another dress rehearsal. He thinks it is the bubble finally popping after years of supposedly “mass” adoption.

Sure, he’s said this a lot over the years but unlike previous cycles, Bitcoin hasn’t been lurking in the shadows of Reddit forums and obscure exchanges. Over the past two years, it has marched directly into the mainstream. ETFs, retirement accounts, major banks, payment platforms, corporate treasuries, political campaigns—crypto didn’t just knock on the front door of the U.S. financial system. It moved in and started rearranging the furniture.

Which brings us to why “it’s different this time”.

Under Donald Trump, the United States has effectively gone all-in on crypto in ways that would have seemed absurd not long ago. Trump has openly branded himself as the “crypto president.” His campaign accepted crypto donations. Pro-crypto advisors and donors gained influence. Regulatory agencies softened their tone. Enforcement actions slowed. Bitcoin and digital assets were reframed less as speculative toys and more as strategic financial technologies.

At the same time, Wall Street embraced Bitcoin. Spot ETFs opened the floodgates for institutional money. Pension funds dipped their toes. Wealth managers added “digital assets” to client portfolios. CNBC began treating Bitcoin price movements like weather reports. You didn’t need to be edgy or rebellious to own BTC anymore. You just needed a brokerage account. Even Vanguard caved…

So if adoption was the rocket fuel, a fair question now is: how much is left in the tank?

That’s the core of the bearish argument. If nearly everyone who wants Bitcoin in the United States already has easy access to it, then where does the next wave of buyers come from? When your barber, your dentist, and your aunt’s financial advisor all know how to buy BTC, you’re not early anymore. You’re late-stage. If demand has peaked, then the recent crash isn’t just noise. It’s the market quietly admitting that the story may be running out of new chapters.

In that scenario, the downside could be ugly. Not just another dip-and-rip cycle, but something more structural. A slow bleed. A loss of cultural relevance. A gradual realization that Bitcoin might survive, but mostly as a niche asset rather than a world-changing revolution. Gold bugs would feel vindicated. Crypto Twitter would feel tired. Venture capital would move on to the next shiny thing…probably some AI-related bullshit.

Yet the bulls are not packing up.

As I ridiculed wrote last week, recurring financial media rash Tom Lee continues to argue that Bitcoin is still in the early innings of global monetization. My buddy Larry Lepard has also talked up targets in the $200,000 to $250,000 range, suggesting that monetary debasement, debt crises, and currency instability will eventually funnel massive capital into scarce digital assets. From this perspective, the recent collapse is just another pothole on a very long highway. Adoption in the US may be maturing, but the rest of the world is still warming up. Sovereign debt problems, geopolitical tensions, and distrust in central banks aren’t going away. If anything, they’re multiplying.

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In this telling, the current selloff is simply another rehearsal in Bitcoin’s long-running play: “How Many Times Can We Kill It Before It Actually Dies?” So far, the answer is “a lot.”

Still, even optimists are starting to acknowledge an uncomfortable reality. There doesn’t seem to be much untapped mainstream adoption left in America. The regulatory environment is friendlier than it’s ever been. The political branding is pro-crypto. The financial infrastructure is built. If Bitcoin can’t thrive in this environment, it’s hard to argue that a better one is just around the corner. When the so-called “crypto president” presides over a 50% drawdown, it raises questions.

Which brings us back, once again, to Bitcoin’s moment of truth.

From here, the paths diverge sharply. One possibility is a serious crash with no meaningful recovery, a slow deflation of the crypto dream that leaves Bitcoin alive but diminished. Another is a long, grinding crypto winter—years of sideways trading, fading hype, shrinking communities, and endless “this is accumulation” posts that age poorly. The third is the familiar miracle: confidence returns, liquidity floods in, narratives reboot, and Bitcoin charges back through old highs like nothing happened, leaving doubters to explain why they sold at $62,000.

History suggests Bitcoin is very good at humiliating both its critics and its fans, often in alternating cycles. Right now, it’s humiliating the optimists. In a year, it might be mocking the skeptics. Or it might finally decide to grow up and become boring, which would be the most shocking outcome of all.

For now, the only certainty is this: this really does feel like another defining moment of truth for Bitcoin. The volatility that maxis call a gift is still very much in circulation. And like most gifts that arrive wrapped in panic and red candles, it’s not entirely clear whether anyone actually wants it.

QTR’s Disclaimer: Please read my full legal disclaimer on my About page here. This post represents my opinions only. In addition, please understand I am an idiot and often get things wrong and lose money. I may own or transact in any names mentioned in this piece at any time without warning. Contributor posts and aggregated posts have been hand selected by me, have not been fact checked and are the opinions of their authors. They are either submitted to QTR by their author, reprinted under a Creative Commons license with my best effort to uphold what the license asks, or with the permission of the author.

This is not a recommendation to buy or sell any stocks or securities, just my opinions. I often lose money on positions I trade/invest in. I may add any name mentioned in this article and sell any name mentioned in this piece at any time, without further warning. None of this is a solicitation to buy or sell securities. I may or may not own names I write about and are watching. Sometimes I’m bullish without owning things, sometimes I’m bearish and do own things. Just assume my positions could be exactly the opposite of what you think they are just in case. If I’m long I could quickly be short and vice versa. I won’t update my positions. All positions can change immediately as soon as I publish this, with or without notice and at any point I can be long, short or neutral on any position. You are on your own. Do not make decisions based on my blog. I exist on the fringe. If you see numbers and calculations of any sort, assume they are wrong and double check them. I failed Algebra in 8th grade and topped off my high school math accolades by getting a D- in remedial Calculus my senior year, before becoming an English major in college so I could bullshit my way through things easier. I am an investor in Mark’s fund.

The publisher does not guarantee the accuracy or completeness of the information provided in this page. These are not the opinions of any of my employers, partners, or associates. I did my best to be honest about my disclosures but can’t guarantee I am right; I write these posts after a couple beers sometimes. I edit after my posts are published because I’m impatient and lazy, so if you see a typo, check back in a half hour. Also, I just straight up get shit wrong a lot. I mention it twice because it’s that important.

A U.S. jury ordered Uber on Thursday to pay $8.5 million to a woman who said she was sexually assaulted by a driver, a verdict that could shape the course of thousands of similar lawsuits pending against the ride-hailing company.

The case, brought by Jaylynn Dean, was the first bellwether trial among more than 3,000 claims consolidated in federal court. Bellwether trials are designed to test legal theories and help both sides assess potential settlement values. Jurors sitting in Phoenix found that the driver acted as an agent of Uber, holding the company responsible for his conduct. They awarded $8.5 million in compensatory damages but declined to impose punitive damages. Dean’s attorneys had sought more than $140 million.

Dean, an Oklahoma resident, sued in 2023, one month after the alleged assault in Arizona. Her complaint argued that Uber knew of a pattern of sexual assaults by drivers but failed to take basic steps to improve rider safety—claims that have followed the company for years and drawn congressional scrutiny.

During closing arguments, Dean’s attorney Alexandra Walsh said Uber had marketed itself as a safe option for women traveling at night, particularly after drinking. “Women know it’s a dangerous world. We know about the risk of sexual assault,” Walsh told jurors. “They made us believe that this was a place that was safe from that.”

Uber has long argued it shouldn’t be held liable for criminal acts committed by drivers using its platform. The company maintains that drivers are independent contractors and that, regardless of classification, it cannot be responsible for actions outside the scope of their duties. “He had no criminal history. None,” Uber attorney Kim Bueno said of the driver during closing arguments, noting that he had completed about 10,000 trips with a near-perfect rating. “Was this foreseeable to Uber? And the answer to that has to be no.”

According to the lawsuit, Dean was intoxicated when she requested a ride from her boyfriend’s home to her hotel. The driver allegedly asked harassing questions during the trip, then stopped the car and raped her.

The trial was overseen by U.S. District Judge Charles Breyer, who is managing the federal cases centralized in San Francisco. Uber also faces more than 500 similar suits in California state court. In the only one of those cases to reach trial so far, a jury last September sided with the company, finding that while Uber had been negligent in its safety measures, that negligence wasn’t a substantial factor in causing the plaintiff’s harm.

The broader financial impact of Thursday’s verdict remains uncertain. Mark Giarelli, an analyst at Morningstar, said the ruling nonetheless highlights the importance of screening measures on app-based platforms. “This underscores the importance of robust background checks on convenience applications such as Uber, Lyft and DoorDash where there is interaction between customers and the supply side—drivers and delivery agents,” he said.

Uber shares fell 1.5% in after-hours trading. Shares of rival Lyft, which faces similar claims, declined 1.8%.

In a statement, an Uber spokesperson said the company would appeal, adding that the jury rejected other claims that Uber was negligent or that its safety systems were defective. “This verdict affirms that Uber acted responsibly and has invested meaningfully in rider safety,” the spokesperson said.

Sarah London, another attorney for Dean, called the decision a validation for plaintiffs across the country. The verdict, she said, “validates the thousands of survivors who have come forward at great personal risk to demand accountability against Uber for its focus on profit over passenger safety.”

Authored by Jonathan Turley,

In the dystopian novel 1984,  George Orwell wrote, “The Party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command.”

The true meaning of that line was never more clear than watching the truly bizarre photo op of California governor Gavin Newsom heralding the success of the greatest boondoggle in history: his high-speed train to nowhere.

Without laying a single yard of track after burning $12 billion, Newsom showed a diesel freight train on a conventional track to create the appearance of a working railroad.

I have been writing about this boondoggle for years. Newsom promised years ago that the project would be transformative. It was, but not as he promised.

Voters approved a $9.95 billion bond issue in 2008 after absurdly low estimates of the projected cost. Influential figures and companies stood to make a fortune, and the key was to secure a “buy-in” worth billions, so that it would become increasingly difficult to abandon the project as overruns and delays sent costs soaring.

Now the official estimate of future ridership has dropped by 25% , and it demands billions more to complete a project delayed by decades. Remember that this entire project was meant to create a rail line of only 171 miles. It is projected to exceed $128 billion and could ultimately cost a billion dollars per mile. There are still uncompleted environmental assessments and challenging rail lines through the mountains.

There is still no train and not a yard of track almost 20 years later.

The inspector general, Benjamin Belnap, issued a scathing report on the first phase of the still uncompleted project.  That is only the stretch from Merced to Bakersfield which was supposed to be completed by 2033. Belnap wrote:

“With a smaller remaining schedule envelope and the potential for significant uncertainty and risk during subsequent phases of the project, staying within the 2033 schedule envelope is unlikely. In fact, uncertainty about some parts of the project has increased as the authority has recently made decisions that deviated from the procurement and funding strategies that were part of its plans for staying on schedule.”

Rather than deliver on the promise of high-speed rail from Los Angeles to San Francisco, the Merced-Bakersfield line would now cost $35.3 billion, exceeding the 2008 projection for a complete system.

Merced and Bakersfield have a combined population of roughly 500,000. That works out to roughly $22,000 per person, based on state ridership estimates.

However, Newsom still wants to be president even as citizens are fleeing his state in record numbers.  The “train to nowhere” is a problem. Even the New York Times is writing editorials on whether Newsom will be the next mistake of the Democratic Party.

Newsom’s response is to arrange for gushing columns like Maya Singer’s embarrassing piece in Vogue:

Let’s get this out of the way: He is embarrassingly handsome, his hair seasoned with silver, at ease with his own eminence as he delivers his final State of the State address…

Newsom’s lanky frame was folded onto a sofa a bit too low-slung for him. This made him lean back—away from me. Or it could be that his body language had nothing to do with ergonomics and is a function of Newsom’s quality of being at once gregarious and aloof.”

It is the type of teenybopper heartthrob coverage that Newsom is counting on from the media. It is not the billions burned on a non-existent railway but his glorious hair and “eminence.”

However, others beyond Vogue readers may be interested in his actual record. Hence, the need to release this absurd photo op that would make a propagandist blush:

“All of the hard work behind us. Now we’re going to see the fruits of that. We’re going to start seeing precisely what you see here. Real tracks, real progress.”

It is like paying for a meal at a restaurant and the Chef charging you ten times what was on the menu, not producing the meal for hours, and then showing you a picture of a different dish as a sign of his progress.

The difference is that Newsom has taken almost two decades to deliver and cut the original dish to a fraction of its original size while increasing the price exponentially.

Californians are now captives on a train to nowhere. The state must continue to burn billions because too much is invested economically and politically. They must ride the train with Gavin Newsom to the very end.

Jonathan Turley is a law professor and the best-selling author of “Rage and the Republic: The Unfinished Story of the American Revolution.”

President Trump's pressure campaign on Cuba is gaining serious momentum as the Caribbean island's energy crisis deepens, unleashing rampant fuel shortages and prolonged power blackouts. The government rolled out new conservation measures late Friday to preserve energy, but large parts of the economy are already imploding.

Bloomberg reports that Trump's move to curb fuel shipments to Cuba is spilling over into the tourism sector, with energy shortages forcing two large beach resorts to shut down as early as this weekend.

Here's more from the outlet:

At least two large beach resorts on Cayo Coco, on the northern coast of the Caribbean nation, will be closing as soon as this weekend due to gasoline shortages, employees reported Friday.

A worker at Mojito Cayo Coco said the resort was shutting down because there wasn't enough fuel for employees to get to work. Instead, about 200 guests will be transferred to Sol Cayo Coco about 30 miles away.

The worker, who asked not to be identified for fear of retaliation, blamed Trump's sanctions and said many of his colleagues were losing their jobs. In more than two decades at the hotel, he said he'd seen temporary shutdowns for multiple hurricanes but never for non-weather-related disasters.

On Friday night, Cuba's government warned that its entire tourism sector was under a "consolidation plan" amid fuel supply disruptions that are rocking the island's economy.

"Cuban authorities have unilaterally decided to regroup certain travelers in hotels with higher occupancy levels to help ensure service continuity and overall service quality," Canadian airline and vacation provider Transat AT wrote in a statement. "They have confirmed that these properties remain operational and continue to meet their usual standards."

Canada recently updated its travel guidance on Cuba to "exercise a high degree of caution," warning, "The situation is unpredictable and could deteriorate, disrupting flight availability on short notice."

Havana has drastically reduced public transportation services, shortened the workweek (Monday through Thursday), and moved university classes online.

As of Friday night, the projected total power output for the nation's grid covered less than half of peak demand (3,100 MW).

Last month, Venezuelan-born political commentator Eduardo Menoni said Cuba's power grid "has completely collapsed in Havana after more than 20 hours of blackouts."

Menoni said, "Cuba's electrical system has completely collapsed in Havana. Communism is a shitty deal."

???? | URGENTE — Cacerolazo masivo en la zona sur de La Habana, Cuba.

Esto es ahora mismo en Arroyo Naranjo. pic.twitter.com/gfMsIZsUGl

— Agustín Antonetti (@agusantonetti) February 6, 2026

With an economic crisis compounded by an energy crunch clearly worsening, Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel was likely forced, due to growing risks of social instability, to begin negotiations with the Trump administration late in the week.

"Cuba is willing to engage in dialogue with the United States," Díaz-Canel announced on Thursday. He made clear it can be a "dialogue on any topic... but without pressure or precondition."

What piqued our interest about a week ago was a sanctioned Russian Ilyushin Il-76, operated by Aviacon Zitotrans, touching down at a Cuban military airfield. The jet can carry up to 50 tons of cargo or roughly 200 personnel, but there has been no official word on its cargo.

This leaves us with a report from the Russian-military-focused Telegram channel Rybar on Tuesday that only suggests that Cuban Missile Crisis 2.0 could be in the making.

Trump recently said, "We're starting to talk to Cuba," and explained his view that "It doesn't have to be a humanitarian crisis. I think they probably would come to us and want to make a deal. So Cuba would be free again."

Update (Saturday):

The official Hims & Hers Health X account, "Hims & Hers Comms," revealed in the early afternoon (a very convenient time to drop news) that its newly launched $49 a month copycat GLP-1 pill, positioned against Novo Nordisk's $149 a month Wegovy pill, will no longer be offered.

*HIMS & HERS TO STOP OFFERING WEIGHT LOSS PILL https://t.co/tiQoqBHf0K

— zerohedge (@zerohedge) February 7, 2026

"Since launching the compounded semaglutide pill on our platform, we've had constructive conversations with stakeholders across the industry," HIMS wrote on X.

It continued, "As a result, we have decided to stop offering access to this treatment. We remain committed to the millions of Americans who depend on us for access to safe, affordable, and personalized care."

Since launching the compounded semaglutide pill on our platform, we’ve had constructive conversations with stakeholders across the industry. As a result, we have decided to stop offering access to this treatment. We remain committed to the millions of Americans who depend on us…

— Hims & Hers Comms (@HimsHersComms) February 7, 2026

HIMS' decision to pull the $49 a month copycat GLP-1 pill comes about two days after FDA Commissioner Marty Makary warned against companies "mass-marketing illegal copycat drugs, claiming they are similar to FDA-approved products."

Makary's statement was directly pointed at HIMS.

FDA will take swift action against companies mass-marketing illegal copycat drugs, claiming they are similar to FDA-approved products.

The FDA cannot verify the quality, safety, or effectiveness of non-approved drugs.

— Dr. Marty Makary (@DrMakaryFDA) February 5, 2026

For HIMS bulls, brace for Monday, shaping up to be one of those gap-down mornings...

* * * 

Hims & Hers Health's $49-a-month copycat GLP-1 pill, priced far below Novo Nordisk's $149-a-month Wegovy pill, can be seen as part of a "GLP-1 price war" between the telehealth company and Big Pharma giant.

It appears that HIMS' strategy has been an access-and-pricing arbitrage play: mass-market a copycat GLP-1 first, then address any regulatory fallout later.

In pure 'FAFO' fashion, HIMS is finding out very fast: hours after Thursday's press release touting its new GLP-1 pill for $49 per month to take on Wegovy, FDA Commissioner Marty Makary wrote on X that his agency will take "swift action against companies mass-marketing illegal copycat drugs, claiming they are similar to FDA-approved products."

Makary noted, "The FDA cannot verify the quality, safety, or effectiveness of non-approved drugs."

FDA will take swift action against companies mass-marketing illegal copycat drugs, claiming they are similar to FDA-approved products.

The FDA cannot verify the quality, safety, or effectiveness of non-approved drugs.

— Dr. Marty Makary (@DrMakaryFDA) February 5, 2026

For context, last June, Novo terminated its partnership, citing the telehealth company's "illegal mass compounding and deceptive marketing."

On Tuesday, Novo reported a disappointing full-year outlook, warning of a tough year in the GLP-1 market. Besides HIMS, the company faces competition from Eli Lilly's Zepbound, gaining ever-larger market share in the U.S.

Makary's comments on X sent HIMS shares down about 7.5% in premarket trading in New York. Shares of Novo in Europe are up about 4.5%.

HIMS bubble unwinds...

We must also note that Makary's swift comments about copycat GLP-1 drugs were likely a nudge from Novo, as shares have been obliterated this week.

Goldman's Novo superbull James Quigley stated earlier this week, "FY26 is a reset year with respect to the pricing aspect of the GLP-1 market."

Authored by Tom Ozimek via The Epoch Times,

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said on Feb. 6 that the United States has given both Ukraine and Russia a June deadline to reach an agreement to end the nearly four-year war, adding that Washington is likely to increase pressure on both sides if fighting continues beyond that point.

Speaking to reporters in Kyiv, Zelenskyy said U.S. officials have outlined a timeline aimed at securing an end to hostilities by early summer, as the Trump administration steps up diplomatic efforts to halt Europe’s largest conflict since World War II.

“The Americans are proposing the parties end the war by the beginning of this summer,” Zelenskyy said, according to remarks embargoed until Feb. 7. He added that Washington wants “a clear schedule of all events” and would likely apply pressure “precisely according to this schedule” if progress stalls.

Zelenskyy said U.S. officials have made clear they intend to “do everything” to bring the war to an end by June. He did not specify what form pressure might take or whether it would apply equally to Kyiv and Moscow.

The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment or confirmation.

US-Brokered Talks Continue

Zelenskyy’s comments came after the latest round of U.S.-brokered trilateral talks in Abu Dhabi involving representatives from the United States, Ukraine, and Russia. All sides described the discussions as constructive, and a Russia–Ukraine prisoner swap was announced, but no cease-fire or political agreement was reached.

U.S. President Donald Trump told reporters on Feb. 6 aboard Air Force One that “we had very, very good talks today, having to do with Russia, Ukraine,” adding that “something could be happening.”

Trump did not provide details on the discussions or address whether a formal deadline had been communicated to the warring parties.

Ukrainian Defense Minister Rustem Umerov said the Feb. 4–5 talks focused on creating conditions for a lasting peace and included discussions on cease-fire implementation and monitoring mechanisms.

“Ukraine expresses its gratitude to [President] Donald Trump for his leadership in advancing efforts aimed at ending the war,” Umerov said.

Russian presidential representative and Russian Direct Investment Fund chief Kirill Dmitriev, who was present at the talks, reported that there was “good, positive movement forward” in the negotiations.

“As you know, we are actively working with the Trump administration to restore Russia–U.S. economic relations, including through the Russian-American Economic Cooperation Group,” he said, according to Russian state-owned news agency TASS.

The delegations agreed to a mutual exchange of 157 prisoners of war each—the first such exchange in five months—and said further talks would continue in the coming weeks.

Zelenskyy said Feb. 6 he had received an initial report from Ukraine’s negotiating team and was expecting a full in-person briefing in Kyiv.

“Further meetings are planned in the near future, likely in the United States,” he said, adding that Ukraine remains open to “all workable formats” that could bring peace closer.

He said that any settlement must ensure Russia “has no appetite to continue the war” and receives “no reward for its aggression.”

Despite renewed diplomacy, Moscow and Kyiv remain far apart on core issues.

Russia has insisted that Ukraine withdraw from the eastern industrial region of Donbas, where fighting remains intense. The Kremlin has described full control of the region as a key condition for any peace agreement.

Ukraine still controls about 20 percent of the Donetsk region and has repeatedly rejected Russian demands to cede the territory.

The diplomatic push comes as Russia continues to intensify attacks on Ukrainian energy infrastructure.

Overnight into Feb. 7, Russia launched a large-scale air assault involving more than 400 drones and around 40 missiles, Zelenskyy said. The strikes targeted power generation facilities and electricity distribution substations across several regions.

“Every day, Russia could choose real diplomacy, but it chooses new strikes,” Zelenskyy said in a post on X, accusing Moscow of using winter conditions as leverage.

Elon Musk's SpaceX is apparently reorienting its near-term space roadmap, pushing back a planned 2026 uncrewed Mars mission and focusing efforts on NASA's Artemis program, with Starship's uncrewed moon mission targeted for early next year.

According to Wall Street Journal sources, the rocket company told investors this week that Musk will prioritize a moon mission, with a Mars mission to follow. The lunar landing with a Starship rocket is slated for March 2027. The person noted that the moon mission will be uncrewed and will not include humanoid or wheeled ground-based robots.

The space pivot comes after SpaceX acquired Musk's AI company, xAI, earlier this week, combining his rocket and satellite business with his artificial intelligence startup to accelerate plans for a fleet of low-Earth-orbit data centers.

The deal gives SpaceX a valuation of $1 trillion, and xAI a value of $250 billion. The combined company's valuation of $1.25 trillion was announced to employees in a memo on Monday, with an IPO slated for later this year that could raise as much as $50 billion.

Kardashev II civilization or bust.

Starship will get us to the Moon and Mars. pic.twitter.com/L9vhMOdDPK

— Tesla Owners Silicon Valley (@teslaownersSV) February 7, 2026

Even though Musk previously dismissed the moon as a "distraction" and argued for Mars first, it appears NASA may have nudged him, especially as Jeff Bezos's rocket company, Blue Origin, has paused space tourism launches to focus on the moon.

In a memo earlier this week, Musk told employees that the pivot will pave the way for the U.S. to construct a permanent base on the moon.

"The capabilities we unlock by making space-based data centers a reality will fund and enable self-growing bases on the moon, an entire civilization on Mars, and ultimately expansion to the universe," he said.

Last month, Musk told a podcaster that getting to Mars this year is becoming a "lower probability" and "somewhat of a distraction."

Also, this week has been busy for NASA's Artemis lunar program, as the Artemis II crewed mission around the moon has experienced several setbacks, and the next launch date could be early March.

All this upcoming launch activity and the return to the moon will certainly drive a new space investing theme once the SpaceX IPO debuts. We have outlined multiple ways to profit from the buildout of the space industry from low Earth orbit to lunar operations and beyond (read here, here, and here).

Authored by James Rickards via the Daily Reckoning,

Our specialty is forecasting. We use multiple branches of science in our predictive analytic models including complexity theory, behavioral psychology, Bayes Theorem, neural networks (a form of artificial intelligence or AI), inference, subject matter expertise and good old-fashioned intuition to arrive at the market and geopolitical predictions we offer our readers.

Our track record speaks for itself. We predicted Brexit when polls gave it only a 25% chance. We predicted Trump’s 2016 victory when polls gave it only a 5% chance. We were the only publication in the world to predict the exact number of Trump’s electoral votes in the 2024 election (312 votes; no one else predicted he would win all seven swing states). There are many other examples. Our forecasts on gold and silver prices are followed all over the world.

But science and applied mathematics are not the only ways to do forecasting. There’s ample room for imagination and creative fiction. In fact, all forms of forecasting are fiction because the events predicted haven’t happened yet. They only become “true” when the forecast plays out.

In this genre, you can think of Jules Verne, who wrote about Captain Nemo and the Nautilus in Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea (1869), decades before systems such as electric propulsion, long-duration submersion and life-support systems were used in submarines.

Another great science fiction writer is Arthur C. Clarke whose 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) described adventures in space that still have not been achieved but are being actively pursued by Elon Musk and others. The pseudonymous author Big Serge is a current master of this genre as it applies to military affairs and geopolitics.

Unlikely Scenarios (For Now)

With this as background, let’s jump into the creative end of the pool and offer some scenarios that are definitely fictional (as of now) and not hard forecasts (that’s for another time), but rather scenarios that if not likely are at least possible and worth your consideration. In some ways, the more unlikely the scenario the greater the impact on your portfolio if it does come to pass.

Trump has backed away from his threat to take Greenland by force if a deal could not be worked out with Denmark, which controls the territory today. But Trump is famously volatile and could reverse his views in a minute if the newly proposed framework for transferring Greenland to the U.S. on some basis yet to be announced falls through.

What if NATO members such as the UK, Denmark, France and Germany send their armed forces to defend Greenland? None of those powers are particularly strong and it’s unlikely they could muster more than two brigades for this purpose (about 5,000 troops in total).

Under the direction of U.S. NorthCom, with a U.S. aircraft carrier battle group, cyber warfare, drones and elite airborne troops trained in Arctic warfare, the U.S. could put those NATO troops into full retreat with substantial casualties on their side in a day or two at the most.

The U.S. would gain Greenland, but the armed confrontation would be the end of NATO. That’s not necessarily a bad thing from the U.S. perspective. NATO members have not been paying anywhere near their share of the costs of military preparedness.

The War in Ukraine has shown that most NATO weapons, including Patriot anti-missile batteries, Abrams and Challenger tanks, HIMARS precision-guided artillery, Bradley fighting vehicles and cruise missiles are obsolete when up against Russian hypersonic missiles, drones, anti-missile defenses and GPS jamming techniques. NATO is probably falling apart anyway, but a debacle in Greenland would accelerate that ending.

The Great Powers Would Rule

Without NATO, the Baltic Republics could be rapidly invaded and annexed by Russia. They already have large Russian-speaking populations and were part of the former Soviet Union from 1945 to 1991. This annexation would be a tragedy for some but a homecoming for others.

The major NATO powers might form a new military alliance centered around France and its nuclear weapons. Yet, the U.S. would still have allies in Europe including Italy, Hungary, Romania, Slovenia, the Slovak Republic, Poland and Greece.

These countries form a kind of wall between Russia and Western Europe. Europe could find itself cut off from Russian natural gas because of Ukraine and also cut off from U.S. natural gas because of the battle for Greenland.

With the U.S. controlling its own oil and that of Venezuela and Guyana, and Arab countries siding with the U.S., Western Europe could find itself with almost no energy supplies apart from its pathetic patchwork of windmills and solar farms and French nuclear reactors. Western European manufacturing would quickly grind to a halt.

With the U.S. grabbing Venezuela and Greenland and Russia helping itself to the Baltic Republics, China could decide that the time was ripe to seize Taiwan. The U.S. might allow this to happen on a view that its sphere of influence is the Western Hemisphere through the Trump Corollary to the Monroe Doctrine.

Of course, the U.S. would destroy Taiwan’s semiconductor fabrication and research facilities on its way out the door. The U.S. would rapidly expand its indigenous semiconductor manufacturing while mining the Western states of the U.S. and Greenland for rare earths.

Have you heard of the Chagos Islands? They’re an archipelago of seven atolls including more than 60 islands lying 300 miles south of the Maldives in the Indian Ocean. The Chagos are controlled by the UK as the British Indian Ocean Territory.

Except for their natural beauty, they would be unremarkable but for the fact that the Chagos includes the island of Diego Garcia, which houses a U.S. Naval Support Facility. That facility has been used to launch B-52, B-1 and B-2 bomber attacks throughout the Middle East including the Gulf War, the Global War on Terror and the invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan.

Keir Starmer, Prime Minister of the UK has agreed to cede the Chagos to the island nation of Mauritius, also in the Indian Ocean closer to Madagascar. The UK would take back a lease to Diego Garcia, but Mauritius would be sovereign. Trump has called the Chagos deal “stupid”. Would Trump take over the Chagos Islands to prevent the transfer to Mauritius? Possibly yes. That would be one more nail in the NATO coffin.

Japan sensing that its alliance with the U.S. might be on shaky ground could decide to build its own nuclear weapons to deter Chinese threats. Japan has long had this technology and engineering capability. Now it would decide that all bets are off and it needs to move as quickly as possible to become a nuclear military power.

In these scenarios, the Great Powers of Russia, China, the U.S. and possibly Japan would strike out on their own and seize as much adjacent territory as they could. The small powers like Greenland, Venezuela, the Baltic Republics and the Chagos Islands would be gobbled up. And the middle powers like the UK, France and Germany would watch helplessly as their assumptions about the shape of the world melted like ice cubes on a hot day.

Big Serge writes, “Our history is full of great wars which began in seemingly small places: the Lexington Common, Fort Sumter, an Archduke’s touring car in the back alleys of Sarajevo.” Could Greenland or Guyana or even the Chagos Islands be the next Sarajevo?

That may seem unlikely. But a look back at the last seven years that brought us COVID, twenty-million illegal immigrants, the War in Ukraine, a senile Biden, the War in Gaza, B-2 bombers over Iran, the seizure of Venezuela, two impeachments and the reelection of Donald Trump should teach us that the least likely scenarios happen with much greater frequency than conventional forecasts expect.

We will stick to our rigorous forecasting techniques. But we will also find a place for fictional scenarios of the kind described above. Fiction has a funny way of becoming fact.