Forbes declares Elon Musk as the world’s first trillionaire(www.forbes.com)
2 pointsby teleforce3 hours ago3 comments
  • ggm3 hours ago
    Almost all of these uber rich hold assets as shares in enterprises they manage with mutable value. They don't diversify most of this wealth into other people's stocks. Their investment is motivated to enhance the underlying value of the enterprises they control. Bezos owns Amazon. He's not now owning chocolate factories, Microsoft and a uranium mining enterprise. He owns AWS and .. selling other people's things. Musk owns his cars, his batteries, and his space enterprises and X. He isn't visibly acquiring Ford, or the Indian National railways, or banks in Japan.

    I'm not trying to disrespect this. I just want to observe it's ephemeral wealth tied to the stock price of enterprises they own. Diversified stock backed wealth, land, minerals, food production is somewhat different. Some of that is also somewhat ephemeral wealth, agriculture is notoriously variable to its value against climate.

    Should spaceX undergo some unforeseen launch related major problem, or tesla become ensnared in a major lawsuit, or xAI and C underlying debts get called in a LOT of this wealth would evaporate surely?

    What I read suggests space X is immensely valuable on government contracts and starlink and xAI is a major debt overhang, which won't entirely vanish because of this float. Instead, it will be diluted into the general stock purchase. If Musk hadn't restructured the AI debt into a bundle, this would be more clear.

    Carnegie owned steel. He sold out for the equivalent of $300b or more and then gave it away. Buffet owned the entire market and made profit in re-insurance. He was across everything. (He's retired now and also appears set on giving almost all of it away)

    • ben_w3 hours ago
      > What I read suggests space X is immensely valuable on government contracts and starlink and xAI is a major debt overhang, which won't entirely vanish because of this float. Instead, it will be diluted into the general stock purchase. If Musk hadn't restructured the AI debt into a bundle, this would be more clear.

      Puts me in mind of the credit default swaps that played a role in the global financial crisis of 2008.

      • __patchbit__3 hours ago
        Wind the clock forward from 2008 to the present and see the quality of vision improve point to point across the planet as SpaceX increases launch cadence to proliferate their Starlink and Starshield constellations. The Blue Origin LEO constellation is way behind in orbit stationed satellite counts and receives special attention from political friends for failing to meet contracted obligation, which is the standard for big American bureaucratic industry that is slow and stupid these days.

        The effects are measurable.

        • ggm2 hours ago
          Europe and Asia are increasingly uncomfortable with a de-facto starlink monopoly, not to say the inherent risks of mandated US traffic snooping.

          Not that a snap of the legal fingers will change this, but it's likely in a 10+ year vision launch costs and LEO won't be single-supplier dominated quite the same way.

          Tesla is losing market share. Not because they are bad cars, because the $27,000 low end unit never emerged and GWM, BYD and the Europeans are accelerating into the segment. Tesla is immensely profitable but it's not as market dominant as it was. Prestige EV auto has returned to core market brand leaders as well. You can't bottle the scent of a German brand like Audi, BMW or Mercedes.

          I'm sceptical "compute in orbit" is going to be a thing. I'm skeptical the AI money pit will ever be profitable. Other ventures (chip makers) will be fine.

        • ben_w41 minutes ago
          I have no idea what point you're trying to make here.

          The 2008 crisis wasn't "literally every mortgage holder is unable to repay", nor was it "none of these houses exist".

          Starlink being decent, the launch business being close enough to profitable they can make it so whenever they want by (I think merely by?) slowing down Starship R&D, that doesn't change anything about X or xAI having the potential to sink the rest of it.

          That said, the Consolidated Balance Sheet in the S-1 filing… I'm new to reading financial docs, but they do have a line saying "Accumulated deficit" is just over 37 billion dollars, which honestly is probably why they felt the need to sell 75 billion of shares as they were in danger of, as Thatcher said of socialism, "eventually run out of other people's money": https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1181412/000162828026...

          * on the one hand this is from legal advice, on the other hand I was hearing this second hand, take appropriate pinch of salt

  • 3 hours ago
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