[eduardogarza]

From the Big Short (movie)

Jared Vennett (narration): "In the years that followed, hundreds of bankers and rating agency's executives went to jail. The SEC was completely overhauled, and Congress had no choice but to break up the big banks and regulate the mortgage and derivatives industries."

"Just kidding. Banks took the money the American people gave them, and they used it to pay themselves huge bonuses, and lobby the Congress to kill big reform. And then they blamed immigrants and poor people, and this time even teachers."

[Fogest]

I feel like without adding some commentary with these quotes this comment lacks enough info to see how it relates to the linked article.

[crystal_revenge]

Because this move is entirely financial engineering to hide losses just like the roll up of X in to xAI.

None of this has anything to do with business or innovation. Do you not immediately see that? Most of my friends reaction to this news was that this is so obvious it's almost funny (or actually it is funny, since most were laughing as they read the headline).

I'm curious how you could not understand the relevance of the quote unless you were aggressively trying to not understanding it.

[Loughla]

Legitimately, did you not immediately conclude it was for financial shenanigans? What did you think? I'm not trying to be shitty, but what else could there be?

[ljm]

You don't see how the common thread is Elon Musk buying out his own businesses, largely on the basis of overinflated stocks and corporate welfare?

It's baffling that the market has stayed so irrational because of Musk. It will collapse because of him.

[keerthiko]

without having watched the Big Short or having read the article, my first impression from the quote is "Megacorporations are failing dramatically, and the billionaires at their helm are freely doing financial gymnastics to pull the covers over the eyes of shareholders, while gaming the system to fully circumvent taxes and regulation -- the people with the power to do anything about it (legislators and regulators) watch idly (maybe profiting), the oligarchs make off like bandits despite copious failures, and the end consumer/taxpayer is either robbed or clueless this is going on, but most likely both, when there was a world where accountability could have been had and the common man was treated better."

the article headline immediately screams "financial gymnastics" to me so the rest followed from the quote.

[belter]

It is pretty clear. Socialize the losses of Musk investments by recovery via SpaceX contracts, supporting the US space program and the new Golden Dome program.

He sold FSD for 12 years, now is going to sell a Dyson Sphere for the next 30. This guy makes Ponzi look like a street hustler.

[rluna828]

This merger smells like a bubble. Servers in space? They don't make enough to cover costs here on earth. Americans will be forced to bail this mess up because we need Falcon 9, Starship one, etc.

[woah]

It's messed up that Grok underwrote all those subprime mortgages in 2008

[bandrami]

I think the argument is that it's messed up that a large debt swap from xAI kept Musk's margin on Twitter from being called by his investors, and now that debt is being absorbed by SpaceX.

[iqster]

Serious question .. are you long on cash or what? What investment class is not overvalued? Gold is but a store of value and doesn't really grow - look at how high it has gone.

[raincole]

I really don't know what you're trying to say. From your comment alone the conclusion I drew was that we should spend more on the industries that makes physical instead of financial products, such as SpaceX.

[caust1c]

The sequence of events: Elon doing a leveraged buyout of X, then xAI funding, then debt transfers to X, then the xAI–X stock deal. Now the proposed SpaceX–xAI merger appears to have shifted X’s financial burden from Musk personally toward xAI investors and, potentially, future SpaceX shareholders.

This is speculative, of course, but yeah seems likely.

[dmix]

SpaceX is a private company

[slowmovintarget]

Step 1: Merge xAI and SpaceX

Step 2: IPO SpaceX

Step 3: Merge Tesla and SpaceX x xAI (which would have been tricky if they were still private).

[cj]

Check back in 2 years to see if your statement is still true.

SpaceX is planning the largest IPO in history aiming for over a trillion dollars in market cap

[throawayonthe]

so are the banks?

[0xy]

Where's the government bailout in this transaction that would make this a relevant comparison?

[esseph]

https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2026/01/starlink-demands...

[skywhopper]

Who is SpaceX’s biggest customer? And which industry are we being told by any number of governments around the world is the most importantly thing ever and must be subsidized and forced on people?

[operatingthetan]

There has been rumblings of speculation that when the AI bubble pops that the government will bail the companies out.