Fri, 26 Aug 2022 09:15:59 +0000
The Elon Musk vs. Twitter takeover dispute (including the whistleblower revelations) will remain one of the dominant, defining business stories for the remainder of calendar year 2022.
“This is gonna be the story of 2022 for sure.” View on YouTube
The Musk-Twitter takeover saga, including the Delaware trial threat and eventual close, remained one of the dominant business stories through the rest of 2022.
Before the Delaware Chancery Court fully adjudicates the case, the Elon Musk–Twitter dispute will most likely be resolved via a settlement in which (a) Musk pays roughly the economic difference between Twitter’s then‑trading price and $54.20 per share (on the order of $7–10 billion), or (b) the deal closes at a renegotiated price around $51 per share, rather than at $54.20.
“this kind of, again, builds more and more momentum in my mind that the most likely outcome here is a settlement where you have to pay the economic difference between where the stock is now and 54, 20, which is more than $1 billion, or you close at some number below $54.20 a share. And I think that that is like, you know, if you had to be a betting person, that's probably. And if you look at the the way the stock is traded, and if you also look at the way the options market trades, that's what people are assuming that there's a 7 to $10 billion swing. And if you impute that into the stock price. You kind of get into the $51 a share, kind of an acquisition price.” View on YouTube
The Musk-Twitter dispute did not end in a discounted settlement; Musk ultimately closed the acquisition at the original $54.20 per share price in October 2022 rather than a lower renegotiated price.
Following the Twitter whistleblower’s allegations about foreign government agents inside Twitter, the U.S. Senate Intelligence Committee will hold at least one closed‑door session with Twitter representatives, and may subsequently call in additional large tech companies for similar briefings, within the ensuing legislative term.
“I think it's fair to say that the the the the Senate Intelligence Committee is going to haul Twitter and have like a closed door meeting. And then the question is, you know, will they haul everybody else in?” View on YouTube
Congressional committees did hold hearings related to Twitter and foreign influence concerns in this period, but a clearly documented closed-door Senate Intelligence Committee session specifically on the whistleblower's foreign-agent allegations, followed by hauling in other tech companies, is not clearly confirmed as having occurred in this specific form.
In the coming years, concerns over government access to cloud‑hosted data will drive a noticeable shift in consumer and small‑business behavior, with increased adoption of (a) local or self‑hosted "mini servers" and user‑controlled encrypted storage, and (b) cloud and device services architected so that providers do not hold decryption keys.
“This is going to lead to a lot of people moving off of the cloud I predict we're seeing. And in fact, Apple is now storing your data and a lot of your privacy information locally on your phone. And if it's encrypted, they can't hand it over.... I do think you're going to see people buy mini servers to put or rent their own cloud services that are encrypted and impossible to unlock. And so look for that trend to come, or more companies to encrypt it and say, we don't have the keys,” View on YouTube
Interest in local/self-hosted storage and zero-knowledge encrypted services grew modestly over subsequent years, but this did not become a dominant mainstream consumer trend; most consumers continued relying on centralized cloud services (iCloud, Google Drive, etc.).
Over the next several years and decades, decentralized or user‑controlled data architectures (e.g., data stored on‑device, on distributed networks, or on blockchains rather than centralized enterprise servers) will increasingly prove better aligned with consumer needs and will win significant market share versus traditional centralized services.
“Isn't this part of the. Philosophy behind decentralized services that. Yeah, crypto is distributed. Yeah. I mean, I don't like using that term, but just decentralized services where the data doesn't sit on some centralized, enterprise controlled servers, but the data is distributed either on a chain or in your phone or in some way.... that fundamental principle may actually come to kind of bear over the next couple of years and decades that a consumer model. Yeah, that that model is more appropriate for us, for me. And therefore the services that are built that way are going to win in the market.” View on YouTube
Decentralized/blockchain-based data architectures did not win significant mainstream consumer market share versus centralized cloud services in the years following; centralized cloud providers (AWS, Google, Microsoft, Apple) remained dominant through 2026.
As awareness of privacy risks grows, a meaningful portion of consumers will shift spending away from discretionary items like restaurant meals and toward paid privacy‑protecting services (e.g., VPNs, private browsers, secure storage) over the coming years.
“I do think that the pendulum starts to swing in the other direction where we say, okay, you know what, I'll eat out at Chipotle one night a week less, and instead I'm going to reallocate that money to making sure that I have, you know, some amount of privacy.” View on YouTube
There is no clear evidence of a meaningful consumer shift away from restaurant spending toward paid privacy services in subsequent years; restaurant/dining spending remained robust through the 2020s.
In the near term (around the early‑to‑mid 2020s), the market will see widespread availability and consumer uptake of bundled privacy suites (combining VPNs, private search engines, and privacy‑focused browsers) priced on the order of $20–30 per month as mainstream offerings.
“You can do it for 25 bucks a month, you know, 2 or 300 bucks a year, which is a big number for maybe the average Joe, but it's, it's it's being packaged and bundled right now so that you're seeing the VPNs, the anonymous search engines, the browsers all starting to bundle. They're bundling a set, a suite of services. And so I think this is upon us now and consumers get it and they want to protect their privacy.” View on YouTube
Some bundled privacy products (e.g., Proton's suite, various VPN bundles) did emerge and gain modest adoption, but they did not become dominant mainstream consumer offerings at the scale implied.
The Biden administration’s 2022 student loan forgiveness initiative will not materially increase voter turnout or be a top‑tier motivating issue for most voters in the 2022 midterm elections.
“I don't think this is what gets people out to vote, and I don't think it's what people care about. Ultimately, at the polls, which if there was a political calculation to make, that's important.” View on YouTube
Student loan forgiveness did not become a top-tier driver of 2022 midterm turnout; exit polling showed economy/inflation and abortion as the dominant issues rather than loan forgiveness.
Biden’s 2022 student loan forgiveness action, implemented via executive authority, will be challenged in court, reach the U.S. Supreme Court, and has a high probability of being struck down as unconstitutional (similar to his prior eviction‑moratorium and vaccine‑mandate executive actions) within a few years of issuance.
“I just add, it's unconstitutional. I mean, the Constitution expressly says no money shall be drawn from the Treasury, but in Consequence of Appropriations made by law. So I don't understand how Biden can even do this by an executive order. I expect this will be challenged and taken to the Supreme Court. And I think there's a very good chance that it'll end up like Biden's other executive orders that were ruled unconstitutional.... I think there's a good chance that this will also be ruled unconstitutional.” View on YouTube
Biden's student loan forgiveness plan was challenged in court and struck down by the Supreme Court in Biden v. Nebraska (June 2023) as exceeding executive authority, consistent with this prediction.
In the November 2022 U.S. midterm elections, Republicans will win control of at least one chamber of Congress, most likely the House of Representatives, while control of the Senate will remain uncertain and could go either way.
“I think what's likely to happen in November is still that the Republicans win one of the chambers. Probably the House. I think the Senate is still up for grabs.” View on YouTube
Republicans won the House in the November 2022 midterms while the Senate outcome remained competitive (Democrats ultimately held and slightly expanded their Senate majority), matching this prediction's framing.