
Data Centers in Space: How SpaceX Justifies $2 Trillion
From Telltales by by Top Mark Capital
June 10, 2026 · 28 min
About this episode
The episode discusses the implications of the US-Iran standoff on the oil market and explores SpaceX's valuation in relation to data centers in space and compute scarcity.
Hunt, Jason, and Mike work through an oil market frozen by the US-Iran standoff, then spend the back half stress-testing SpaceX’s ~$2 trillion valuation against Tesla’s — landing on data centers in orbit and a chronic compute shortage as the load-bearing assumptions. Plus Apple’s WWDC miss, the software disruption map, and a strong week of healthcare data. The Cashflow Memo Key Takeaways * Hunt’s working case: if the US-Iran standoff just persists, oil sits near $90 twelve months out despite deep backwardation (mid-$90s spot vs mid-$70s forward); the casualty is natural gas, because roughly two-thirds of dry-gas supply growth is Permian associated gas, so a higher oil price pumps more gas and keeps gas pricing weak. * Exhibit A is the macro tail risk: holding public-debt-to-GNP under 100% requires keeping the deficit flat-to-declining near $1.5T even with higher defense spend — a developed-world problem (Japan is ~180%), not just a US one, and the thing that most threatens the credit markets. * SpaceX’s ~$2T valuation only pencils on space-based data centers: 150kW micro-satellites (one NVL72-rack equivalent, Nvidia silicon, in-sourced solar), a ~1 GW launch cadence targeted by…
People in this episode
Host: Hunt
Guests: Jason, Mike
Topics covered
- oil market
- US-Iran standoff
- SpaceX valuation
- data centers in space
- compute shortage
- healthcare data
Keywords
- oil market
- SpaceX
- Tesla
- data centers
- compute shortage
- WWDC
- healthcare data
Mentioned in this episode
Organizations: SpaceX, Tesla, Apple
Places: US, Iran, Permian
More episodes of Telltales
- Weekend Update - W2623 · June 6, 2026 · 12 min
- The Greatest Insurance Business Ever Built, and Why It's Bankrupting Us · June 3, 2026 · 36 min
- Weekend Update - W2622 · May 30, 2026 · 10 min
- How Do You Get to $2 Trillion? · May 27, 2026 · 34 min
- Weekend Update - W2621 · May 23, 2026 · 13 min
- Google's Real AI Risk Isn't Just ChatGPT · May 20, 2026 · 32 min
Explore listener stats, chart rankings, contacts and more on the Telltales podcast page.