Trump verdict, COVID Cover-up, Crypto Corner, Salesforce drops 20%, AI correction?

Jason’s prediction window was roughly from May 31, 2024 (podcast release) to about July 30, 2024 ("the next 30 to 60 days").

On July 21, 2024, President Joe Biden ended his 2024 reelection campaign and announced he would not seek another term. In the same announcement, he endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris as his replacement to lead the Democratic ticket, and Democrats quickly moved to unite behind her as the new standard-bearer.(pbs.org) This effectively removed Biden as the Democratic presidential candidate and installed Harris as the de facto nominee within the 30–60 day window Jason specified.

Formally, Harris was only officially nominated by the Democratic National Committee on August 5, 2024, after a virtual roll call that concluded that day, which is just outside the 60‑day window.(en.wikipedia.org) However, Jason’s wording about Democrats “fielding a different candidate” is satisfied in the common political sense as of July 21–22, when Biden withdrew and Harris became the presumptive nominee and active Democratic presidential candidate. On that practical interpretation, the prediction came true within the timeframe, so it is best scored as right, with the caveat that the formal nomination occurred slightly later.

Jason’s multi-part prediction substantially came true.

1. Trump “demolishing” Biden in the June 27 debate
   A 538/Ipsos post‑debate poll found that about 60% of debate watchers said Trump performed best vs. 21% for Biden, and 73% rated Biden’s performance as poor or terrible, with only 8% calling it good or excellent. (ipsos.com) This matches the spirit of “demolish” and a clear Trump outperformance.

2. Biden’s support dropping to ~30%
   After the debate, Biden’s job approval and general standing slid into the low–mid 30s in major polls. Gallup recorded his all‑time low presidential approval at 36% in July 2024, in the days after the debate and just before his withdrawal. (news.gallup.com) Pew’s July 1–7, 2024 survey (covering the immediate aftermath) put his approval at 32%. (en.wikipedia.org) That’s “roughly 30%” by normal forecasting standards, even if not exactly 30 in the averages.

3. Democrats engineering a ‘graceful out’ and replacing Biden as nominee
   On July 21, 2024, Biden announced he would not accept the Democratic nomination and was ending his re‑election bid, explicitly framing it as being in the best interest of his party and the country. (time.com) In the same window he endorsed Kamala Harris to be the nominee, and Democratic leaders rapidly coalesced around her; reporting at the time tied his withdrawal directly to the “disastrous” June 27 debate and the subsequent party revolt. (latimes.com) Harris then became the Democratic presidential nominee at the August 2024 convention.

Putting it together: Trump clearly outperformed Biden in the June 27 debate; Biden’s national support (as measured by job approval) dropped into the low 30s; and Democratic leaders did in fact orchestrate a relatively face‑saving withdrawal and substitute a different nominee. Minor numerical imprecision aside, the core scenario Jason described played out closely enough that this forecast is best judged right.

The prediction had two clear conditions:

1. Democrats replace Joe Biden with another presidential candidate during June 2024.
2. That replacement candidate then defeats Donald Trump in a landslide in November 2024.

What actually happened:

• Joe Biden remained the Democratic nominee through and after June 2024; there was no June “switcheroo” to a different Democratic candidate. Major reporting throughout summer 2024 continued to identify Biden as the Democratic nominee against Donald Trump, with no formal replacement occurring.
• Since the conditional trigger (a June 2024 replacement of Biden) never happened, the prediction’s scenario did not materialize, and thus its stated outcome (a landslide win by the replacement candidate) did not occur.

Because the prediction is explicitly conditional on an event that did not occur (Democrats switching candidates in June 2024), the prediction as stated is wrong.

Sacks predicted that the late‑May 2024 Silicon Valley Trump fundraiser would “break the ice” and trigger a preference cascade in which high‑profile business and finance figures would start openly backing Trump, making such support more acceptable in elite circles.

Evidence from the 2024 cycle shows exactly that pattern:

• Within days, David Sacks and Chamath Palihapitiya’s San Francisco fundraiser for Trump (early June 2024) raised about $12 million and drew dozens of prominent tech investors. Jacob Helberg, a former Democratic fundraiser who himself donated about $1 million to Trump, said that in 2016 he knew only one Silicon Valley Trump supporter (Peter Thiel) but by mid‑2024 he counted them “in the dozens” and described the prior six months as seeing “the dam break.”(cnbc.com) In a separate interview he noted that “the social cost of supporting Trump isn’t as great as it was” and called himself one of a “cadre of high‑powered Silicon Valley businessmen” newly warming to Trump.(dailywire.com) That is precisely the dynamic Sacks forecast.

• A dedicated Trump super PAC, America PAC, was founded by Elon Musk in 2024 with backing from multiple high‑profile tech investors including Joe Lonsdale, Tyler and Cameron Winklevoss, Ken Howery, Shaun Maguire, and Antonio Gracias—an organized cluster of Silicon Valley and crypto‑aligned business elites publicly financing Trump’s bid.(en.wikipedia.org) Separately, Trump’s main super PAC, MAGA Inc., saw very large checks from billionaire financiers Timothy Mellon, Diane Hendricks, Howard Lutnick, and Paul Singer in mid‑2024, including Mellon’s $50 million contributions in both May 31 and July, underscoring strong, visible support from the financial elite.(en.wikipedia.org)

• Several very prominent business figures who had been Democrats or non‑Trump Republicans made public pro‑Trump moves after this period:

  • Elon Musk, by early 2024 already leaning right, formally endorsed Trump minutes after the July 2024 assassination attempt and went on to become the single largest individual donor of the 2024 election, giving roughly a quarter‑billion dollars in support of Trump and allied efforts.(en.wikipedia.org)
  • Bill Ackman, a long‑time Democratic donor who had backed Dean Phillips and RFK Jr. earlier in the cycle, publicly endorsed Trump on July 13–14, 2024, in widely covered posts on X, explicitly framing it as a careful, data‑driven choice.(investing.com)
  • Marc Andreessen and Ben Horowitz, co‑founders of Andreessen Horowitz and historically Democratic donors, announced on their own podcast and in a TechCrunch‑covered statement on July 16, 2024, that they would support and vote for Trump, citing tech and crypto policy as reasons.(techcrunch.com)
  • Thomas Peterffy, a billionaire who had previously said he would not fund Trump, reversed course and in August 2024 both attended a high‑dollar Aspen fundraiser for Trump and contributed hundreds of thousands of dollars after giving nothing to Trump earlier in the cycle.(en.wikipedia.org) Together with other financiers such as Scott Bessent—an ex‑Democratic donor turned seven‑figure Trump fundraiser—this represents exactly the “flipping” of business and finance leaders Sacks anticipated.(en.wikipedia.org)

• Compiled endorsement lists for Trump’s 2024 campaign show a substantial roster of named CEOs, founders, hedge‑fund managers, and crypto leaders in the finance and technology categories, including Musk, Ackman, Andreessen, Charles Hoskinson, Thomas Peterffy, Joe Ricketts, the Winklevoss twins, and others.(en.wikipedia.org) Post‑election commentary by Bill Gates explicitly notes the emergence of a “significant right‑of‑center group” of tech leaders—he specifically names Musk, Sacks, Thiel, Patrick Collison, Horowitz, and Andreessen—who had backed Trump in 2024, emphasizing how unusual this was given Silicon Valley’s historic Democratic tilt.(nypost.com)

At the same time, many corporate leaders continued to back Democrats (especially Kamala Harris once she became the nominee), and some high‑profile Republicans on Wall Street, like Ken Griffin, remained outspoken Trump critics or sat the race out.(en.wikipedia.org) But Sacks did not predict that elite support would be monolithic—only that there would be a noticeable cascade and that open Trump support would become more acceptable in elite business circles.

Given:

• the rapid sequence of highly visible endorsements and mega‑donations from new or previously reluctant business and finance leaders after the late‑May / early‑June 2024 fundraiser,
• explicit contemporary descriptions of a “dam break” in Silicon Valley Trump support and a reduced social cost to backing him,
• and subsequent recognition that a sizable, coherent pro‑Trump faction had emerged among tech and financial elites,

Sacks’s prediction that the fundraiser would be followed by a noticeable preference cascade of elite business and financial support for Trump during the 2024 cycle is best judged as right.

The prediction was that Democrats would not pull off a late switch and that Joe Biden would remain their nominee through the 2024 election. In reality, Biden withdrew from the 2024 race on July 21, 2024, citing the best interests of his party and the country, and he endorsed Kamala Harris as the Democratic nominee. (cnbc.com) Following his withdrawal, the Democratic Party moved forward with Harris, who officially became the Democratic presidential nominee on August 5, 2024, and then headed the ticket in the November election, which she ultimately lost to Donald Trump. (en.wikipedia.org) Because there was a late switch and Biden did not remain the nominee through Election Day, Sacks’s prediction is wrong.

Evidence about the June 3, 2024 House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic hearing supports parts of Jason’s prediction but not the full, stronger claim in the normalized version.

What clearly happened

• Contentious / “explosive” tone: Major outlets described the hearing as contentious and fiery, highlighting bitter partisan clashes. Coverage emphasized heated exchanges, including Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene accusing Fauci of “crimes against humanity,” which briefly derailed the hearing over decorum issues. (cbsnews.com) This matches the “explosive” / highly contentious aspect of the prediction.
• Widely covered: The hearing was carried and analyzed by national news organizations (CBS, CNN, AP‑syndicated local outlets, Reuters, etc.), as well as partisan and niche outlets, indicating substantial media attention. (cbsnews.com)
• Some “revealing” material: Public questioning revisited and amplified material already emerging from Fauci’s January 2024 closed‑door testimony, including: his statement that the 6‑foot distancing guideline “sort of just appeared,” questions about NIH‑funded work with EcoHealth and the Wuhan Institute of Virology, and emails from Fauci aide David Morens about avoiding FOIA. Fauci publicly distanced himself from Morens and reiterated that he keeps an open mind on lab‑leak vs. natural origin while denying any cover‑up. (cbsnews.com) These points gave commentators “takeaways,” though most were continuations of earlier revelations rather than brand‑new bombshells.

Where the prediction goes beyond what we can verify

• The normalized prediction adds that the exchanges would “significantly escalate public controversy over Fauci’s role” in COVID‑19 origins and an alleged cover‑up. While controversy around Fauci and the lab‑leak hypothesis did intensify over 2024–2025 in general—e.g., the Republican‑led subcommittee’s December 2024 report concluding a lab‑associated origin is “most likely” and sharply criticizing Fauci, and later political moves like the Trump administration’s 2025 COVID‑origin website and removal of a Fauci mural at NIH (en.wikipedia.org)—those developments stem from a multi‑year investigation, accumulated documents, and broader politics.
• Available reporting on the June 3 hearing itself (from mainstream and partisan sources) treats it as a high‑profile, partisan hearing but does not identify it as a clear watershed that newly “cracked open” the origins issue or produced decisive new evidence against Fauci. Instead, it mainly publicized already‑emerging disputes and Fauci’s denials. (amp.cnn.com) There is no robust, quantifiable way to isolate how much that single hearing, versus the ongoing investigation and subsequent report, “significantly escalated” public controversy.

Because:

• The tone and media‑attention parts of the prediction clearly came true (contentious, widely covered, and to some extent revealing), but
• The claimed causal impact—that this specific hearing would significantly escalate controversy over Fauci’s role and a cover‑up—cannot be cleanly measured or attributed from available evidence,

the overall accuracy of the normalized prediction cannot be determined with confidence. Hence the classification "ambiguous" rather than clearly right or wrong.

Dr. Fauci did testify publicly before the House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic on Monday, June 3, 2024, and the hearing was widely covered and described as contentious or fiery, with sharp partisan exchanges and high political drama. (cbsnews.com) However, major mainstream accounts emphasize that the hearing did not produce new evidence or decisive revelations about a COVID “cover‑up.” Associated Press reporting on the hearing noted that after more than a year of investigation, the GOP-led subcommittee had found no evidence linking Fauci to wrongdoing and that there was no new scientific information resolving the lab‑leak versus natural‑origin debate. (waka.com) Scientific American similarly characterized the session as Fauci fending off allegations and calling cover‑up claims “simply preposterous,” without highlighting any breakthrough disclosures. (scientificamerican.com) CNN’s detailed takeaway piece focused on Fauci’s reiteration of long‑standing positions about COVID’s origins, his denial of influencing scientists via grants, and his description of ongoing death threats—again, not on any dramatic new facts emerging. (keyt.com) Some partisan or activist outlets on the right framed the hearing as producing “fireworks” or a “heated showdown,” largely because of confrontational questioning and calls for prosecution rather than because of substantiated new findings. (childrenshealthdefense.org) Taken together, the public record shows a high‑temperature but largely rehashing hearing, not one that “cracked open” a COVID cover‑up with major, widely recognized revelations, so Jason’s prediction is best judged as wrong.

As of November 30, 2025, Bitcoin has not "completely replaced gold" as a store-of-value asset:

• Gold’s total market value is still on the order of $15–$16 trillion, while Bitcoin’s market cap is roughly $1–1.5 trillion (depending on price), meaning gold remains far larger and more widely held as a reserve and wealth-preservation asset.
• Central banks continue to hold and accumulate gold as a reserve asset, while none treat Bitcoin as a primary reserve comparable to gold.
• Gold is still the dominant asset in jewelry and physical bullion markets, and is deeply embedded in institutional portfolios and monetary systems.

Bitcoin also has not yet gained broad transactional use for purchasing hard assets (e.g., real estate, cars, large capital goods). While there are niche examples of real estate or cars being bought with Bitcoin, these remain exceptions rather than a mainstream, system-wide practice; most high‑value asset markets are still priced and settled in fiat currencies, with Bitcoin rarely used directly as the payment medium.

However, Chamath’s claim was framed as an eventual, long‑run outcome of the current halving+ETF cycle, without a specific date. Because this is a structural, multi‑cycle thesis about Bitcoin ultimately displacing gold and gaining widespread transactional utility, it is too early to judge it definitively right or wrong based solely on conditions in 2025.

Therefore, the appropriate classification as of now is “inconclusive (too early)”: the prediction has not come true yet, but also has not been invalidated by a missed time-bound target.

Jason’s prediction has two main parts:

1. A clear, pro‑crypto regulatory framework would emerge as a political issue by the 2024 U.S. general election.

   • On the law side, Congress had not passed a comprehensive, clear framework for crypto by Election Day (Nov 5, 2024). The House passed the FIT21 bill in May 2024, which would clarify SEC/CFTC jurisdiction over digital assets, but it stalled in the Senate and never became law in that Congress.(mayerbrown.com) The first major federal framework, the GENIUS Act on stablecoins, was only enacted in July 2025 under Trump, i.e., after the election.(en.wikipedia.org) So a formal, enacted “crypto framework” did not exist yet for voters to respond to in 2024.
   • On the politics side, crypto policy clearly did become a visible campaign issue for a minority of voters and elites. Industry‑ and crypto‑adjacent surveys (DCG/Harris, Gemini, Grayscale, Paradigm, etc.) consistently found that roughly 20% of some voter samples considered crypto a “major” or “significant” issue, and that many wanted candidates to talk more about regulation.(cryptopotato.com) A Paradigm poll in October 2024 found that 5% of voters were “single‑issue” crypto voters.(paradigm.xyz) Trump explicitly campaigned on ending the “war on crypto,” promised to fire SEC Chair Gary Gensler, and attracted significant crypto‑industry money via the Fairshake super PAC and other efforts; contemporaneous summaries describe crypto regulation as a wedge issue in the 2024 race.(en.wikipedia.org)
   • At the same time, mainstream issue polling and the televised debates show crypto was not a top‑tier concern for most voters. Large non‑industry polls list the economy, inflation, democracy, abortion, immigration, etc. as the dominant issues; crypto usually doesn’t appear on those lists.(today.yougov.com) The Harris–Trump debate in September 2024 did not mention crypto at all, and analysis in both crypto and general‑finance media argued this reflected how low it ranked for the broader electorate.(coindesk.com) One post‑hoc critique also points out that industry‑funded polls may overstate both usage and salience of crypto.(bettermarkets.org)
   • Net: crypto regulation clearly emerged as a recognizable campaign and wedge issue for a niche but non‑trivial slice of voters and donors, but not as a clear, enacted pro‑crypto regulatory framework understood by the general electorate. Whether that matches what Jason meant by a “crypto framework” is interpretive rather than factual.

2. Supporting crypto would be worth roughly 5 percentage points of the vote in that election.

   • The main quantitative support for a “5‑point” effect comes from the Paradigm polling that 5% of voters self‑describe as single‑issue crypto voters.(paradigm.xyz) Paradigm itself emphasized that 5% is larger than the 1–2 point margins typical in key swing states, implying that, in theory, a strongly pro‑crypto stance could swing close races. This is almost exactly Jason’s “worth probably five points” framing.
   • However, there is no solid evidence that pro‑crypto positions actually produced a ~5‑point shift in realized vote share:
     • Even crypto‑friendly coverage notes that a Paradigm‑commissioned poll found just 5% of likely voters considered crypto a key issue, underscoring how small this bloc is nationally.(coindesk.com)
     • Broader polls show crypto ranks near the bottom of issues, especially among men 18–29, where it came dead last among 28 tested issues.(blueprint-research.com)
     • Post‑election commentary argues that crypto money and PAC spending mattered more than any measurable “crypto voter” bloc; one analysis explicitly doubts that single‑issue crypto voters had a large electoral impact, suggesting industry cash did the heavy lifting.(dlnews.com)
     • No exit polls or rigorous academic studies attribute a ~5‑percentage‑point net swing in national or swing‑state margins specifically to candidates’ crypto stances, as opposed to the dominant issues (economy, democracy, abortion, immigration, etc.).(grokipedia.com)
   • Because the available data are either industry‑funded and hypothetical (“could swing,” “could decide”) or high‑level and non‑specific, we cannot confidently say that being pro‑crypto actually yielded ~5 extra points for any candidate in 2024.

Why this is scored “ambiguous”:

• There is credible evidence that crypto policy and regulatory debates did emerge as a visible, partisan wedge issue, especially in elite politics and among a notable minority of voters; in that narrow sense, part of Jason’s intuition was directionally right.(en.wikipedia.org)
• But a clear, enacted pro‑crypto regulatory framework did not exist by Election Day 2024, and the claim that supporting crypto was “worth probably five points” cannot be empirically validated: we only have suggestive polls, no robust measurement of an actual 5‑point vote effect.(mayerbrown.com)

Because one part of the prediction is partly borne out in a limited way (salience as an issue) while the stronger claims (a clear framework in place and a realized ~5‑point electoral payoff) are not clearly supported nor clearly disproven by the available evidence, the overall forecast cannot be cleanly classified as simply right or wrong. Hence, “ambiguous.”

Several key parts of Chamath’s scenario cannot be directly tested with available post‑election data, even though the 2024 election has already occurred.

1. Size of the crypto‑holder population (~50M)
   Surveys before the election estimated that roughly 15–20% of U.S. adults had invested in or used cryptocurrency. Pew Research in 2024 found 17% of American adults had ever used or invested in crypto, which corresponds to tens of millions of people, broadly consistent with a 40–50M range. (washingtonpost.com) Industry and advocacy groups later cited figures around 50–52M U.S. crypto owners (about 15% of adults), again roughly matching his order‑of‑magnitude claim. (standwithcrypto.org) So his base population estimate is plausible, but that alone is not the core of the prediction.

2. Turnout among crypto holders ("80% show up")
   Pre‑election polling by Consensys/HarrisX and related reporting suggested extremely high intended turnout among crypto owners: around 92% said they planned to vote. (elections.harrisx.com) However, official election statistics and high‑quality post‑election studies (e.g., Pew’s validated voter work) do not report actual turnout rates specifically for crypto owners. No validated‑voter dataset I could find includes cryptocurrency ownership as a category. As a result, we cannot verify whether realized turnout among crypto holders was actually on the order of 80%.

3. Direction of the vote ("they're all going to vote for President Trump")
   Multiple pre‑election polls did find that crypto owners leaned toward Trump relative to non‑owners:

• A Fairleigh Dickinson University poll in August 2024 showed Trump leading Harris 50–38 among likely voters who own crypto, while Harris led 53–41 among non‑owners. (fdu.edu)
• A Paradigm‑linked survey in March 2024 found 48% of crypto holders planned to vote for Trump vs. 39% for Biden, a 9‑point edge. (cryptoslate.com)
  These results support the idea that crypto owners disproportionately favored Trump, but they do not show anything close to “all” or an overwhelming supermajority; they suggest a modest but meaningful lean, not unanimity.

4. Did this bloc swing the election by ~5 percentage points?
   The actual national popular‑vote margin in 2024 was about Trump 49.8% vs. Harris 48.3%, a Republican lead of roughly 1.5 percentage points, with Trump winning 312–226 in the Electoral College. (en.wikipedia.org) Some post‑election counterfactual analyses by Pew and others indicate that even if all eligible Americans had voted, Trump’s margin would likely have increased only modestly, not by anything like five full percentage points. (politico.com)

Crucially, though, no available dataset isolates the marginal effect of crypto holders on that margin. We do not have a credible estimate of what Trump’s vote share would have been in the absence of crypto owners, nor a validated measure of how many of them actually voted and for whom. Without that counterfactual, we can’t say whether they swung the race by 0.5 points, 2 points, 5 points, or not at all.

5. Overall assessment

• The existence and size of a substantial crypto‑interested electorate is broadly in line with his framing. (digitalchamber.org)
• The tendency of crypto owners to lean toward Trump is supported by multiple polls, though at single‑digit or low‑double‑digit margins rather than an overwhelming “all for Trump.” (fdu.edu)
• But the central, quantifiable pieces of the prediction — 80% turnout among ~50M holders and a resulting swing of up to 500 basis points in the election outcome — cannot be confirmed or refuted with current evidence, because those metrics are not directly observed in any validated post‑election data.

Because the core causal and quantitative claims about turnout and a 5‑point swing can’t be empirically tested with existing public data, the prediction cannot be cleanly labeled as right or wrong. It remains ambiguous rather than demonstrably fulfilled or refuted.

Available data strongly supports Chamath’s view so far, but it cannot prove a "never" prediction.

What’s happened to BAYC prices since the podcast (May 31, 2024):

• BAYC’s floor price peaked around 128–153 ETH in 2022, over $400k at the time. (cointelegraph.com)
• By April 2024, before the podcast, the floor had crashed to about 11 ETH, more than 90% below the peak. (cointelegraph.com)
• On May 1, 2024, CNBC reported a floor of about 13.4 ETH, versus a 128 ETH peak. (cnbc.com)
• In June 2024, multiple sources reported BAYC briefly plunging below 10 ETH (around 8.95–9.5 ETH on Blur/OpenSea). (knightsbridgedigital.com)
• A July 22, 2025 overview notes that by mid‑2025 the floor price was still only roughly 11–13 ETH. (digitalcollectables.biz)
• As of November 10, 2025, reports again show BAYC’s floor under 10 ETH (about 8.95 ETH on Blur, 9.49 ETH on OpenSea), still down more than 90% from the 2022 highs. (bitexes.com)

Interpretation:

• Since Chamath’s May 2024 comment, BAYC has not “gone back up” anywhere close to prior bubble highs; it has instead stayed in the ~9–13 ETH range, over 90% below peak levels.
• That is consistent with his claim that the apes would not recover to their old bubble valuations and would remain effectively crushed in value relative to the peak.
• However, because his wording was effectively "never" (no meaningful recovery ever), and markets could in principle re-inflate in the future, we cannot definitively say the prediction is finally and irreversibly correct.

So, based on the data up to November 30, 2025, the prediction has not been falsified and is currently tracking well, but in strict terms it remains inconclusive (too early) to declare a timeless “never” prediction fully right.

How the prediction was framed

Sacks’ prediction had two parts:

1. The ~20% post‑earnings drop in late May 2024 would be a buying opportunity for Salesforce (CRM).
2. Marc Benioff would successfully pivot Salesforce to benefit from the AI trend rather than missing it or being caught flat‑footed.

1. Was the May 2024 crash a buying opportunity?

• After weak Q1 FY25 results, Salesforce fell about 20% on May 30, 2024, closing near $216, its worst day since 2004. (upi.com)
• The next day (May 31, 2024) it rebounded but still finished the month around $232–234 per share. (statmuse.com)
• From that level, CRM went on a very strong run:
  • It reached a highest closing price of $365.66 on December 4, 2024, up roughly 55–60% from the late‑May closing level. (statmuse.com)
  • It ended 2024 at about $333 per share, still ~40% above the May 31 close. (digrin.com)
• By late November 2025, the stock has round‑tripped back near its May 2024 level (around $230.54 vs. ~$232–234 then), meaning a buy‑and‑hold investor from May 2024 to now would be roughly flat and would have underperformed the broader market. (statmuse.com)

However, Sacks did not specify a holding period—only that the drop would prove to be a buying opportunity. In the 6–12 months after the call, buyers had multiple chances to realize very substantial gains (40–60% at year‑end 2024 and even more at the December 4 peak). In common investing language, that qualifies the May 2024 plunge as having been a buying opportunity, even if the stock later gave back those gains.

2. Did Benioff pivot Salesforce to AI instead of missing the trend?

Evidence strongly supports that Salesforce leaned into AI rather than missing it:

• Salesforce launched Einstein Copilot, a conversational generative‑AI assistant embedded across its CRM, first announced in February 2024 and made generally available in April 2024; it’s grounded in customer data via Data Cloud and marketed as part of the “Einstein 1 Platform” (now Salesforce Platform). (salesforce.com)
• Salesforce then introduced Agentforce, positioning itself as the “#1 AI CRM” and emphasizing autonomous AI agents that automate customer‑facing workflows. Earnings commentary highlighted hundreds of early Agentforce deals and a large AI deal pipeline. (cnbc.com)
• By mid‑2025, management and analysts were pointing to fast‑growing AI and data‑related annual recurring revenue (hundreds of millions to over $1 billion in ARR) and to AI as a central driver of Salesforce’s long‑term growth plan, including guidance to exceed $60 billion in revenue by 2030 with AI‑driven products like Agentforce 360 at the core. (reuters.com)
• Internally, Benioff has said AI “digital employees” now do roughly 30–50% of Salesforce’s own work, underlining how aggressively the company has adopted AI in its operations. (sfchronicle.com)

There is ongoing debate about how quickly Salesforce can monetize these AI offerings, and some recent commentary notes investor concern that AI could be more disruptive than accretive until monetization catches up. (barrons.com) But the factual record is clear: Salesforce did not sit out the AI wave—it rebranded itself as an AI‑first CRM platform, launched multiple AI products, built a substantial AI deal pipeline, and tied its long‑term financial guidance directly to AI.

Overall assessment

• Stock call: The May 2024 plunge was a buying opportunity over the subsequent year, with 40–60% gains available to investors who bought near the lows and exited during the 2024–early‑2025 rally.
• Strategic/AI call: Benioff did pivot Salesforce aggressively toward AI, with Einstein Copilot, Agentforce, and AI‑driven revenue and internal usage becoming central to the company’s narrative and product roadmap.

Given that both key elements of Sacks’ prediction largely materialized, despite later volatility and lingering questions about AI monetization, the prediction is best classified as right overall.

Sacks predicted that Donald Trump’s New York hush‑money/business‑records conviction would eventually be overturned on appeal, but only after the November 5, 2024 election.

What has actually happened so far:

• Trump was convicted in New York on 34 felony counts of falsifying business records related to the Stormy Daniels hush‑money payments on May 30, 2024, and later received an unconditional discharge at sentencing on January 10, 2025. (en.wikipedia.org)
• Trump has appealed the conviction in New York’s state courts (notice of appeal filed January 29, 2025; a formal appeal seeking to overturn the conviction filed in October 2025). (en.wikipedia.org)
• Separately, a federal appeals court in November 2025 gave him another chance to try to move the case to federal court, where he would then argue for dismissal on presidential‑immunity grounds, but that ruling only ordered further consideration—it did not vacate the conviction. (washingtonpost.com)
• Major overviews of Trump’s legal status as of late November 2025 still describe him as convicted in the New York hush‑money case and “seeking to overturn that conviction,” indicating no court has yet set the verdict aside. (apnews.com)

Because the conviction remains in place and the appeals (both in state court and via the attempted federal removal route) are still unresolved as of November 30, 2025, we don’t yet know whether it will “get tossed on appeal.” It has remained in effect through and beyond the November 5, 2024 election, matching his timing claim so far, but the core question—whether it will ultimately be overturned—has not been decided. Therefore the prediction’s accuracy is inconclusive (too early to tell).

Available polling of independents and undecided/swing voters after Trump’s May 30, 2024 New York conviction shows a net negative reaction, not a sympathy-driven boost.

Key evidence:

• A Reuters/Ipsos poll summarized by Forbes found that among independents, 25% said the conviction made them less likely to vote for Trump, vs only 18% who said more likely—a clear net negative effect. Over half of independents in the same coverage said he should drop out of the race. (forbes.com)
• A Politico/Ipsos poll reported that 32% of independents were less likely to support Trump after the verdict, while only 12% were more likely; 53% of independents said he was guilty. (benzinga.com) Another Politico/Ipsos reading found 21% of independents less likely vs 5% more likely—again a net negative. (onnradio.com)
• An AP‑NORC survey found overall views of Trump and Biden were essentially unchanged from before the verdict, with independents divided on Trump and no sign of a broad sympathy surge; about half of U.S. adults approved of the conviction. (ny1.com)
• Morning Consult’s post‑verdict polling showed a majority of independents (about 52%) approved of the conviction and a similar share believed Trump had committed crimes, even as many opposed imprisoning him—suggesting limited sympathy for Trump himself, rather than for harsh punishment. (pro.morningconsult.com)
• A separate summary of polling noted that 52% of independents thought Trump should end his 2024 campaign after the conviction, underscoring admonishment rather than increased sympathy. (gvwire.com)

On Election Day, Trump did perform better with independents than in 2020 (e.g., Pew finds independents including leaners split 48–48 between Trump and Harris in 2024, after favoring Biden by 9 points in 2020; Edison data shows self‑identified independents 49% Harris, 46% Trump). (pewresearch.org) Other analyses suggest his share of the independent vote rose several points and that independents were pivotal in swing states. (thefulcrum.us) But these longer‑run shifts are driven by many factors (economy, immigration, Harris replacing Biden, etc.), and the direct polling on the conviction itself shows it initially hurt him with independents rather than generating net sympathy.

Because multiple independent polls consistently show that, among independents and undecided/swing voters, more people moved away from Trump than toward him in response to the New York conviction—and many wanted him to drop out—the prediction that the conviction would create a net sympathy effect and thus improve his standing with that group going into 2024 is best classified as wrong.

Donald Trump’s New York business‑records/hush‑money case resulted in a May 2024 felony conviction on 34 counts, but when he was finally sentenced on January 10, 2025, Judge Juan Merchan imposed an unconditional discharge—no jail time, no probation, no fine, and no community service—leaving only collateral consequences such as a felony record, loss of gun rights, and a DNA submission requirement. (apnews.com) The conviction remains on the books and is being appealed in New York’s courts, and Trump has also pursued related federal litigation seeking to move or undo the case; so far, no appellate court has overturned the verdict. (theguardian.com) Because this is a state conviction, it is not subject to a presidential pardon, and no form of clemency has mooted it. (theguardian.com) However, by late 2025 the criminal‑justice outcome is effectively limited to a largely symbolic sentence with minimal practical punishment, while Trump continues to serve again as president, which aligns with Jason’s core claim that the case would function more like a political “speeding ticket” than a source of severe long‑term punishment—even though his more specific expectations about an outright overturning or pardon have not (at least yet) materialized. (theguardian.com)

Trump was convicted in May 2024 on 34 felony counts in the New York hush‑money case, making him a legally defined felon during the 2024 campaign.(apnews.com) After the verdict, Democrats explicitly incorporated his felony status into their messaging: the DNC and Biden/Harris campaigns ran paid ads and billboards labeling him a convicted felon and framing the race as prosecutor versus felon, including the Phoenix billboard, the Character Matters ad, and the Law & Order–style convention spot, as well as broader strategy pieces describing this contrast as a key weapon.(cbsnews.com) Despite this, Trump won the 2024 presidential election with 312 electoral votes and a popular‑vote plurality, and Republicans captured the presidency and control of Congress, indicating that the felon‑focused line of attack did not prevent his political success or keep him from remaining highly competitive and ultimately victorious.(en.wikipedia.org) Given that the strategy was clearly used and Trump still prevailed, Sacks’s prediction that it was probably not going to work is borne out by the eventual results.

By late 2025, the tech/AI/SaaS space does not look like it entered a prolonged “slow contraction” starting in mid‑2024, nor like an initial AI mini‑bubble that burst and then deflated.

1. Valuations and sector size went up, not down.
Bessemer’s 2025 Cloud 100 report shows the leading private cloud/AI companies’ aggregate value jumping from about $820B in 2024 to about $1.1T in 2025, a ~36% increase, with valuations at all‑time highs and AI companies accounting for a rapidly growing share of that value. This is expansion, not contraction. (bvp.com)

2. Multiple compression was real, but ongoing since 2021, not a new mid‑2024 “reckoning.”
Cloud/AI revenue multiples have been drifting down from their 2021 peak for several years. Bessemer notes Cloud 100 revenue multiples falling from 26× (2023) to 23× (2024) to ~20× (2025), about 40% below the 2021 peak, while total valuations still hit records. (bvp.com) Public SaaS indices such as the BVP Nasdaq Emerging Cloud Index are trading around 7–8× revenue in 2024–25—roughly 65–70% below 2021 peaks, but described as having stabilized, not entering a new phase of contraction starting mid‑2024. (rockingweb.com.au) So multiples compressed, but that process began years earlier and coexisted with very strong growth in overall sector value.

3. Investor enthusiasm for AI remained extremely strong.
Far from a deflating mini‑bubble, AI names increasingly dominated markets through 2025. A widely cited overview of the “AI bubble” notes that in 2025 AI‑related enterprises were responsible for roughly 80% of U.S. stock‑market gains, that market concentration in a handful of mega‑cap tech/AI firms reached the highest levels in about 50 years, and that valuations were in the most stretched territory since the dot‑com era. (en.wikipedia.org) Parallel coverage of the AI trade describes “insatiable enthusiasm,” with Nvidia’s market cap briefly exceeding $4–5T, OpenAI’s private valuation rising into the hundreds of billions, and an IPO/financing boom for AI infrastructure and software firms. (financialcontent.com) Major platforms like Alphabet, Oracle, Palantir, and others saw huge 2025 gains explicitly tied to AI optimism. (reuters.com)

4. Net effect vs. the prediction.
The prediction was that, starting around mid‑2024, tech—especially AI and SaaS—was beginning a slow contraction driven by multiple compression and waning enthusiasm, marking the bursting of an initial AI mini‑bubble. What actually happened is better characterized as:

• Continued, gradual multiple normalization from 2021 extremes, but
• Record‑high aggregate valuations and sector size, and
• Intensifying AI hype and capital flows through 2025, not sustained cooling.

Taken together, the core thrust of the prediction—an AI/tech mini‑bubble starting to deflate into a slow contraction from mid‑2024 onward—has not played out by November 2025. The sector instead experienced an even larger AI boom with only intermittent corrections, so the forecast is best judged as wrong.

As of 30 November 2025, the conditions and time horizon of Chamath’s prediction have not clearly played out yet.

1. What the prediction requires The normalized prediction is conditional and medium‑term:

• If hyperscalers keep spending tens of billions per quarter on AI infra without commensurate new revenue,
• then, within the next few years, Nvidia’s valuation will prove unjustified and both Nvidia and the big spenders will suffer significant share‑price punishment.

The key pieces to check are: (a) continued huge AI capex, (b) lack of matching revenue/earnings, and (c) a major, sustained drawdown in Nvidia and hyperscaler stocks within a few years of May 2024. We’re only ~18 months into that window.

2. What has actually happened so far

Spending:

• Google/Alphabet has sharply ramped technical‑infrastructure and AI spending, guiding ~$85–90B of annual capex, mostly for servers, data centers and networking to meet AI cloud demand.【0search7】【0news16】
• Amazon plans around $100B of AWS capex in 2025, with quarterly capex in the low‑$20Bs to $30B+ range, the “vast majority” on AI infrastructure.【0search3】【0search8】
• Microsoft’s capex has risen into the tens of billions per quarter as well, largely to support Azure and AI workloads.【2news13】

So the “tens of billions per quarter” spending part is clearly happening.

Revenues/earnings:

• AWS became a >$100B‑per‑year business in 2024 with ~$107.6B in sales and ~$39.8B operating income, 19% YoY growth, as Amazon simultaneously prepares ~$100B of AI‑heavy capex in 2025.【0search5】【0search3】
• Alphabet’s Google Cloud revenue grew 32% YoY to $13.6B in a recent quarter, with a $106B backlog, and management explicitly ties its elevated capex to strong AI and cloud demand.【0search7】
• Microsoft reports that Azure surpassed $75B in annual revenue, growing in the low‑to‑mid‑30% range, and total Microsoft Cloud revenue is growing ~27% YoY, framed by the company itself as driven by cloud and AI.【0search0】【0search2】

In other words, substantial incremental revenue and profit are already showing up, even though investors still argue about whether these returns are fully “commensurate” with the capex.

Stock‑price behavior: Starting near Chamath’s podcast date (31 May 2024) and looking through late 2025:

• Nvidia (NVDA) closed at about $109.6 on 31 May 2024; recent prices are around $177–180, a gain of roughly 60%+.【1search0】【0finance0】 Nvidia even briefly reached a $4T market cap in July 2025, becoming the world’s most valuable company due to AI chip demand.【3search0】【3search1】
• Microsoft (MSFT) rose from about $411 at 31 May 2024 to roughly $490–520 in late 2025.【2search0】【0finance1】
• Alphabet (GOOGL) went from about $171 to around $280–320, and its market cap is now approaching $4T, with the stock up ~70% in 2025 alone on AI optimism.【1search1】【0finance2】【3news12】
• Amazon (AMZN) climbed from about $176 to the low‑$230s.【1search3】【0finance3】
• Meta (META) moved from about $464 to the mid‑$600s.【2search4】【0finance4】

There have been sizable pullbacks and sector wobbliness in late 2025 (e.g., Nvidia giving back hundreds of billions from a peak above $5T, short‑term 10–15% drops on AI‑ROI fears),【0news14】【3news13】 but from the May 2024 baseline these names are still dramatically higher, not “punished.”

3. Why this is not yet a clean “right” or “wrong” call

• The timeframe Chamath pointed to was “within the next few years” from mid‑2024. As of late 2025, that window is only partially elapsed; markets could still reassess the ROI of AI capex and re‑rate these stocks lower in 2026–27.
• The prediction is explicitly conditional on hyperscalers not showing incremental revenue/earnings from their AI spending. So far, they are in fact reporting large and growing cloud/AI revenue and profits; whether that is “commensurate” is partly subjective, and the condition has arguably not been met yet.
• Because the antecedent (“no incremental revenue”) is not clearly satisfied, we can’t empirically test the “then they will be punished” part. At the same time, the observed outcome so far (Nvidia + hyperscalers up sharply) runs opposite to the spirit of his warning, but that could still change before his vague “few years” horizon fully expires.

Given this, the forecast cannot yet be definitively scored as right or wrong. The AI capex boom and Nvidia’s valuation have so far been rewarded, not punished, but the specified time window and the conditional nature of his statement mean the final verdict is still open.

Conclusion: it’s too early to declare a definitive outcome, so the appropriate rating is **“inconclusive (too early).”

Why this prediction missed

1. No sustained U.S. economic slowdown from mid‑2024 onward. Real U.S. GDP grew at a 2.8% annualized rate in Q3 2024 and 2.3–2.4% in Q4 2024, with full‑year 2024 growth at 2.8%—above the post‑2000 average.(cnbc.com) After a brief 0.5–0.6% contraction in Q1 2025, GDP rebounded sharply to about 3.8% annualized in Q2 2025.(tradingeconomics.com) That pattern (solid 2H24 growth plus a one‑quarter dip followed by strong re‑acceleration) is not a “slow contraction from mid‑2024 onward.”

2. Enterprise / IT spending kept growing rather than falling. Gartner’s forecasts through 2024–2026 show rising worldwide IT outlays: up ~7.5% in 2024, with software and data‑center systems growing double‑digits, and further 7.9–9.3% growth projected for 2025, again led by software and AI‑driven infrastructure.(gartner.com) Gartner does note a 2025 “pause on net‑new spending” due to macro uncertainty, but explicitly says this is outweighed by ongoing AI digitization initiatives, not a broad pullback.(gartner.com) That is inconsistent with “reduced spending” and “reduced conversion of enterprise customers to buy anything.”

3. Tech stocks did not enter a sustained contraction; many hit record highs. The Nasdaq Composite was already near record levels in June 2024 and went on to set new all‑time highs in June 2025, alongside the S&P 500.(marketwatch.com) The Nasdaq‑100 likewise notched a record close of ~22,190 in June 2025 and later, by November 28, 2025, the Nasdaq was up ~21% year‑to‑date.(reuters.com) Sector ETFs focused on software and cloud—exactly the kind of enterprise tech he was talking about—show gains, not a sustained bear market: IGV returned about +27% in 2024 and is modestly positive in 2025 overall,(companiesmarketcap.com) while WCLD shows mid‑teens 1‑year returns as of September 2025 despite volatility.(myplaniq.com) Those trajectories contradict the idea of an enduring sector‑wide contraction.

4. Valuation multiples did not broadly compress across public tech. As of November 2025, IGV’s price/earnings ratio is around 52, a very elevated level by historical standards,(ishares.com) and market commentary through 2025 repeatedly highlights concerns about stretched AI‑driven tech valuations, not cheapened ones.(apnews.com) Even where there were pockets of de‑rating—e.g., a software ETF falling ~21% from a recent high and CIOs trimming budget growth expectations from 4% to 3% amid tariff worries—analysts still emphasized strong long‑term growth and only modest near‑term caution.(barrons.com) That is a far cry from broad, lasting multiple compression across tech.

Taken together, the data show: (a) continued macro growth with just a brief 2025 soft patch, (b) rising, not falling, enterprise tech spending, and (c) technology equity markets that, while volatile, reached record levels and retained high valuations rather than entering a long, contractionary, multiple‑compression phase. That makes the prediction wrong in both its macro and sector‑specific components.

Available public information confirms that Poker Power does run a Summer Bootcamp tied to All-In Summit tickets, but does not provide data on how fast the 2024 cohort filled or whether all spots were taken.

What we can see:

• Poker Power currently advertises a 2025 Summer Bootcamp, a free 2‑week virtual program that is explicitly capped (“reserved for the first 100 people who register”) and culminates in a tournament awarding two tickets to the 2025 All‑In Summit. Registration is described as first‑come, first‑served, with a prominent “Register” call‑to‑action, but there is no public indicator of whether or when capacity is reached. (pokerpower.com)
• Site‑wide banners and blog pages reference a “Win All‑In Summit tickets! FREE 2‑week poker bootcamp + tournament” promotion, which is clearly the same campaign, but again they provide no enrollment statistics or waitlist/sell‑out notices. (pokerpower.com)

However:

• There is no accessible archived 2024 Summer Bootcamp landing page (e.g., a 2024-summer-bootcamp URL or similar) and no press release or news item describing the 2024 women’s bootcamp filling its 80‑spot capacity or selling out quickly.
• Searches across Poker Power’s site and broader web (including news and blog coverage) do not turn up any statements about 2024 registration numbers, sell‑out timing, or a public waitlist for that year’s women‑only summer bootcamp.

Because Jason’s claim is very specific—that the 2024 women’s summer bootcamp with 80 spots would "fill up quick" after the episode—verifying it would require internal registration data or explicit public confirmation that the 80 places sold out rapidly. No such evidence is available from public web sources, and there is also no counter‑evidence that it failed to fill or was still advertising open spots near the start date.

Given the lack of concrete public data either confirming or refuting the bootcamp’s fill rate in 2024, the prediction cannot be reliably judged as correct or incorrect. Therefore the outcome has to be classified as ambiguous rather than right, wrong, or merely “too early to tell.”

Jason makes this statement at the end of the May 31, 2024 episode, saying they are "going to do a party in Vegas" when they hit a million subscribers, in the context of directing listeners to the YouTube channel. (podscripts.co)

However, multiple independent analytics trackers show that the All-In Podcast YouTube channel has not yet reached 1,000,000 subscribers as of late November 2025. Social Blade lists the channel at around 963K subscribers in late October 2025, while its realtime page and history show mid–900Ks through fall 2025. (socialblade.com) SPEAKRJ reports 972K subscribers as of November 23, 2025, and SocialCounts.org shows roughly 975K subscribers on November 27, 2025—still below 1M. (speakrj.com)

Given that the trigger condition (1,000,000 YouTube subscribers) has not yet been met, we cannot know whether they will in fact hold a Vegas party at or near that milestone. The prediction therefore cannot yet be judged as either fulfilled or failed, so the correct status is "inconclusive (too early)".