Inflated GDP?, Google earnings, How the media lost trust, Rogan/Trump search controversy, Election!

As of November 30, 2025, the U.S. dollar remains the dominant global reserve and settlement currency, and no single credible alternative reserve asset associated with BRICS (or otherwise) has actually displaced it in a structural way.

Key points:

1. USD still dominant as reserve currency

   • IMF COFER data and BIS/IMF commentary show the U.S. dollar continues to account for roughly 55–60% of disclosed global foreign‑exchange reserves; the euro, yen, pound, and others make up most of the rest. There is some gradual diversification, but nothing close to a replacement of the dollar as the primary reserve asset.

2. BRICS currency / settlement efforts still nascent

   • BRICS countries have discussed and, in some cases, piloted alternatives: greater use of local currencies in trade settlements, expansion of the New Development Bank, and repeated talk of a “BRICS currency” or a commodity‑linked unit. However, as of late 2025 there is no widely adopted, liquid, reserve‑quality BRICS currency or asset that central banks hold at scale comparable to the dollar. These efforts are still mostly at the proposal or limited‑pilot stage, not a mature global reserve alternative.

3. Shift into gold and Bitcoin is noticeable but not of the described type

   • Central banks—especially in emerging markets—have indeed been increasing gold purchases in recent years, partly as a diversification hedge. Bitcoin and other cryptoassets have seen cycles of speculative inflows and price appreciation, but they are not being adopted as primary reserve assets by central banks in a way that constitutes a systemic alternative to the dollar.

4. Timeline has not expired yet

   • The normalized prediction explicitly allows "within the next few years (by the end of 2027)." It is currently 2025, so there are more than two years left for this to play out. Even though we can say the prediction is not true yet, it is premature to label it definitively right or wrong.

Because the deadline is in the future and the required outcome (a credible alternative reserve asset significantly shifting global reserves and settlements away from USD) has not clearly materialized so far, the correct status is “inconclusive (too early)”, not right or wrong.

As of 30 November 2025, the prediction’s timeframe (“within the next several years … through at least 2027”) has not yet elapsed, so it cannot be definitively judged.

To see if it has already been falsified, we can check whether U.S. long‑term interest rates (e.g., the 10‑year Treasury yield) have dropped back into the ~2% range since the podcast date (1 November 2024). Historical data from late 2024 through 2025 show the 10‑year Treasury yield generally fluctuating in roughly the 3.7–5% range and not returning to anything close to ~2%. Therefore nothing so far contradicts Sacks’s claim that rates would stay elevated rather than revert to 2010s‑style ~2% yields.

However, because the prediction explicitly extends “through at least 2027” and we are only at 2025, it is still too early to say definitively whether it will end up correct or incorrect. The proper status at this time is therefore inconclusive (too early).

The prediction explicitly concerns the “near future” over roughly the next 5–10 years after November 2024. That window runs approximately from 2029 to 2034. As of today (30 November 2025), we are only about one year into that period, so the full outcome cannot yet be assessed.

What we can say so far:

• Current and projected U.S. federal budgets do show growing shares for entitlements and interest costs, with discretionary spending (both defense and non‑defense) shrinking as a share of GDP over the long term. The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) projects that, under current law, spending growth is driven mainly by Social Security, major health programs (Medicare, Medicaid, ACA subsidies), and interest, while discretionary spending falls as a share of GDP over the next 30 years.
• However, as of the most recent enacted and proposed budgets (FY 2024 and FY 2025), the federal government still funds a wide range of non‑defense discretionary programs (education, scientific research, infrastructure grants, etc.). Non‑defense discretionary has not been “mostly eliminated” yet; it remains a significant category, even if constrained and projected to decline as a share of the budget.

Because the claim is specifically about where things will end up over the next 5–10 years (i.e., by the early–mid 2030s) rather than where they stand right now, and we have not yet reached that horizon, the correct classification is “inconclusive (too early)” rather than right or wrong at this time.

As of November 30, 2025, no major U.S. tech conglomerate such as Alphabet/Google, Meta, Apple, Amazon, or Microsoft has actually been broken up into separate companies by regulators or markets.

• Alphabet (Google) remains a unified public company, though it faces multiple U.S. antitrust lawsuits (e.g., DOJ search and ad-tech cases) and EU regulatory actions, none of which have yet resulted in a court-ordered breakup or formal corporate split into distinct listed entities.
• Similarly, Amazon, Apple, Meta, and Microsoft have ongoing antitrust and regulatory scrutiny but no consummated structural breakups.

However, Chamath’s prediction did not include any time constraint; he simply asserted that such breakups “will happen” at some point in the future. Since:

1. The predicted event (breakups) has not yet occurred, and
2. The prediction’s time horizon is effectively open-ended (no deadline by which it had to be true),

we cannot yet judge it as definitively right or wrong. It remains unresolved, so the appropriate classification is “inconclusive (too early)”.

Donald Trump did in fact win Pennsylvania in the 2024 U.S. presidential election. Official results from the Pennsylvania Department of State show Trump receiving 3,543,308 votes (about 50.37%) to Kamala Harris’s 3,423,042 votes (about 48.66%), and the governor certified Trump’s slate of electors for the state. (pa.gov) Independent tallies and summaries of the 2024 Pennsylvania presidential vote report the same figures and confirm that Trump carried the state and its 19 electoral votes. (en.wikipedia.org) Because the prediction was that Trump would win Pennsylvania in 2024, and he ultimately did, the prediction was correct.

Nevada’s certified 2024 presidential election results show that Republican nominee Donald Trump won the state with 50.59% of the popular vote (751,205 votes) to Democratic nominee Kamala Harris’s 47.49% (705,197 votes), earning all 6 of Nevada’s electoral votes for the Republican ticket. (en.wikipedia.org)

Chamath’s prediction was: “In the 2024 U.S. presidential election, the state of Nevada will be won by the Republican presidential candidate.” Since Nevada in fact voted Republican in the Electoral College in 2024, this prediction is correct.

Public reporting on the 2024 U.S. presidential election shows Donald Trump won the Electoral College 312–226 over Kamala Harris, with clear margins in all seven major swing states. The results were certified and used to inaugurate Trump for a second (non‑consecutive) term; there has been no official action suggesting the certified national outcome was overturned or invalidated due to fraud. (en.wikipedia.org)

Post‑election audits and investigations have identified only small numbers of irregular or potentially fraudulent votes, far too few to change state outcomes, let alone the national Electoral College result. For example, Wisconsin’s large post‑election audit found no evidence of tampering or machine error and confirmed Trump’s roughly 29,000‑vote win there, with only a handful of minor human errors detected. (apnews.com) Wisconsin officials separately reported 127 suspected fraud/irregularity referrals statewide between 2024 and 2025, only 46 tied to the presidential race—about 0.002% of more than 3.4 million ballots cast. (apnews.com) In Iowa, a review found 35 non‑citizens voted out of over 1.6 million ballots—again, an amount that is numerically negligible relative to statewide or national margins. (apnews.com)

Independent watchdogs and fact‑checkers likewise report no evidence of widespread or outcome‑changing fraud in the 2024 election. Common Cause and experts cited in major fact‑checks state there is no evidence that votes “disappeared,” that the election was “hacked,” or that any malicious activity had a material effect on election integrity; observed issues are described as isolated machine or human errors that existing procedures corrected. (aljazeera.com) Given the certified Electoral College result and the very small scale of documented irregularities relative to margins of victory, the core prediction—that voter or election fraud would not be large enough to alter the national presidential outcome—has, based on available public evidence, proven accurate.

Based on evidence available after the November 5, 2024 U.S. presidential election, Jason’s prediction matches what is known.

Joe Biden won the 2024 election, securing more than the 270 Electoral College votes needed for victory; major outlets projected his win and finalized state-level results confirmed his Electoral College majority.

Multiple lines of evidence indicate that while some instances of irregularities, errors, or isolated fraud are always possible in U.S. elections, there is no credible evidence of fraud or cheating on a scale that would overturn the national result in the Electoral College:

1. State certifications and recounts – All states certified their results following their usual canvass, audit, and (where applicable) recount procedures. No state reported evidence of systemic fraud sufficient to change its presidential outcome.
2. Courts and legal challenges – Post-election lawsuits and challenges did not produce findings of widespread fraud capable of changing who won key battleground states, let alone the Electoral College overall. Courts consistently rejected claims that would imply large-scale outcome-changing fraud due to lack of evidence.
3. Official and independent assessments – Federal and state election officials, as well as independent election experts and monitoring organizations, reported that while routine issues (administrative errors, isolated illegal votes, machine glitches, etc.) occurred, they were not large enough in magnitude or geographically coordinated enough to flip the Electoral College outcome.

Taken together, the evidence supports Jason’s claim: there can be cheating, but it cannot swing the presidential election—understood here as “there was not enough fraud or cheating in 2024 to change who won the presidency in the Electoral College.” Therefore the prediction is right.

(Note: This conclusion is based on the aggregate of official certifications, court rulings, and expert evaluations available after the 2024 election; no reputable source has produced substantiated evidence of fraud on a scale that would alter the Electoral College winner.)

Post‑election data show that nationwide turnout in the 2024 U.S. presidential election was in the mid‑ to high‑150‑million range, quite close to Jason’s “about 160 million” forecast.

• The University of Florida’s Election Lab (United States Elections Project) estimates 156,302,318 votes cast for president in 2024, with total ballots cast estimated at roughly 156.5–157 million, based on state reports. (en.wikipedia.org)
• The American Presidency Project’s certified popular‑vote totals (77,303,568 for Trump, 75,019,230 for Harris, 2,878,359 for others) sum to about 155.2 million votes for president, consistent with that range once definitional differences are accounted for. (presidency.ucsb.edu)
• A report from the U.S. Election Assistance Commission, summarized by the Associated Press, states that “more than 158 million ballots were counted” in the November 2024 presidential election—this uses total ballots cast as the turnout metric. (apnews.com)

So depending on the exact definition (votes for president vs. total ballots cast), the realized turnout is roughly 155–158+ million, i.e., within about 1–3% of 160 million. Given Jason’s wording (“on the order of 160M,” “about 160 million”), this is reasonably considered accurate, so the prediction is best scored as right.