White House BTS, Google buys Wiz, Treasury vs Fed, Space Rescue

Alphabet announced its agreement to acquire Wiz for about $32 billion on March 18, 2025, its largest deal ever and the biggest cybersecurity M&A transaction to date. (investopedia.com) Analysts at the time explicitly framed the deal as a key test and potential catalyst for a new wave of Big Tech and cybersecurity M&A, saying it could “open the door to a massive wave of M&A across the tech landscape.” (spglobal.com) In the subsequent quarter, U.S. venture-backed exits surged: PitchBook/NVCA data show Q2 2025 exit value of about $67.7 billion — the highest quarterly level since 2021 and roughly 70–76% higher year over year — with IPOs and acquisitions both contributing. (tailwindventures.co) That rebound was driven by multiple large liquidity events, including major IPOs such as CoreWeave (the largest U.S. tech IPO since 2021) and later offerings like Circle and Voyager, alongside a 61% increase in total U.S. IPO count versus the same point in 2024. (cnbc.com) Although the recovery is still incomplete and causality cannot be pinned solely on the Wiz deal, the near-term period after the announcement did in fact see a clear, widely noted pickup in large IPOs and exits from a very depressed base, matching the substantive outcome Jason predicted when he called the Wiz acquisition a “starter’s pistol” for venture and tech liquidity.

Evidence since Trump’s January 20, 2025 inauguration shows a clear, administration‑linked jump in tech‑sector M&A relative to the late‑Biden period.

1. Regulatory shift under Trump vs. Biden

   • Biden’s 2021 Executive Order 14036 explicitly pushed a “whole‑of‑government” crackdown on corporate concentration, especially in tech, and he installed Lina Khan at the FTC to pursue an aggressive antitrust agenda, including actions against Amazon, Meta and other large platforms. (en.wikipedia.org)
   • Khan left office in January 2025, replaced by Trump’s appointee Andrew Ferguson, who campaigned on ending a “war on mergers,” while House Republicans moved to strip the FTC of much of its antitrust role—both clear signals of a more permissive stance toward consolidation. (theguardian.com)
   • A Wall Street Journal analysis reports that in 2025, under Trump’s new team, U.S. regulators have challenged only three mergers, versus an average of six per year under Biden, and describes corporate dealmaking as having “surged” in response to the looser enforcement. (wsj.com)

2. Tech M&A levels under Biden (baseline)

   • After the record 2021 boom, global M&A slumped in 2022–2023 and only partially recovered in 2024. PwC and Bain both characterize 2024 as a rebound year but still below the 2021 peak. (bain.com)
   • In 2024 specifically, technology was already the leading sector, with tech M&A deal value around $500–640 billion globally (depending on dataset), up roughly 16–32% versus 2023, but volumes were weak and tech deal counts fell sharply. (alliuris.org)
     This provides a meaningful, but relatively constrained, “late‑Biden” baseline for tech deal activity.

3. Tech and software M&A under Trump in 2025

   • LSEG data for the first nine months of 2025 show the tech sector leading global M&A with US$595.5 billion in deals, up 55% from the same period in 2024. (investmentexecutive.com)
   • Kroll’s software‑sector update reports that in Q1 2025 there were 714 software deals, a 36% increase over Q1 2024, with deal value up 23% year‑on‑year, and highlights Google’s US$32 billion acquisition of Wiz as emblematic of large strategic tech transactions. (kroll.com)
   • RBC Capital Markets notes that software M&A activity in 2025 is up 78% year‑on‑year, with private‑equity‑backed software deals more than doubling, driven by depressed SaaS valuations and aggressive buyers. (businessinsider.com)

4. Broader dealmaking surge tied to new administration

   • EY‑Parthenon’s U.S. Deal Barometer finds that in 2025, U.S. corporate M&A volume is up about 10%, and overall deal value 36% versus 2024, with technology listed among the most active sectors driving large transactions. (ey.com)
   • The Wall Street Journal likewise reports a more than 40% year‑over‑year rise in total U.S. deal value to US$1.9 trillion in 2025, with twice as many $10B+ megadeals, and explicitly attributes this to Trump’s more lenient antitrust enforcement that is “more tolerant” of consolidation in media and tech. (wsj.com)

5. Assessment vs. Chamath’s prediction
   Chamath’s normalized claim was that under the new Trump administration, tech and large companies would become much more aggressive on M&A, producing a clear increase in tech M&A versus the prior Democratic administration.

   • Empirically, tech and software M&A deal values in 2025 are up on the order of 50–80% versus 2024, after adjusting for the same period, and tech remains the leading sector for global deals. (investmentexecutive.com)
   • Multiple independent sources (EY‑Parthenon, BCG, LSEG, WSJ) describe a broad, administration‑linked M&A boom, with technology singled out as one of the main drivers and a more permissive U.S. antitrust regime explicitly cited as an enabler. (ey.com)

   While 2021 under Biden was itself an exceptional record year for global TMT activity, the relevant comparison for “the coming period” after Trump takes office is the late‑Biden environment (2022–2024), which featured significantly lower tech M&A intensity and stricter enforcement. Against that baseline, the post‑inauguration data show exactly the kind of sharp, tech‑heavy rebound in dealmaking Chamath described.

   On balance, the observed 2025 surge in tech and software M&A and the clear softening of antitrust enforcement under Trump support judging his prediction as right in direction and in its claim of a clear increase in tech M&A activity.

Public reporting shows Wiz at roughly $700M in ARR around the time of Google’s acquisition announcement in March 2025, with multiple sources saying it is projected or on track to reach about $1B in ARR by the end of 2025, but none confirming that the $1B ARR milestone has actually been achieved as of late November 2025.

• TechCrunch reported that Wiz was at about $700M in ARR in March 2025 and was “on track to double last year’s annual recurring revenue to $1 billion.” (techcrunch.com)
• Forbes likewise estimated Wiz’s ARR at “over $700 million” at the time of the $32B deal and discussed valuation multiples based on that figure, not on an already‑achieved $1B. (forbes.com)
• Other coverage (CRN, MarketWatch, Business Insider, Techpression, etc.) consistently describes Wiz as having about $500M ARR in 2024 and aiming or expected to cross $1B in ARR in 2025, again phrased as a forecast rather than a completed milestone. (crn.com)
• Reference-style summaries (e.g., Wikipedia) only document ARR milestones up to 2024 (e.g., ~$350M ARR in early 2024), with no update stating that Wiz has reached $1B ARR yet. (en.wikipedia.org)

Because (a) the prediction is about calendar year 2025 and the year is not yet over as of November 30, 2025, and (b) no reliable public source confirms that Wiz has already hit ~$1B in ARR, we cannot presently determine whether the prediction ultimately proves correct or not. It remains too early to call based on available evidence.

As of November 30, 2025, the Federal Reserve has carried out two 25-basis-point cuts in 2025: one at the September FOMC meeting, which lowered the target range from 4.25–4.50% to 4.00–4.25%, and a second at the October 28–29 meeting, which further reduced the range to 3.75–4.00%. (cmegroup.com) That leaves the federal funds rate at roughly 4% going into the final scheduled 2025 meeting in December. (medium.com) However, markets and forecasters currently assign a significant probability to an additional 25-basis-point cut at that December meeting, and the Fed has not yet made that decision. (financialcontent.com) Because the prediction concerns the outcome by year-end 2025 (both the total number of cuts and the ending rate level), and the final meeting has not occurred yet, it is too early to say definitively whether there will be exactly two cuts and a year-end rate around 4%. Therefore, the prediction’s accuracy is still inconclusive at this time.

As of November 30, 2025, the full 2025–2026 horizon hasn’t played out, so the prediction can’t be definitively scored.

On the pace of rate cuts:

• In December 2024 and again in March 2025, the Fed’s “dot plot” projected two 25 bp cuts in 2025 and two in 2026, taking the funds rate to about 3.9% at end‑2025 and 3.4% at end‑2026. (cnbc.com)
• Through July 2025, the Fed held rates steady at 4.25–4.50% at every meeting, despite projecting two cuts later in the year. (cnbc.com) The first cut of 2025 was only in October (25 bp), and markets expect another in December and possibly one more in January 2026. (reuters.com) This is a relatively slow, back‑loaded easing path versus many early‑2025 market hopes for faster cuts. (forbes.com)
• By June 2025, the Fed revised its projections, still penciling in two cuts in 2025 but reducing expected cuts in 2026 and 2027 to just one each, explicitly “slowing the pace of cuts” in those years versus prior guidance (two in 2026 and two in 2027). (cnbc.com) In September 2025, the Fed’s projections showed only one cut in 2026, which media described as more conservative than markets had expected. (cnbc.com)

These developments are directionally consistent with Chamath’s claim that an over‑correction would result in a slower‑than‑previously‑anticipated cutting path, especially for 2026. But 2026 policy is still only a forecast; the actual pace of cuts next year could end up faster if political or economic pressures intensify. (reuters.com)

On “increased economic pressures” (weaker growth / higher stress):

• The Fed’s June 2025 projections downgraded real GDP growth to 1.4% for 2025 and 1.6% for 2026, while raising PCE inflation to about 3.0% for 2025 and 2.4% for 2026—more stagflationary than the March projections. (tradingeconomics.com) NABE’s November 2025 survey similarly sees only modest 2.0% growth in 2026 with inflation still elevated. (reuters.com)
• Unemployment has risen to about 4.4% (a four‑year high), and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent notes that housing and other rate‑sensitive sectors are under pressure, while consumer sentiment has fallen to a three‑year low. (nypost.com) Fed Governor Miran explicitly links the rise in unemployment to overly tight monetary policy and argues for faster and larger rate cuts. (reuters.com) These fit the idea of “pressure in the economy,” though causation is shared with tariffs, immigration policy, and a long government shutdown, not just Fed policy. (tradingeconomics.com)
• However, broad financial stress remains limited so far. The Chicago Fed’s National Financial Conditions Index is around –0.53 (negative values = looser‑than‑average conditions), indicating overall easy financial conditions rather than tight stress. (chicagofed.org) The St. Louis Fed’s Financial Stress Index has recently moved modestly above zero (~0.55), higher than the very calm levels of 2023–24 but far below crisis readings in 2008 or 2020. (wolfstreet.com)

Why the verdict is inconclusive:

• The core of the prediction explicitly covers 2025–2026, and we are only at late 2025. The Fed has already slowed its projected pace of cuts for 2026 and the economy is showing some strain (slower growth, higher unemployment, sectoral stress), which partially supports his thesis. (cnbc.com)
• Yet we do not know how many cuts will actually occur in 2026 or how severe economic and financial stress will ultimately be. Projections could be overtaken by events, including potential politically driven “sugar‑rush” easing that would speed up cuts rather than slow them. (reuters.com)

Because a substantial part of the forecast concerns policy actions and economic outcomes in 2026, which has not yet occurred, the most defensible assessment is that the prediction’s truth value is still unresolved.

The new administration (Trump’s second term) began on January 20, 2025, so the first 100 days ran to about April 30, 2025.(en.wikipedia.org)

By that 100‑day mark, GDP data clearly reflected the impact of tariffs and spending cuts:

• Q1 2025 real GDP, covering January–March and released April 30, showed a –0.3% annualized contraction, the first since 2022. Multiple analyses attributed this to a record import surge as firms front‑loaded purchases ahead of Trump’s broad April tariff package, plus a sharp drop in federal spending.(cnbc.com)
• Detailed breakdowns noted imports up over 40% and federal government spending down about 5.1%, explicitly linking the decline to aggressive budget cuts and layoffs.(indilegalonline.com) A business‑economics review summed it up by saying Q1 GDP “highlight[ed] tariff impacts,” underscoring how the data revealed the directional effect of the new trade policy.(cbia.com)

Employment data in the same window captured the effects of federal cuts and policy uncertainty:

• February and March jobs reports showed moderating payroll growth (roughly 150k–220k per month) and unemployment edging around 4.1–4.2%, with commentary that mass federal layoffs from the new Department of Government Efficiency and tariff uncertainty were key headwinds, even as private‑sector hiring continued.(theguardian.com) This made the early labor‑market effects of the administration’s fiscal and trade stance visible.

Inflation data plus forward‑looking forecasts tied tariffs to the future price path:

• CPI reports for February and March 2025 showed inflation temporarily cooling (headline around 2.4–2.8% year‑over‑year), but economists repeatedly stressed that the announced April tariff package was not yet in the data and was expected to push prices higher later in 2025.(reuters.com) Major forecasters (e.g., Goldman Sachs) raised their projections for 2025 core PCE inflation to about 3.5% specifically because of the tariff program.(investopedia.com)

Markets and forecasters used these first‑100‑day data to reset expectations about growth, jobs, and inflation:

• As tariffs and spending cuts were rolled out and Q1 data arrived, Goldman Sachs and others repeatedly cut 2025 growth forecasts and lifted recession probabilities (to ~35–65%), explicitly citing the combined drag from higher tariffs, tighter fiscal policy, and weaker confidence.(fortune.com) A June 2025 NABE survey likewise showed consensus GDP forecasts marked down versus pre‑April and identified tariff impacts as the dominant downside risk to growth and employment.(nabe.com) Analysts also parsed Q1 GDP into “core” domestic demand versus tariff‑driven trade distortions to better project the path of real activity.(cbia.com)

Putting this together: within roughly the first 100 days, the observed trajectories of GDP (headline contraction with tariff‑driven trade distortion and reduced government spending), employment (slower gains with visible federal layoffs), and inflation (temporarily subdued but forecast to rise on tariffs) were already being used by economists and markets to model the directional impact of the administration’s spending cuts and tariff policy. That matches Friedberg’s claim that the first 100 days would be “pretty telling” for understanding those effects and for improving forward forecasts, so the prediction is best judged as right.

The prediction explicitly frames this as a story that will play out “over the next couple of years” after March 2025—a multi‑year horizon that, in the normalized version, runs roughly through 2027. The original quote in the episode is: “This is basically what I think is gonna end up being the story over the next couple of years, is the space race between effectively SpaceX's platform and technology versus China …” (podscripts.co)

As of today (2025‑11‑30):

• SpaceX’s Starship is still in a test‑flight phase but has become central to U.S. deep‑space and lunar plans, with multiple high‑profile test launches in 2025 and explicit ties to NASA’s Artemis program. (apnews.com)
• China’s Long March 9 is still an in‑development super‑heavy launcher, widely described as a Starship‑like, methalox, multi‑engine reusable heavy lifter, but its first test flight is generally targeted around 2030, well after 2027. (space.com)
• Broader space‑race coverage in 2024–2025 focuses on a U.S.–China competition in space (lunar and Mars ambitions), but also heavily features NASA’s Artemis/SLS, Blue Origin’s New Glenn, and other U.S. commercial players. NASA has even reopened parts of the lunar‑lander competition beyond SpaceX, which dilutes any simple “Starship vs Long March 9” framing as the dominant narrative. (livescience.com)

Because (1) the stated time window (through ~2027) has not yet elapsed and (2) narrative dominance is inherently subjective and can’t be settled this early in that window, there isn’t enough evidence yet to say the prediction is clearly right or clearly wrong. Hence the result is inconclusive (too early).

The prediction’s horizon is “the next couple of years” from the podcast date in March 2025, i.e., roughly into 2026–2027, so that full window has not elapsed yet.

On the facts:

• Starship has made multiple orbital‑class test flights in 2025 (Flights 7–11) and is clearly positioned as the U.S. flagship for future super‑heavy, fully reusable launch, but it remains in a test/early demonstration phase, not yet an established operational workhorse or the sole focus of U.S. strategic launch. (en.wikipedia.org)
• Long March 9 has been repeatedly redesigned into a Starship‑like, fully reusable methane/LOX super‑heavy rocket and is explicitly described as a Starship‑class competitor, but it is still on the drawing board, with a first flight currently targeted around 2033, well after the mid‑2020s. (en.wikipedia.org)
• China’s near‑term crewed‑lunar strategy for the 2020s instead centers on Long March 10 and existing Long March rockets, while Long March 9 is framed more as an infrastructure builder for 2030s lunar bases. (en.wikipedia.org)
• The current strategic launch landscape in the mid‑2020s is multi‑polar: besides SpaceX’s Falcon 9/Heavy and Starship tests, the U.S. has ULA’s Vulcan Centaur and Blue Origin’s operational New Glenn (with successful launches and an NSSL role), and Europe’s Ariane 6 has entered commercial service; these systems all feature in discussions of launch competition. (en.wikipedia.org)
• Geopolitical commentary broadly describes a new space race between the U.S. and China (sometimes including Russia), focused on lunar landings, bases, and even nuclear propulsion, rather than specifically and exclusively on a Starship‑vs‑Long‑March‑9 duel in the mid‑2020s. (houstonchronicle.com)

Because:

1. we are only partway through the “next couple of years” window implied by the quote, and
2. Long March 9 has not flown and is not yet central to current operational competition (its role is still prospective), we cannot yet definitively say whether Starship vs. Long March 9 will emerge as the primary strategic launch rivalry over the full horizon the predictor specified. Hence the status is inconclusive (too early) rather than clearly right or wrong.

As of November 30, 2025, both of the predicted missions are still in the future:

• Multiple sources describe Blue Ghost Mission 2 as scheduled to launch in 2026 but do not give a firm launch date or indicate that it has already flown. (en.wikipedia.org)
• Firefly and NASA press-related materials describe Blue Ghost Mission 3 as a mission to the Gruithuisen Domes slated for 2028, again with no indication that it has occurred yet (which would be impossible given the date) or that it has definitively slipped beyond 2028. (news.flyjets.com)

The prediction is about whether Mission 2 will actually fly in 2026 and Mission 3 in 2028. Since we are still in 2025, neither year has arrived, so we cannot yet judge success or failure of those schedule claims. The current information only shows intent and planning, not realized outcomes.

Because the relevant years have not yet passed, the correct status for this prediction is “inconclusive (too early)”.