Never underestimate what humans can come up with!
A respected scientist at the time, Lord Kelvin, stated in 1895 that heavier-than-air flying machines were impossible. Eight years later, the Wright brothers did the impossible. Space travel, nuclear energy, breaking the sound barrier—you name it, we humans just keep knocking down barriers to feats and tech that were viewed as impossible at the time.
SpaceX started space-based internet access through Starlink in early 2019. Now they have over 9,000 working satellites in orbit and over 9 million subscribers worldwide, and the subscription rate is accelerating rapidly. SpaceX has announced their intention to take the company public sometime this year. This could be the biggest IPO ever. Some estimates have it worth over $1 trillion. Why is SpaceX going public? Well, they need a lot of money to fund their future and their desire to launch space-based AI data centers. Granted, this requires technology that is not here yet. Anyone betting against Elon Musk—good luck. He usually wins, even if the timeline is longer than predicted.
As ludicrous as AI centers in space seem, if you dig deeper, they actually make sense. We need 1 gigawatt of energy to power an average AI data center—that’s equivalent to one nuclear power plant. We only have so much land space, water availability, and funding (nuclear plants are expensive) to make this happen. Then there are the politics of “not in my backyard” (NIMBY).
Why not move the entire operation into geosynchronous sunlight orbit? Solar panels never run out of sunlight up there. Sunlight is 140% or so stronger in space (no atmosphere and clouds). Cooling of data centers takes up 30% of the power usage here on Earth. Space is cold—vent the heat there. Starcloud, backed by Nvidia and Google, has already launched an experimental chip in a space satellite. The tech for this is real and being developed.
Granted, there are many technical hurdles to get this all to work: millions of tons of cargo into space, AI chips don’t like radiation so shielding has to be developed. The SpaceX plan for now is to develop a 100-megawatt cluster of solar and AI compute. Ten clusters would be roughly equivalent to a 1-gigawatt AI center here on Earth.
The why for the SpaceX IPO becomes clear: they need billions to make this happen. Will timelines change? Will technology take time? Yes is the answer. Is it 100% certain that this will happen? No. Does anyone really want to bet against Elon Musk in a company once they set their sights on an endeavor? Based on Elon’s track record, I am not betting against this happening eventually. Elon and SpaceX have done the math, and it seems they are going for it.
Why do we need so much electric power?
In the world of geopolitics, power generation and usage is taking center stage. If we want to have any chance at keeping up with the Chinese, we have to win the power race. AI data centers and chip production all depend on power to run. The more power, the more data centers, the more efficient modern life becomes. Demand is only going in one direction. In 1955, humans used 1,200 terawatt-hours of electricity; in 2025, it’s estimated at 32,000 terawatt-hours. Don’t forget the Chinese government has the stated goal of world domination, and I for one do not want to be forced to learn Mandarin. It is a race we have to win. Freedom is not cheap or easy.
2026 IRA Contribution Limit Increases
Effective for the 2026 tax year, the IRS has increased several key IRA-related limits due to cost-of-living adjustments (as announced in IRS Notice 2025-67 and detailed in IR-2025-111). The main changes include:
- The annual contribution limit for traditional and Roth IRAs has increased to $7,500 (up from $7,000 in 2025).
- The catch-up contribution limit for individuals aged 50 and older has increased to $1,100 (up from $1,000 in 2025), allowing a total maximum contribution of $8,600 for those eligible.
These adjustments apply starting January 1, 2026, and help savers keep pace with inflation while building retirement savings. Call or email us if you want to take advantage of the increases!!
Thanks, Andy McClung CFP™
Sources: Nextbigfuture.com; Jason Wong; Google.com/search
2025 Market Results – 12/31/2025
S&P 500: +16.39%
Nasdaq Composite: +20.36%
Dow Jones Industrial Average: +12.97%
Russell 2000 (small-cap index): +11.26%