Chris Campbell:

The AI Revenge Trade

Go find your last electric bill. Look for the line that says "supply" or "generation." Part of that number powers Big Tech's data centers. You never signed up for that.

More specifically, a big piece of that number comes from an auction almost nobody watches. It's run by power grid operators like PJM, which runs the power grid for 65 million people in 13 states and D.C.

PJM pays power plants in auctions, years in advance, to stand by for it. The auction sets one price, and every plant gets paid it.

Until recently, nobody minded. Then AI showed up. One AI data center can use as much electricity as 100,000 homes.

In a single auction, AI caused the price to rise nearly tenfold, and the region's yearly bill jumped about $12.5 billion. So the governors forced a cap, at about 11 times what the price was in 2024. The auction has hit it three times in a row. In July, even at the cap, PJM came up short by about seven nuclear reactors' worth of power.

Last week, regulators froze PJM's emergency plan to buy new power plants. The fight is over who pays. On November 3, the states elect the people who decide. And it's looking like AI companies will need to become power companies.

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James Altucher:

David Rubenstein: Why Owners Care About Winning, Not Money

On The James Altucher Show, I'm usually the one asking the questions. But near the end of this conversation, David Rubenstein turned it around on me. He asked why I care whether the Mets win. And I didn't really have an answer.

I said, "I guess when I was a kid, it felt like I was winning when they won." And David said, basically, yeah. That's the whole thing.

David owns the Baltimore Orioles now. And he explained that Baltimore has spent roughly 200 years living in the shadow of cities like New York, Boston, Philadelphia, and Washington. If the Orioles win, somebody in Baltimore who will never make a dollar from the team still gets to feel like they won too.

His new book is Inside the Owner's Box: Conversations on Power and Leadership in Sports.

I wanted to ask someone who actually owns the team what ownership teaches you that being a fan never can. And there were two things David told me that I can't shake.

Here's David Rubenstein.

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Ray Blanco:

SpaceX Seeks $40 Billion Financing To Buy Nvidia AI Chips

SpaceX (SPCX), Elon Musk's rocket and AI company, is seeking $40 billion in financing to buy Nvidia chips, potentially creating one of the largest debt-funded AI hardware purchases.

The proposed financing would comprise about $10 billion in bank loans and $30 billion in investment-grade bonds, with Apollo Global Management (APO) expected to lead the transaction and Pimco among investors considering the debt.

Talks remain at an early stage, with the financing expected to close in 2027, while SpaceX, Nvidia, Apollo and Pimco have not commented.

The borrowing highlights the capital required to build AI infrastructure, as companies spend heavily on processors, data centers, and power equipment.

SpaceX has expanded its computing operations since incorporating xAI, Musk's AI business, and has said its data centers will use Nvidia hardware exclusively.

The proposed deal comes after SpaceX completed an $86 billion initial public offering in June and raised $25 billion through a bond sale, increasing scrutiny of its spending and debt.

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