(Win McNamee/Getty Images)

Reading between the lines on the latest SpaceX merger report and Musk’s cryptic tweet

There are a few things to note in and around Bloomberg’s report that SpaceX and xAI are in advanced deal talks.

2/2/26 12:58PM

Bloomberg reported this morning that SpaceX was in “advanced talks” with xAI about a merger. That might sound similar to some of the eye-popping stories we all read just a few days ago, but there are some new nuances here that are worth paying attention to.

Chiefly, Bloomberg’s report today says that the companies “may announce an agreement as soon as this week,” though the story also includes typical M&A shoptalk language that negotiations are ongoing and could drag on or fall apart. Things can always fall apart for a number of reasons, which is why you see a similar line in pretty much every M&A story from any respectable news outlet. But this story is a pretty good indication that in-the-know people are telling Bloomberg reporters that SpaceX and xAI are very close to a deal.

(And why wouldn’t they be? I assume this negotiation is just Elon Musk looking in a mirror and talking with himself in two different voices.)

Another thing to pay attention to around this report: Musk himself replied “Yes” to someone’s post on X that linked to the Bloomberg story and indicated that a merger between the two companies would mean “Explore the Universe 🤝 Understand the Universe.” That’s not a confirmation, but it’s certainly not a denial, which is something Musk frequently does with reporting he doesn’t like.

Yes
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) February 2, 2026

The third thing I’d be paying close attention to with regard to this report is that Bloomberg was the news outlet that originally reported Tesla might be involved in merger talks with xAI. But this latest article doesn’t mention Tesla as part of the tie-up — in fact, its only mention of Tesla in the talks is to say in the last paragraph that SpaceX “has also discussed the feasibility of a tie-up with Musk’s Tesla Inc., Bloomberg News has reported.”

Of course that doesn’t rule Tesla out, but it’s interesting that in a story that definitely seems to move deal progress forward, Tesla’s not mentioned near the top.

Chris Stokel-Walker

Bot bias

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Prediction markets have, predictably, been given a boost by the summer of sports

Major platforms like Kalshi and Polymarket have seen huge upticks in users of late, thanks in no small part to what’s felt like a recent sporting smorgasbord, with major competitions across hockey, basketball, and soccer soaking up fans’ time (and spending, clearly) at the outset of summer.

While gaming industry groups may not like it, there’s been a huge change in the methods people are using to put money on the big games, with everyone from fortunate NYC bar owners, to a far less fortunate Spanish supporter, turning to prediction markets to try and turn their sports know-how into cold, hard cash.

According to a new report from Adam Blacker for apptopia, that shift might have been even more seismic than imagined in the wake of the NBA and NHL finals and around the 2026 World Cup kicking off.

2026 World Cup Reverses Seasonal Lull for Sports Betting Apps

According to a new report from Adam Blacker for apptopia, that shift might have been even more seismic than imagined in the wake of the NBA and NHL finals and around the 2026 World Cup kicking off.

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Anthropic pulls Fable and Mythos access worldwide after Trump administration bars their use by foreign nationals

Only days after releasing two versions of its next-gen AI model, Anthropic has disabled them for users worldwide.

Anthropic says it received a Friday night order from the Trump administration to suspend access to the models for any foreign national (anywhere in the world) — a group that included some Anthropic employees. In response, the company turned off access to everyone.

Last week, the company released to the public its much-anticipated Claude Fable 5 model (and its restricted version Claude Mythos 5, which is still being tested with trusted partners). Anthropic said in a blog post announcing the action that officials cited national security concerns with the new models, while offering few specific details.

The post said that the government gave the company “verbal evidence of a potential narrow, non-universal jailbreak” of the public Fable 5 model. A jailbreak is a means by which users can evade restrictions built into the code to unlock prohibited functionality. Anthropic downplayed the significance of the attack, and said other major models, such as OpenAI’s GPT-5.5, could also be affected by the technique described.

Fears of these first Mythos-class models being misused are running high, after Anthropic warned the cybersecurity world in May that the advanced cyber capabilities of Mythos have rapidly discovered thousands of vulnerabilities in ubiquitous software, leading to the decision to restrict the full version of the model to a close group of trusted partners for testing.

This morning, Axios reported that Anthropic technical staff have flown to Washington to meet with White House officials to resolve the issue.

The Wall Street Journal is reporting that the Trump administration’s decision to take action against Anthropic was prompted by discussions that Amazon CEO Andy Jassy had with officials, including Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent. According to the report, Amazon researchers said they had been able to evade some of Fable 5’s security restrictions using specific prompts. Amazon is a major investor in Anthropic.

Anthropic is currently suing the US government to fight the Pentagon’s blacklisting of the company on national security grounds.

Statement on the US government directive to suspend access to Fable 5 and Mythos 5