Jan 2, 2026 4 min read Daily Rundown

⛵ FSD Across America

Plus: Labubu Bubble Pops, Mobile Towers Go Orbital

Good Morning, Early Adopters!

Tesla’s FSD quietly proved it can survive an entire continent without human rescue.

ROBOTAXI

Tesla FSD Proved It Can Survive Long Roads Alone

👀 What’s happening: In the final days of 2025, a Tesla Model 3 owner using FSD v14.2 completed a full coast-to-coast drive across the United States with zero human intervention. The car covered roughly 2,700 miles in under three days, including highway driving, city streets, charging, parking, and routing, without the driver taking control once.

🌍 How this hits reality: This was not a demo, pilot zone, or internal test. It happened on live roads, under real traffic, weather, and infrastructure constraints. 2,700 miles of consecutive FSD miles without intervention stresses against a core assumption in autonomy. That reliability only appears inside geo fenced or supervised systems. It also exposes how dependent modular stacks like Waymo remain on maps, connectivity, and graceful failure paths.

⛵ Key takeaway: This looks like the first real and “big enough” proof from the real user that Tesla’s system can operate end to end without collapsing in a long trip. If repeated at scale, Tesla's robotaxi leadership shifts from controlled perfection to real world survival.

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BUBBLE

Pop Mart’s Resale Bubble Finally Meets Gravity

👀 What’s happening: Pop Mart shares dropped after signs that Labubu’s resale frenzy is fading. Secondary market prices slipped below retail. Once the flip trade paused, the stock fell sharply, exposing how much recent confidence depended on aftermarket heat rather than end demand.

🌍 How this hits reality: Pop Mart’s rise was powered by scarcity, fast cycles, and a belief that resale premiums validated real demand. When that loop breaks, the illusion goes with it. A roughly 44 percent drawdown since August and more than $25 billion erased show how fragile hype priced growth can be once inventory stops clearing at higher prices.

⛵ Key takeaway: This is a classic unwind. Speculative demand can accelerate growth, but it cannot anchor value. When the trade exits, businesses are left with fundamentals only, and markets reprice quickly, quietly, and without sentiment protection.

SPACE

AST Launches a Base Station–Sized Satellite Into Orbit

👀 What’s happening: AST SpaceMobile has put the largest communications satellite ever into low Earth orbit. BlueBird 6 is built like a flying cellular tower, designed to connect directly with standard smartphones. The goal is not broadband terminals but native mobile service. AST plans dozens more launches and commercial activation through carrier partnerships rather than selling directly to consumers.

🌍 How this hits reality: This puts AST on a very different path from Starlink. Instead of building a parallel ISP, AST acts as radio access infrastructure for operators like AT&T and Verizon. The tradeoff is clear. It extends coverage where towers do not exist, but it still depends on operator core networks. No carrier backbone means no service.

⛵ Key takeaway: The open question is why operators need this at all. AST offers instant rural reach without towers, spectrum reuse, and roaming continuity. The alternative is slow capex heavy terrestrial buildouts. If coverage matters more than ownership, AST becomes infrastructure. If not, it stays niche.

BAY AREA MEMOS

Warren Buffett today stepped down as Berkshire Hathaway CEO, with Greg Abel taking over amid slower growth and a massive cash reserve.
Nvidia is in advanced talks to buy Israel’s AI21 Labs for up to $3 billion, focusing on its AI talent and expanding Nvidia’s R&D footprint in Israel.
The U.S. Virgin Islands sued Meta, accusing it of profiting from scam ads and misleading the public about platform and child safety.
Biren raised $717 million in a Hong Kong IPO, joining a wave of Chinese GPU listings and disclosing its chip and order details.
Uber is reportedly in talks to acquire parking platform SpotHero to integrate parking reservations into its ride-hailing and autonomous mobility services.

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