🚀 California wealth tax

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Market Overview
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Year To Date Performances:

1. Democratic Rep. Ro Khanna is facing an unprecedented revolt from Silicon Valley leadership after publicly backing a proposed one-time 5% wealth tax on California billionaires. The backlash intensified after Khanna mocked tech titans like Peter Thiel and Larry Page for threatening to leave the state, quoting FDR’s famous line: "I will miss them very much." High-profile figures, including Garry Tan (Y Combinator) and Martin Casado (Andreessen Horowitz), have labelled the move a "speed run" in alienation and are now calling for a 2026 primary challenge against him. While Khanna argues the tax is a necessary "emergency measure" to save California's healthcare system from federal Medicaid cuts, tech leaders warn that taxing unrealized gains, the paper wealth of startup founders, will trigger a permanent exodus of innovation and capital.

2. Meta has finalized an agreement to acquire Manus, a Singapore-based AI agent startup, in a deal reported by the Wall Street Journal to be valued at over $2 billion. Founded as a spin-off from the Chinese startup Butterfly Effect (Monica.im), Manus rose to prominence in early 2025 by claiming to outperform OpenAI’s "Deep Research" on the GAIA benchmark. The acquisition gives Meta access to a high-growth subscription business (generating over $125 million in ARR) and a sophisticated multi-agent architecture capable of planning and executing complex, multi-step tasks like recruitment, financial screening, and website generation. This move follows Meta's massive 2025 investments in Scale AI and Limitless, signalling a shift toward "agentic" AI that can operate 24/7 in cloud-hosted virtual environments.

3. Silver futures suffered a historic 8.7% plunge, the worst daily drop since 2021, settling at $70.46 after briefly hitting an all-time intraday record of $82.67. The sharp reversal was fueled by a "perfect storm" of triggers: the CME Group hiked margin requirements by $3,000 to curb speculation, while optimism over Russia-Ukraine peace talks dented safe-haven demand. Despite this 15% peak-to-trough volatility and aggressive year-end tax-loss harvesting, silver remains the standout performer of 2025 with a 140%+ year-to-date gain. Analysts like KKM’s Jeff Kilburg maintain that the structural supply deficit, exacerbated by China’s upcoming silver export limits and booming solar/EV demand, will likely push prices toward a $90–$100 target in 2026.

   Headlines

   1. GM stock was the best-performing in the automotive sector in 2025.

   2. Softbank is acquiring DigitalBridge for $4 billion.