A man with no working truck convinced Wall Street he had built the next Tesla. His company hit $30 BILLION. All he did was push it down a hill with no engine.
> Trevor Milton founded Nikola in 2014, named after the same inventor as Tesla.
> The goal was to build hydrogen powered trucks that would make diesel obsolete. He had no trucks.
> In 2018 he released a promotional video called Nikola One In Motion. It showed a sleek semi truck accelerating smoothly down an open highway.
Investors went wild.
> What nobody knew was that the truck had no engine, no fuel cell, and no propulsion system of any kind.
> Milton's team towed it to the top of a hill, tilted the camera to hide the slope, and let it roll.
> He spent the next four years doing the same thing with words. On podcasts, television and social media.
> Investors were told Nikola could produce its own hydrogen. It could not. They were told the trucks were ready for production. They were not. They were told orders were flooding in. They weren't.
> In June 2020 Nikola went public. Within days the company was worth $30 BILLION, more than Ford.
> Milton's personal stake hit $7.3 BILLION overnight.
> A $32.5 MILLION ranch in Utah followed. A record for the state at the time.
> In September 2020 Hindenburg Research published a report calling Nikola "an intricate fraud" built on "an ocean of lies." Milton resigned within ten days.
> A federal jury convicted him of securities fraud and wire fraud in 2022. Sentenced to four years in prison the following year.
> He never went. He was free on $100 MILLION bail pending appeal.
> He and his wife donated $3.2 MILLION to Donald Trump's 2024 campaign.
> In March 2025 Trump gave him a full pardon. The pardon erased $168 MILLION in restitution to defrauded shareholders.
> Nikola filed for bankruptcy the following month, leaving thousands of investors with nothing.
The company never had a product. The only thing that was real was the $30 BILLION valuation, the $7 BILLION that landed in his pocket and the pardon that made sure none of it had to be returned.
BREAKING: Nearly $920 million in crude oil shorts were placed at 3:40 AM ET, about 70 minutes before Axios reported the U.S. and Iran were nearing a “14-point” deal to end the war.
Oil then plunged more than 12%, with the position gaining an estimated $125 million.
Unusual.
"Professor, don't you find it curious that a new US-Iran peace deal leaks almost every time the 10y UST yield breaks 4.4% on the upside?"
"Actually, if I think about it, I don't find it curious at all."
🇺🇸BREAKING: Someone placed a $920 million crude oil short at 3:40 AM.
70 minutes later Axios reported the US and Iran were close to a deal.
Oil dropped 12%.
The trade made $125 million in profit.
Minutes after that Iran launched the “Persian Gulf Strait Authority” and oil surged 8%.
$760 million placed before Trump’s last announcement.
$920 million placed before this one.
Every major announcement in this war has been front-run by someone who knew it was coming.
What kind of war is this?
This is more like a trading desk with an army.
Never stop connecting the dots.
🚨 Warren Buffett just issued the most serious warning of his career
The man is 95 years old.
He’s lived through every major crisis of the last 60 years.
He just said:
“We’ve never had people in a more gambling mood than now”
He called the stock market “a church with a casino attached”
Berkshire is now sitting on nearly $400 billion in cash.
The largest cash pile any company has ever held.
This is the same man who raised cash before 2008.
The same man who told everyone to be greedy when others are fearful.
He’s not greedy right now.
He’s the most cautious he’s ever been.
The man who built one of the greatest fortunes in history is telling you the market has become a casino.
Most people will ignore him, a few will listen.
History usually rewards the few.
Every new move I make in the market gets posted on @InTheAssembly before anywhere else.
Follow them right now or you will regret it later.
“In my whole life I've never been good at something I wasn't very interested in. It just doesn't work. There's no substitute for strong interest.”
— Charlie Munger
🩸 HUGE WARNING:
🇺🇸 Warren Buffett says that we have never had people in a more gambling mood than now
He warns that the US dollar could collapse and admitted he doesn't understand most of the stock market anymore.
$380,000,000,000 in cash is his answer because he believes things are about to get MUCH worse.
95yo man who has survived every crash, every war, every crisis of the last six decades just told you the market is a casino...
“You can't look around for people to agree with you. You can't look around for people to even know what you're talking about. You have to think for yourself. An ability to detach yourself from the crowd is a quality you need.”
— Warren Buffett
Mark Cuban reveals he only uses E-MAILS to run all his businesses, no meetings or phone calls
"It's got to be an email."
"So, a lot of people ask about my daily routine and you're going to be shocked. I look at my phone or I'm looking at a laptop and I'm on there 8, 9, 10 hours a day."
"Am I going to meetings? No. Am I taking phone calls? No. Am I going to some office somewhere? No."
"When I was working my way up, I always had to work to somebody else's schedule. When I finally sold my companies and had enough money to stand on my own, prior to getting an iWatch, the first thing I did was get rid of a watch. I didn't wear a watch for 30 years because I didn't want to be on anybody else's time."
"And now, finally, because people pretty much kiss my ass when it comes to business, I can tell them I'm doing everything via email. Period end of story. And because of that, I can get everything done by sitting on a laptop or a phone anywhere in the world and that works out really well."
🇺🇸BREAKING: Oil dropped below $100 the moment Trump announced the US would guide ships through the Strait of Hormuz.
Someone placed a $760 million short on oil before his last announcement too.
The strait has opened and closed four times in two weeks.
Each announcement moves markets worth billions.
Never stop connecting the dots.
Warren Buffett watching Berkshire Hathaway CEO Greg Abel speak at this morning's shareholder meeting in Omaha. Sitting in the audience for the first time ever.
He looks very proud.
Inflation is “the most regressive tax that anyone in Washington could come up with,” Kevin Warsh has said.
“If you were trying to do the most harm to the least well off among us, inflation would be the way to do it."
This is the type of person you have to be to get hired at Citadel
Ken Griffin once asked a Harvard graduate with a Citadel offer letter what he would do if he had $10 million in his bank account
The young man replied that he would quit his job to travel and climb the highest peaks around the world
Ken Griffin responded by saying that Citadel was not the right fit for him