Data Explained

Data context for breaking news. We add the numbers mainstream media leaves out. Economics, geopolitics, tech, AI. Follow us for analysis, not hot takes.

[Data Explained @dataexplain]

Will Elon musk become a trillionaire this year?

[Data Explained @dataexplain]

https://t.co/OKm7rQnrWd

[Data Explained @dataexplain]

Could Temu Become the Next Biggest E-Commerce Platform?

The global e-commerce market welcomed the Chinese-owned online retailer Temu in 2022.

Ever since then, the platform has ‘paid its way’ to becoming one of the biggest online shopping platforms in the world today.

[Data Explained @dataexplain]

For decades, Nigeria was Africa's biggest crude producer and its biggest importer of refined fuel. It sold oil cheaply and bought petrol back at a high price. The Dangote refinery flipped that.

Nigeria became a net petrol exporter in 2026, with the plant covering about 80% of domestic demand.
Now Dangote is doubling capacity to 1.4M barrels a day by 2028, enough to overtake India's Jamnagar as the world's largest refinery.

The real question isn't whether it's impressive. It's what happens when one private company controls the fuel supply of a country of 200 million people.

[Data Explained @dataexplain]

SpaceX is targeting a $1.75 trillion valuation in what would be the largest IPO in history.

It earned $18.67 billion in revenue last year and incurred a $4.94 billion loss. Investors are being asked to pay roughly 94x annual sales for a company that isn't profitable.

For context: Apple trades at about 8x revenue. NVIDIA at 25x.

You are not buying what SpaceX earns. You are buying what Elon Musk might build.

Vision, or valuation trap?

#dataquestion

[Data Explained @dataexplain]

The Iran war didn't begin in the US housing market, but it's noticing an impact there now. Redfin points out that America's mortgage rates are closely linked to the war and oil prices. As a result, buyers are becoming more cautious, and there are already more sellers than buyers out there.

[Data Explained @dataexplain]

AI data centers are projected to use 9.3 trillion liters of water by 2030, equivalent to the domestic water needs of 1.3 billion people in Sub-Saharan Africa, and 945 TWh of electricity, almost triple the combined electricity consumption of Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Nigeria.

This $600 billion expansion comes with a high environmental cost.

[Data Explained @dataexplain]

It's important to clarify the 100x figure here: it refers to the valuation multiple, not a growth forecast.
With a $1.75 trillion target based on $18.7 billion in 2025 revenue, SpaceX would be valued at approximately 100 times its sales.
Meanwhile, the xAI division it acquired actually posted a loss of over $6 billion last year.
Investors are valuing the potential of the bet, not the financial statements.

[Data Explained @dataexplain]

📈 Starting today, you no longer need $25,000 to day trade US stocks.

The SEC eliminated the Pattern Day Trader rule, effective June 4, 2026, scrapping the $25,000 minimum equity requirement in place since 2001.

The rule was created after the dot-com crash. Regulators watched retail traders get wiped out by volatile tech stocks and decided a $25,000 barrier would protect smaller investors from themselves.

Now that the barrier is gone, any margin account with $2,000 or more can now day trade as frequently as they want.

[Data Explained @dataexplain]

📉 The S&P 500 just hit an all-time high. Crypto just lost 48% of its value from its October 2025 peak.

Total crypto market cap peaked at $4.27 trillion in October 2025. Today it sits at roughly $2.2 trillion. Bitcoin just fell to a four-month low as $1.5 billion in leveraged positions were liquidated in a single session.

Same period. Two completely different markets.

[Data Explained @dataexplain]

📈 Starting today, you no longer need $25,000 to day trade US stocks.

The SEC eliminated the Pattern Day Trader rule, effective June 4, 2026, scrapping the $25,000 minimum equity requirement in place since 2001.

The rule was created after the dot-com crash. Regulators watched retail traders get wiped out by volatile tech stocks and decided a $25,000 barrier would protect smaller investors from themselves.

Now that the barrier is gone, any margin account with $2,000 or more can now day trade as frequently as they want.

[Data Explained @dataexplain]

💧 By 2030, AI data centres are projected to consume 9.3 trillion litres of water a year.

That's equal to the basic annual domestic water needs of all 1.3 billion people in Sub-Saharan Africa.

The electricity generation of 945 terawatt-hours alone is nearly three times the combined yearly consumption of Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Nigeria, which are countries with a total population of over 650 million.

"The public debate still treats AI as software. AI is also physical infrastructure: data centres, electricity generation, cooling systems, transmission networks, chips, minerals, land and water." — UN lead researcher Kaveh Madani.

Big Tech is investing $600 billion in building data centres this year. Meanwhile, the UN has just released its environmental impact report.

Is anyone actually accounting for this, or is the AI boom creating a resource crisis nobody wants to talk about?

[Data Explained @dataexplain]

AI data centers are projected to use 9.3 trillion liters of water by 2030, equivalent to the domestic water needs of 1.3 billion people in Sub-Saharan Africa, and 945 TWh of electricity, almost triple the combined electricity consumption of Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Nigeria.

This $600 billion expansion comes with a high environmental cost.

[Data Explained @dataexplain]

A flesh-eating parasite, eradicated from the US in 1966, reappeared in a 3-week-old calf in South Texas.

The New World screwworm's larvae feed on warm-blooded animals' living tissue. It's not a food safety risk; proper treatment allows recovery, but it affects food production.
Texas's $15 billion cattle industry was protected by a decades-long program of releasing sterile flies, which worked for 60 years. Now spreading north through Central America, the parasite has reappeared in the US for only the third time since eradication.

The USDA has set a 12-mile quarantine zone and is releasing sterile flies. No additional cases reported yet.

The key question: can the 1966 eradication method succeed again in 2026?

[Data Explained @dataexplain]

📉 The other side of the story with the S&P 500 is that crypto markets have lost $2 trillion in value since October 2025, which is a 48% drop from their peak.
It's interesting to see stocks reaching all-time highs while cryptocurrencies are in a bear market, and both of these are happening simultaneously.

[Data Explained @dataexplain]

🇳🇬 Nigeria attracted $10.37 billion in foreign capital in Q1 2026, up 84% from a year ago. Nearly half came from the UK.

That sounds like a strong vote of confidence in Nigeria's economy. The breakdown tells a different story.

Most of the inflows, about 95%, came from portfolio investment, foreign investors attracted by the high yields on Nigerian bonds and money market instruments.
In contrast, Foreign Direct Investment, which involves building factories and creating lasting jobs, totaled only $135 million, accounting for just 1.3% of the total.

Economists often emphasize that a stronger flow of FDI is essential for sustainable growth and industrial development. While hot money can flow in quickly, it tends to leave just as fast.

Nigeria is drawing in billions, but most of it isn’t being invested in creating things that could really make a difference.

[Olúwatósìn Olaseinde @tosinolaseinde]

According to NBS data, 49% of total inflows into Nigeria is from the UK.

[Data Explained @dataexplain]

https://t.co/KvctFuCcQS

[Data Explained @dataexplain]

Can you guess the only country with over 130 million TikTok users?

In January 2025, TikTok reached 1.59 billion users. This is 19.4% of the global population and 28.6% of internet users.

Watch the video below to discover the country with the largest TikTok user base.

[Data Explained @dataexplain]

@stats_feed https://t.co/McgHN7BcWv

[Data Explained @dataexplain]

🇱🇻 Riga had 915,000 people in 1989. Today it has 591,000. That's a 35% decline in 35 years.

The city is projected to see its population cut in half by 2050 at current rates.
Latvia is projected to have the EU's largest population decline this century, losing 33.9% of its population by 2100, according to Eurostat. Ahead of Poland and Lithuania.

Two forces are driving it simultaneously: deaths outnumbering births, and more people leaving than arriving. Some rural parishes in eastern Latvia have already passed the point where a working settlement can be sustained. Schools have closed, doctors' surgeries have consolidated, and bus services have been scrapped.

The Latvian counties of Strenci, Baltinava, Viļaka, Krāslava, and Ērgļi will lose all their residents to emigration or mortality by 2049 if current trends hold, according to demographic modeling by the University of Latvia.

[Data Explained @dataexplain]

🇱🇻 Riga had 915,000 people in 1989. Today it has 591,000. That's a 35% decline in 35 years.

The city is projected to see its population cut in half by 2050 at current rates.
Latvia is projected to have the EU's largest population decline this century, losing 33.9% of its population by 2100, according to Eurostat. Ahead of Poland and Lithuania.

Two forces are driving it simultaneously: deaths outnumbering births, and more people leaving than arriving. Some rural parishes in eastern Latvia have already passed the point where a working settlement can be sustained. Schools have closed, doctors' surgeries have consolidated, and bus services have been scrapped.

The Latvian counties of Strenci, Baltinava, Viļaka, Krāslava, and Ērgļi will lose all their residents to emigration or mortality by 2049 if current trends hold, according to demographic modeling by the University of Latvia.

[World of Statistics @stats_feed]

🇱🇻 Population of Riga, Latvia

1989: 915,106
2000: 764,329
2011: 658,640
2021: 614,618
2024: 605,273
2025: 591,882