DISPATCHED FROM THE PROBABLE FUTURE — According to the sharp-eyed speculators of Kalshi exchange, the world's first trillionaire is no distant fantasy but a living, breathing personage already accumulating wealth at a pace that beggars comprehension. Market consensus places the odds at a commanding 91% that this historic threshold — one trillion dollars, a number requiring twelve zeroes to write and a lifetime to contemplate — shall be crossed before January the First, 2030. The markets have spoken with the confidence of a man who has already counted the money.

For the uninitiated reader, consider: a trillion dollars exceeds the annual economic output of all but a handful of nations. The frontrunners named by analysts and oddsmakers alike include Elon Musk, whose constellation of enterprises spans automobiles, rockets, and the very infrastructure of digital speech, and Jeff Bezos, whose commercial empire scarcely requires introduction. Prediction markets suggest the race is not whether, but merely who and when.

Yet markets, like men, are fallible. A ruinous regulatory reckoning, a market crash of historic proportion, or the cruel arithmetic of a collapsing asset bubble could yet strand the contenders short of the summit.