DISPATCHES FROM THE PROBABLE FUTURE — The trading floors of Kalshi exchange have rendered their verdict: Elon Musk, already the wealthiest man recorded in the annals of commerce, stands a three-in-four chance of amassing one trillion dollars before history closes its present chapter. Prediction markets, those cold and unsentimental arbiters of likelihood, have spoken with unusual conviction. Should the markets prove correct, no king, no robber baron, no oil sheikh of prior generations could have conceived such a sum — a figure that dwarfs the GDP of entire nations and renders the fortunes of Rockefeller and Carnegie quaint by comparison. At 76% probability on Kalshi, with a modest $1,333 in daily trading volume lending the figure a quiet confidence rather than speculative fever, market consensus holds that the Tesla and SpaceX impresario is less a question of *if* than *when*.