THE TICKER[LAUNCH] AST SpaceMobile will build its own rocket, Blacklift, with Firefly engines, in a deal of more than $1.3 billion.[LAUNCH] Europe's reusable Prometheus methane engine fired and restarted several times on an upgraded test stand in Germany.[LAUNCH] SpaceX's Starship Flight 15, which will try to catch both its booster and its ship, is in final checks for no earlier than Nov. 13 and still needs FAA approval.[LAUNCH] Italy's Avio scaled back its reusable rocket engine test program after technical trouble, with about 101 million euros of 217.5 million spent.[LAUNCH] No orbital launches flew worldwide in the window so far; the 2026 count stays at 257, with China's Ceres-2 and a Falcon 9 for the Space Force set for tonight.[ORBIT] The Space Force picked Viasat to build the control room for its Space Data Network, a contract worth up to $450 million.[ORBIT] Europe's Trace Gas Orbiter caught hydrogen chloride gas rising from fresh cracks on the Martian volcano Alba Mons, a hint that Mars may not be fully asleep.[ORBIT] Hubble shared a new picture of M30, a ball of ancient stars about 27,500 light-years away.[AIR] Wing, Alphabet's drone delivery company, will spend up to $125 million on a drone factory in Fort Worth, Texas.[AIR] Axon, the police body camera maker, is putting $1.2 billion more into drone maker Skydio, and Axon's stock fell about 18% Friday after weak quarterly results. Not investment advice.[AIR] Atlantic Aviation's vertiport company agreed to study landing spots around New York with Electra, whose planes need very short runways.[AI] Thinking Machines Lab released Inkling 2 Small, a model that scores 31 on the Artificial Analysis Intelligence Index, and says it plans to share the full model next week.[AI] Gemini 4 Carbon (High) still holds the top score of 60 on the Artificial Analysis Intelligence Index.[WILD] IBM turned on a Quantum System Two in Chicago, its first quantum computer in Illinois, to work on medicines, the power grid and physics.[WILD] Chip stocks won back part of Thursday's big drop: AMD closed up about 11% and Nvidia up about 3%. Not investment advice.[WILD] Cloudflare, which helps websites run fast and safely, grew its quarterly revenue 39% to $782.5 million, and its stock rose about 10%. Not investment advice.[WILD] French quantum company Pasqal reported 3.3 million euros of third quarter revenue, down from 5.7 million, with 312.8 million euros in cash. Not investment advice.[MED] An AI model in Nature Medicine predicted 1,887 health measures from 3D video of 3,328 people walking.[MED] A heart pill called HRS/BHB-1893 kept working for a year in people with a thickened heart muscle: 33 of 42 reached the target blood flow pressure.[MED] A drug called fazirsiran cut a harmful protein in the liver by a median of 89.6% in people with alpha-1 antitrypsin deficiency.[DEF] The Army opened a $4.17 billion contract for 11 companies to design and build new Army ammunition plants.[DEF] Amentum won a $609 million contract to supply at least 500 extra workers to Army repair depots.[DEF] The Navy hired Vigor Marine for an $18.1 million, 59 day overhaul of the hospital ship USNS Mercy in early 2027.[POLICY] The Treasury's FinCEN and the Federal Reserve withdrew a 2020 plan to lower the Travel Rule limit on international transfers from $3,000 to $250.[POLICY] Forty-five state attorneys general asked Congress to pass the Senate's Kids Online Safety Act.[POLICY] California's privacy agency proposed rules so one "do not sell my data" setting in your browser covers every device linked to you.[TOKEN] Nigeria's central bank stablecoin rules took effect, requiring offshore issuers to get a local license. Not investment advice.[TOKEN] Hawkeye Digital plans to put its own shares on the Ethereum blockchain with Securitize, with the same dividends and votes. Not investment advice.[TOKEN] A CFTC staff letter lets clearinghouses use trust companies, including crypto-focused ones, to settle trades. Not investment advice.[TOKEN] Tokenized real-world assets stood at $39.36 billion, down from $39.70 billion on Thursday, per RWA.xyz. Not investment advice.
LONGEVITYLife expectancy gained +0.6 yearsEscape velocity, our estimate 2036SN DATAOrbital launches YTD 257Satellites this week 50Top AI score 60 (Gemini 4 Carbon)Tokenized assets $39.4B
Singularity Nightly

The future, explained every weeknight.

The Week No. 2

The Week: Neighbors Push Back on AI Data Centers, NASA Picks a Nuclear Rover for Its Moon Base, and Drones Head to 300 More Walmarts

Covers Friday, October 30, 2026, 6:00 PM ET to Saturday, November 7, 2026, 11:59 PM ET

Our second weekly look back: voters, regulators and investors all pushed back on AI data centers, NASA named a nuclear-powered rover for its Moon base, Zipline raised $1.5 billion to bring drone delivery to 300 more Walmart sites, and a gene editing medicine made a hepatitis B signal vanish in 11 of 12 patients.

Edited by Dennis W. Davis. AI-assisted; see How We Make This.

Long rows of computer cabinets inside NASA's Pleiades supercomputer room at Ames Research Center
Rows of computers inside NASA's Pleiades supercomputer at Ames Research Center. NASA

In 60 Seconds

  • AI data centers had a hard week: voters turned them down in almost every local ballot measure, Florida's utility board rejected a power plan for them, and chip stocks had one of their worst days in years.
  • Space kept building: NASA hired three companies for a new network of relay satellites, named a nuclear-powered rover for its Moon base, and AST SpaceMobile said it will build its own rocket.
  • Drone delivery grew up: Zipline raised $1.5 billion and Walmart signed on for 300 more Zipline sites, while Wing plans a $125 million drone factory in Texas.
  • Also: a gene editing medicine for hepatitis B, an AI that hunts for security holes for defenders, the first tokenized U.S. stock trade, and humanoid robots that worked a full factory shift.

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Lead Signal

Neighbors push back on AI data centers at the ballot box, the utility board and the stock market

Long rows of computer cabinets inside NASA's Pleiades supercomputer room at Ames Research Center
Rows of computers inside NASA's Pleiades supercomputer at Ames Research Center. AI data centers are buildings full of machines like these, on a much larger scale. NASA

A building full of computers that store data and run online services. Data centers for AI use large amounts of electricity. In the Glossary are the giant buildings full of computers that run AI and the internet, and this week ordinary people had their say about them. On Tuesday, Election Day, voters in 10 states decided more than 40 local measures about data centers, and the side against them won nearly all of them, in early results. The only reported win for data center interests came in Harwood, North Dakota. In Emporia, Kansas, just over 60% of voters passed a ban on the biggest power and water users, and in Ohio, where nearly 20 places voted, opponents appear to have won every race (Wednesday's edition). Brookings' Mark Muro put it this way: "The mutiny is about the way this technology is being introduced" (Monday).

The same day, Florida's A state board that decides what electric, gas and water companies may charge and what they must do. In the Glossary, which sets what utilities can charge, voted 5 to 0 to reject Duke Energy's plan for charging very large power users such as data centers, saying it could not make sure each one paid its own way. St. Johns County, Florida, and Mooresville, North Carolina, paused new data centers for a year (Tuesday). On Thursday, the A stock market index that tracks 30 large companies that design, make or sell computer chips. In the Glossary, which tracks 30 big A tiny slice of material, usually silicon, carved with billions of switches that let a device compute and store information. Chips run everything from phones to AI data centers. In the Glossary companies, fell 12.25% and the A stock market index of the companies listed on the Nasdaq exchange, many of them technology companies. People watch it to see how tech stocks are doing overall. In the Glossary fell 5.52%, as investors worried about new rules for AI and data centers (Thursday). Not investment advice.

The Desks

[AI] AI Models

OpenAI builds an AI bug hunter for defenders, and the strongest free model yet arrives

OpenAI released GPT-6 Cyber on Thursday, a version of its AI trained to find weaknesses in software and help fix them. OpenAI says researchers using it found 81 serious, previously unknown flaws in the Firefox web browser, and because the same skill could help attackers, only approved security teams can use it. On Wednesday, Beijing's Moonshot AI put Kimi K3.1 Pro on Hugging Face for anyone to download; at 46 on the Artificial Analysis Intelligence Index, it is the highest scoring downloadable model, while the top overall, Gemini 4 Carbon (High), is at 60. First in Evening Edition No. 9 and No. 8.

[LAUNCH] Launch and Orbit

NASA picks a nuclear-powered rover for its Moon base, and AST SpaceMobile decides to build its own rocket

OPTIMISM, the Earth-bound twin of the Perseverance rover, at a doorway of the Mars Yard garage at JPL
OPTIMISM, the Earth-bound twin of the Perseverance Mars rover, at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in 2021. NASA plans to build its Moon rover PROMISE from spare parts and test models like it. NASA/JPL-Caltech

At its MAX POWER expo at Kennedy Space Center on Saturday, NASA gave an update on its Moon base near the lunar south pole. It said it will send PROMISE, a six-wheeled, nuclear-powered rover built from spare parts and test models of its Curiosity and Perseverance Mars rovers, to the south pole on a Blue Origin lander, and named eight companies for the next round of its program that buys rides to the Moon, Starlust reports. Nuclear power lets a rover keep working through the two-week lunar night. Administrator Jared Isaacman said, "We are building the Moon Base mission by mission." On Friday, AST SpaceMobile, which builds satellites that talk straight to ordinary phones, said it will build its own rocket, Blacklift, with engines from Firefly Aerospace in a deal worth more than $1.3 billion, Payload reports. First in Evening Edition No. 10.

[ORBIT] Satellites and Orbit

NASA hires three companies to carry its spacecraft's calls home

A Tracking and Data Relay Satellite moving away from space shuttle Discovery's cargo bay in 1989
A Tracking and Data Relay Satellite heads away from space shuttle Discovery in March 1989. NASA now wants companies to take over this job. NASA

NASA picked Astranis, Global Enterprise Solutions and Viasat on Wednesday to develop commercial A satellite that passes signals between other spacecraft and the ground, like a cell tower in the sky, so a spacecraft can send data home without waiting to fly over a ground station. In the Glossary, with contracts worth up to about $1.07 billion together. A relay satellite works like a cell tower in the sky: a spacecraft sends its data up to the relay, and the relay passes it down to Earth. NASA's own relay fleet is getting old, and it wants to buy the service from companies instead of owning the satellites, with a test in space by 2029. First in Evening Edition No. 8.

[AIR] Air Mobility

Zipline raises $1.5 billion, and Walmart signs on for 300 more drone delivery sites

A Zipline drone delivery pod
A Zipline drone delivery pod, from Zipline's press images. Zipline

Zipline, which delivers packages by drone, raised $1.5 billion on Thursday, valuing it at $21.5 billion, and Walmart signed a multi-year deal to add 300 more Zipline delivery sites. Around Dallas and Fort Worth, the typical order arrived 19 minutes after checkout in October, DroneXL reports. On Friday, Wing said it plans a $125 million drone factory in Fort Worth. First in Evening Edition No. 9 and No. 10.

[MED] Medicine

A gene editing medicine makes a hepatitis B virus signal vanish in 11 of 12 patients

Precision BioSciences shared early results for PBGENE-HBV, a Tools that change a specific spot in a person's DNA, like fixing a typo in a long document. CRISPR is the best-known method. In the Glossary medicine designed to cut and destroy the hidden copy of the A virus that infects the liver, often for life, and can lead to liver scarring and cancer. In the Glossary virus inside liver cells, the reason today's pills can hold the virus down but rarely cure it. A blood sign of virus activity became undetectable in 11 of 12 patients who could be measured, and there were no serious side effects at the dose chosen for the next trial. Full results come today, Nov. 8, at a liver meeting in Denver, and a larger trial should start in early 2027. First in Evening Edition No. 9.

[DEF] Defense

Shield AI agrees to buy drone-spotting radar maker Echodyne for $5.3 billion

Shield AI, a San Diego company that builds AI pilots and drones, agreed to buy Echodyne, whose flat radars with no moving parts are built into hundreds of systems that find and stop small drones, in more than 40 countries. The deal needs government approval and should close in early 2027. On Friday, the Army opened a $4.17 billion contract for 11 companies to design and build new ammunition plants over five years. First in Evening Edition No. 9 and No. 10.

[POLICY] Law and Policy

The bank regulator tells examiners how to check AI that acts on its own

The The Treasury Department office that charters and supervises national banks. In the Glossary, which oversees national banks, issued its first framework on Wednesday for how examiners should review AI. It sorts AI systems by what happens if they fail, puts AI software that takes actions on its own, such as making a payment or booking a trip, instead of only answering questions. In the Glossary that move payments or approve credit in the riskiest group, and suggests safeguards such as automatic stops and An automatic stop that halts a system when it behaves strangely, so people can check what went wrong. In the Glossary. It is guidance for examiners and does not create new rules, Decrypt notes. First in Evening Edition No. 8.

[TOKEN] Tokenized Assets

The first tokenized U.S. stock trades under the SEC's new exemption

Shares of Canton Strategic Holdings, a Nasdaq-listed company, traded in token form on Wednesday, the first trades of a tokenized U.S. stock under the SEC's A conditional SEC permission, for up to five years, that lets approved venues trade tokens of U.S. stocks. In the Glossary. A tokenized stock is a share recorded on a A shared digital record book copied across many computers, so entries are hard to change or fake. It keeps track of who owns which tokens. In the Glossary, a shared digital ledger; the shares and the payment changed hands in a single step, and trading runs every hour of every day, but only for checked, approved buyers. First in Evening Edition No. 9. Not investment advice.

[WILD] Wildcard

Xiaomi's humanoid robots work a full 8-hour shift in its car factory

Xiaomi says its A robot built in roughly human shape, with arms, hands and often legs, so it can work in places and with tools designed for people. In the Glossary worked a full 8-hour shift in its electric car factory, sorting parts and catching and fixing their own mistakes, Electrek reports. Xiaomi did not share how many parts were sorted, the success rate, or how often a person had to step in. First in Evening Edition No. 8.

By the Numbers

  • More than 40: local data center measures in 10 states on Tuesday; data center backers won 1 reported race. Route Fifty
  • 12.25%: Thursday's drop in the PHLX Semiconductor Index; the Nasdaq fell 5.52%. Fox Business Not investment advice.
  • About $1.07 billion: NASA's new relay satellite contracts, shared by three companies. NASA
  • $21.5 billion: Zipline's value after raising $1.5 billion. Zipline
  • 46: Kimi K3.1 Pro's score, the highest of any downloadable model; the top overall is 60. Artificial Analysis
  • $6.12 billion: contracts the Pentagon announced Nov. 2 to 5. These are ceilings and orders, not money spent. war.gov
  • 260: orbital launch attempts worldwide in 2026 through Saturday, including 3 since Friday evening. Launch Library 2
  • $39.36 billion: tokenized In blockchain finance, a traditional asset that exists outside the blockchain, such as a Treasury bill, a loan or a building, represented by a token on one. Often shortened to RWA. In the Glossary, excluding A digital token designed to stay worth a fixed amount, usually one U.S. dollar, backed by cash and safe assets such as Treasury bills. In the Glossary. RWA.xyz Not investment advice.

Next Week's Watchlist

  • Sun Nov. 8: Long March 12 launch from Wenchang, about 3:25 PM ET; Precision BioSciences presents its full hepatitis B results at the liver meeting in Denver, 4:15 PM ET.
  • Mon Nov. 9: Congress returns after the election; CRISPR Therapeutics shares results for a one-time gene edit that lowers blood fats, 9:00 AM ET; Archer reports results; Falcon 9 launches USSF-627 from Vandenberg, 10:03 PM ET.
  • Tue Nov. 10: China's pause on rare earth export controls is due to end; South Korea's new small military rocket may make its first flight, about 1:00 AM ET.
  • Thu Nov. 12: AST SpaceMobile shows its Blacklift rocket in New York City.
  • Fri Nov. 13: Vulcan returns to flight with Amazon Leo satellites, 12:54 PM ET; Starship Flight 15, no earlier than this date, pending FAA approval.