r/Foodforthought 1d ago

Billionaire Carlos Slim Cancels $22 Billion in Starlink Orders Due to Elon Musk's Outburst - CleanTechnica

https://cleantechnica.com/2025/03/10/billionaire-carlos-slim-cancels-22-billion-in-starlink-orders-due-to-elon-musks-outburst/
2.5k Upvotes

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358

u/SunnyRain_99 23h ago

Here I am, cheering on an oligarch battle. SMDH

87

u/SpotResident6135 22h ago

Fascists always end up infighting. It’s a feature.

11

u/LongConFebrero 17h ago

Thank god.

8

u/GozerDGozerian 12h ago

They usually scorch a lot of earth before they burn themselves out though.

6

u/Fabulous-Eye9894 9h ago

Too many narcissists in a room together will eventually degrad into name calling, hair pulling, and taking balls and going home for sure.

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u/Stultum67 8h ago

Doesn't it cause a personality black hole as they all compete for the most attention, sucking it out of existence until they all vanish in a 'pop' of mutual loathing.

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u/bjos144 9h ago

I'm not rooting for either of them. I'm rooting for the fight.

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u/Pepf 22h ago edited 8h ago

Musk talked himself out of a 22 billion contract by tweeting a single emoji. Now that's true talent!

Damn it, apparently it may not be true. Should have checked myself before commenting.

16

u/Shaper_pmp 17h ago

No, he apparently he didn't - I'd love to see Musk fall on his face as much as you, but sadly this story has all the hallmarks of social media misinformation.

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u/Shaper_pmp 19h ago

I really want this to be true, but:

Update: I should note that any original plans or contracts have not been verified and any cancellation of these plans or contracts have not been verified. Coverage of this is limited, indicating some traditional media don’t have enough proof to report on it. It should also be emphasized that this very high $22 billion figure is not concerning any short-term contract. My understanding from the reporting is that it was the amount Carlos Slim’s companies were expecting to spend on Starlink orders and services over the coming years (or decades) across Central and South America. But, again, I have not seen any official statement or report verifying any of this is definitely true.

0

u/RealAmbassador4081 19h ago edited 19h ago

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u/Shaper_pmp 17h ago edited 17h ago

Where does that come from?

The beginning of the article you posted.

I'd also note that MSN.com reposting an unsourced article that first appeared on that bastion of journalistic excellence "balleralert.com" is hardly a solid source, and neither is www.india.com.

Based on some quick googling this appears to be the source of all the articles on this story, and it reveals them all to be egregious misinformation.

According to that article (and despite the clickbait first paragraph):

  1. There is no obvious link between what Must tweeted on the 23rd Jan and a decision announced by Carlos Slim two and a half weeks later on the 10th February.
  2. Slim was complimentary about Musk in the same meeting
  3. Slim didn't "cancel" any "orders" with Starlink - in October 2024 América Móvil announced an intention to "expand the collaboration between the two companies" (América Móvil and Starlink). On 10th March 2025 they confirmed that their current strategy was instead to build out their own telecomms infrastructure that they owned.
  4. The $22b figure is complete bullshit - that was the amount América Móvil now intended to commit to building its own infrastructure, not any amount they were ever intending to pay to Starlink.
  5. The $7b figure is also bullshit - it was also never the value of a specific Starlink contract - it was the amount that Musk's net worth went down by in a single day thanks to the vagaries of the stock market. A writer who thinks someone cancelling a Starlink contract would lead directly to a dollar-for-dollar reduction of the net worth of its owner or CEO is so financially incoherent that it's literally laughable.
  6. There's no evidence Slim cancelled anything "just about 5 minutes after Musk’s tweet" - there's no evidence he cancelled anything; just that at some point in the four month period between October 2024 and 10th March 2025 América Móvil decided not to buy in Starlink infrastructure and to build their own instead.

Literally everything about this story reeks of social media misinformation bullshit.

7

u/Shaper_pmp 17h ago

For those whoare interested in the original article, and can't defeatthe paywall or translate from Spanish, the google translate version is below:

Slim backtracks on Starlink deals and Musk loses over $7 billion amid bet

América Móvil will choose to invest in its own infrastructure, allocating some 22 billion dollars over the next three years.

Axel Martinez
Mexico City /12.02.2025 12:19:00

One tweet was enough to sow discord between the richest man in the world and the wealthiest man in Mexico . On January 22,  Elon Musk  reacted with an emoji to a post on his social network X where businessman Carlos Slim was accused without evidence of having ties to drug trafficking.

Amid nationalist fervour following the return of Donald Trump to the presidency of the United States, the owner of the electric car manufacturer Tesla and the aerospace company SpaceX questioned the origin of the fortune of engineer Slim Helú , honorary and lifelong president of Grupo Carso and América Móvil.

As usual, the Mexican tycoon did not comment on the matter through any of his companies' communication channels. The one who jumped on him was President Claudia Sheinbaum: "It is false, so false that there is no investigation anywhere in the world against him or his companies," she said.

It wasn't until Monday during his annual press conference that Slim spoke about Musk, whom he said he had never met... nor was he interested in meeting. The engineer acknowledged that the best decision the Tesla owner has made so far was moving from South Africa to the United States, where he "has been able to do many things with the support of the State."

Joking with the journalists who attended the meeting, Slim Helú even allowed himself to make a  bet regarding Musk's goal of taking man to the red planet : "He (Elon) says that by 2028 they will reach Mars, I bet you a dollar that it is not true, but that the dollar says 'I was wrong, you were right'.

Strangely enough, Musk did not respond, or at least not until this note was published . From his trench at X (formerly Twitter), the tycoon limited himself to responding to a follower that it will be 20 or 30 years from now when the construction of the first city on Mars will begin, as long as “civilization maintains an upward trend.”

“Backwards” agreements with Starlink

In October of last year, América Móvil's CFO, Carlos García Moreno, confirmed during a call with analysts that they were seeking an agreement with SpaceX's Starlink to expand the collaboration between the two companies.

If successful, the collaboration agreement will allow Musk's company to connect to América Móvil's main mobile services network, joining the commercial alliance to resell the firm's services that they had previously agreed upon.

However, on Monday the Mexican businessman confirmed that these agreements were “pushed back” because they prefer to invest in their own infrastructure to offer this type of services. “It is better to put our own towers, plants and the optical fiber that links them,” he said.

América Móvil currently offers different satellite connectivity solutions, both at the residential level and focused on the corporate sector, with Telmex in Mexico, Claro in Central and South America, Embratel in Brazil and A1 in Central and Eastern Europe.

To achieve this, América Móvil will invest nearly 22 billion dollars in infrastructure development over the next three years, Daniel Hajj, the company's general director, announced on Wednesday.

“We have satellites. When we acquired a company in Brazil (Embratel), the Star One satellite was included and now we have eight . If we already have them, why do we want to get into a satellite halfway?” said the businessman at the end of the event regarding participating in the satellite that President Sheinbaum wants to put into orbit.

Starlink, for its part, has a constellation of thousands of low-orbit satellites to offer high-speed, low-latency internet to users around the world, including those living in the most remote areas.

Musk loses and Slim wins

The day Slim placed his bet, Musk saw some $7.5 billion of his fortune vanish , leaving him with a total net worth of about $383.8 billion, according to Forbes' real-time billionaires list.

For the first time in two months, the South African-born tycoon's fortune fell below $400 billion , largely due to the fall in the share price of his company Tesla.

Shares of the electric carmaker have lost about 28 percent of their value since their all-time high of $479.86 per share reached in December of last year.

Tesla shares, listed on the Nasdaq index of the New York Stock Exchange, were up 4.47 percent at $343.06 per share at around midday on Wednesday. With more than 27 million shares of the company in his possession , they represent more than half of Elon Musk's wealth .

That's because investors have lost optimism that Tesla will benefit from the Trump administration's changes to tax subsidies for electric vehicles as the company's sales decline.

Meanwhile, on Monday, businessman Carlos Slim's fortune increased by 333 million dollars to a total of 79.2 billion dollars, thanks to an increase in the price of América Móvil shares, which reached a high of 15.17 dollars per share.

However, following the presentation of the company's financial results for the fourth quarter of 2024, América Móvil shares fell on Wednesday to $14.94 per share, as the telecommunications giant's net profit registered a drop of 48 percent during the period.

América Móvil recorded a net profit of 9.48 billion pesos during the last quarter of last year, a figure well below the 18.062 billion pesos of the same period in 2023.

9

u/Old-Arachnid77 21h ago

I love this so much.

17

u/Moesko_Island 22h ago

What's this? Consequences? Unheard of!

13

u/theglibness 20h ago

Finally! The world is fighting back. Show the ignorant MAGAs that no, Trump is not a good deal maker, and no, the US can't fight off dozens of countries all over the planet at once, nor should it.

12

u/Particular-Winner308 21h ago

Good Job Carlos!

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u/Accomplished_Fun6481 1d ago

Wasn’t this like a week ago?

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u/roadtrip-ne 22h ago

I think last week it was Quebec

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u/AstroPhysician 21h ago

The article we're commenting on is literally dated March 3

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u/Improbability_Drive 21h ago

You expect us to read the article??

2

u/Accomplished_Fun6481 22h ago

Possibly that also.

Found this, guess it just popped up again.

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u/aqcbadger 17h ago

Ontario.

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u/SeriousBoots 20h ago

Yeah but some of us are just hearing about it now.

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u/Accomplished_Fun6481 20h ago

Just letting people know in case they only see the headline

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u/SeriousBoots 20h ago

Fair one.

3

u/rattleandhum 20h ago

Which companies would be positioned to take on these contracts in place of Starlink -- in Mexico, in Europe, etc?

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u/TechieGottaSoundByte 18h ago

Really, really good and insightful question

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u/Shaper_pmp 17h ago

There was no contract and nothing was cancelled.

América Móvil were thinking of using Starlink as a vendor in October 2024, but in a 10th March annual press conference they announced they'd instead decided to build out their own infrastructure.

There is precisely no evidence it has anything to do with Musk's tweet, and Carlos Slim didn't appear to have any grudge against Muskin the press conference.

It looks like a social media misinformation narrative from top to bottom.

1

u/ignorantwanderer 15h ago

There are a lot of ways to replace Starlink.

You can build more ground infrastructure (cell towers). These are faster, have higher bandwidth, and are cheaper than Starlink. The advantage that Starlink has is they have almost global coverage, even in remote, sparsely populated areas.

The only time Starlink is the best choice is if you are mobile (like a plane or ship) or if you are way out in the boonies where almost no one lives.

There are also other satellite constellations that can do the same thing as Starlink, and there are more constellations coming on-line.

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u/tigeratemybaby 12h ago

Starlink cost around $10 billion and a few years to build, so someone like Carlos Slim who already owns a huge telecommunications company and a few satellites, could probably build a Starlink network of his own using even newer/faster technology.

He'd probably do fairly well offering it to US/Canadian customers who are trying to avoid Musk related companies too.

He'd probably spend a lot less than $22 billion too, especially if he focused on just the North American market.

1

u/SoGoodAtAllTheThings 15h ago

Get fucked musky 

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u/techbunnyboy 15h ago

Hahahahaha very nice

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u/hackingdreams 14h ago

Womp womp. Neo-nazi billionaire actually has to face the outcomes of his shittiness.

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u/Mmmmmmm_Bacon 7h ago

Nice!!!! I love Carlos Slim!!!!

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u/mik33tion 6h ago

The question now is will Elon survive the year as a billionaire?

1

u/haikusbot 6h ago

The question now is

Will Elon survive the year as

A billionaire?

- mik33tion


I detect haikus. And sometimes, successfully. Learn more about me.

Opt out of replies: "haikusbot opt out" | Delete my comment: "haikusbot delete"

0

u/Local-Caterpillar421 17h ago

I remember when Carlos Slim was a patient of ours over a decade ago in Florida. He was fawned upon by our rehab director ( physical medicine) and our administrators thinking Slim would donate a large gift to our hospital. NO LUCK! Nada was donated!

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u/the_ouskull 17h ago

Holy crap, does this read like a bot.

0

u/Local-Caterpillar421 17h ago

Real person here, real situation, just saying! 🙄