Here’s what will surely happen in 2026. Unless it doesn’t.

Kevins for Fed Chair. Nope. Not going to happen. Meaning I see neither Kevin Hassett nor Kevin Warsh becoming chairman of the Federal Reserve in May. Remember that President Donald Trump—our reality TV veteran overlord—loves nothing more than to keep us all guessing and then, poof, picking a wild card. Who gets the nod? Look for Scott Bessent (not so wild) or Fed governor Chris Waller (hat tip to Jeff Sonenfeld of Yale) to get tabbed.

AI Erodes Social Media. I think this is a significant, underrecognized trend. The beauty of Instagram or TikTok used to be that you would see things that would amaze you, whether it was your old high school pal Bruce playing with lion cubs in South Africa or some guy juggling plates while simultaneously paddling down the Ganges. (Wow!) All kinds of stuff, but it was real. Now with artificial intelligence, you see Chairman Mao playing badminton with Brigitte Bardot. OK, that’s clearly fake. But how about the picture of all those NBA superstars together, including Bill Russell and Kobe Bryant? Was that taken when Russ and Kobe were still alive? Who knows? I recently posted a beauty shot of my wife on a horse on a mountain and friends wondered if it was AI. I think people will find this increasing speculation of real versus fake to be tiresome and begin to tune out.

Geopolitical Stasis Continues. Yes, the word “continues" is the bane of headline writers, but I see no way around it. We are in an era which I am sure historians will refer to as that of the Three Strong Men, that is Xi Jinping, Vladimir Putin, and Donald Trump, and I see nothing (elections, death, or coups) changing that in 2026. So the stasis, i.e., inactive equilibrium, will remain. The bigger point is that these mighty three inform the world order. Full stop.

Midterms: They Won’t Matter Much. Democrats will make inroads, but in this era of the unitary executive, Potus has executive power to such a degree that congressional and judicial action matters less—so the inroading matters less. The real action comes in 2028.

The AI Trade. Not so much. It’s running out of steam. Over the past decade, Nvidia’s stock has risen 30,442% versus 260% for the S&P 500. Over the past six months, the gains have been 18.7% and 11.1%, respectively. I’ll still take the former (yes, please), but the barn-burning days are in the rearview mirror. It’s tough to grow to the moon when you have a $4.57 trillion market cap.

Say Hello to the World’s First Trillionaire. (Speaking of growing to the moon.) Yup, this will happen. Write it down. It’s Elon, of course, as my colleague Al Root notes, in large part because of the ever-skyrocketing valuation of SpaceX, Musk’s rocket company. A successful IPO, Root says, will make this a reality even with Tesla’s valuation staying flat. When Musk becomes a trillionaire, it will engender all the usual metaphors and comparisons: “That’s enough money to string a row of his fortune in dollar bills from earth to a colony on Mars."

Boom! Goes the Sports Business. Valuations of sports teams will streak ever higher as more and more institutional money enters the picture. You think this has already topped out? I say you ain’t seen nothing yet. Sports is the only live, unscripted game left in town. And it’s real. (See “AI Erodes Social Media," above.) Don’t look now, but Apollo just put out a report, “The Financing Gap in Sports: Unlocking a $2.5 Trillion Opportunity," which noted that “according to the Ross-Arctos Sports Franchise Index, which tracks six decades of transactions across the NFL, NBA, MLB, and NHL, team valuations have compounded at roughly 13% per year over the past six decades." That compares with 10.5% for plain-vanilla equities. Will this all come crashing down at some point? For sure. But not in 2026, it won’t.

Prediction Markets, a la Kalshi and Polymarket, Will Keep on Growin’. This is in large part due to the fact that as my colleagues Andrew Welsch and Nick Devor recently pointed out, prediction markets are now mostly in the business of sports betting, but as they aren’t registered as such, they can circumvent laws in states that ban such activity. Unless the federal government intervenes—unlikely in the Trump regulation-lite administration—prediction markets will take more share from sports book companies like Flutter Entertainment and DraftKings, which have been under serious pressure this fall.

And Finally, the Market. Unlike the usual prognosticators (“It will go up unless it goes down, where do I send my bill?"), I’m going to go out on a limb and say the market goes…down. Not that much, just like around 6260.85 for the S&P 500, which is a 10% haircut. I feel like the bull has been running on fumes a bit lately, and as markets guru and “Camp Kotok" founder Dave Kotok notes, between the administration messing with the economy’s biggest industry, healthcare, and brewing labor shortages, growth will surely be hindered. I also chuckled when I saw this eye-popping Bloomberg headline: “Every Wall Street Analyst Now Predicts a Stock Rally in 2026." The article notes that the analysts are betting that “the U.S. stock market will rally in 2026 for a fourth straight year, marking the longest winning streak in nearly two decades." Let them zig, I will zag. But of course, you’re welcome to beat me up 12 months from now if I’m wrong. No one will be happier lying in their hospital bed than yours truly.

Write to Andy Serwer at andy.serwer@barrons.com