What if venture-debt lenders to AI startups face rising defaults as equity funding dries up?
Venture-debt lenders to AI startups face rising defaults as equity funding dries up and runways shorten, an under-appreciated leveraged channel of the bust.
how we built this number — every step
The class rate is measured from our dated, sourced event library (decade-normalized Poisson — the full table is public at base_rates.json). The variant’s share within its class is the analyst’s editorial call, published so you can audit it. A wider range means thinner precedent. Full recipe: methodology · scored at Reality Check.
The butterfly cascade
How this trigger trickles across markets, left → right — the root shock, its first‑order moves, then the ripple effects. Drag any node; tap a market for its real price history.
Resolution timeline — how this probability is moving
Our model's odds (gold) over time vs the crowd's (Polymarket, blue), from the past toward the 1–3 years horizon. Each dot is a real macro event that nudged the probability — green pushed it up, red pushed it down. Tap a dot for the source. The gold path is an illustrative reconstruction anchored to today's estimate — real dated events, not a live re-estimate history.
What it would mean
If this plays out, it is a risk-off shock. Venture-debt lenders to AI startups face rising defaults as equity funding dries up and runways shorten, an under-appreciated leveraged channel of the bust. The trigger decomposes into signed root‑shocks — AI capex ▼ · Credit spreads ▲ · Recession signal ▲ · Risk appetite ▼ — which propagate through our causal graph to the markets below.
If it happens — the markets it would move
Biggest moves first. Projected moves are cascade-model priors; hist A–B% = what comparable past events actually did (measured abnormal returns), and model prior · unmeasured marks markets with no analogue backing yet. Tap any market for its price history.
| Market | Class | Projected move | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Nvidia NVDAon Hyperliquid 📈 chart | Equity | ▼ -1.3% hist -1.38–+0.77% · other way +3.51% (n=12) |
| 2 | MicroStrategy MSTRon Hyperliquid 📈 chart | Equity | ▼ -1.2% hist -3.72–+0.69% · other way +9.6% (n=12) |
| 3 | Broadcom AVGOon Hyperliquid 📈 chart | Equity | ▼ -1.0% hist -1.44–+2.62% · other way +7.11% (n=12) |
| 4 | Micron MUon Hyperliquid 📈 chart | Equity | ▼ -0.9% hist -1.2–+1.02% · other way -0.31% (n=12) |
| 5 | Solana SOLon Hyperliquid 📈 chart | Crypto | ▼ -0.9% hist -19.75–+3.04% · other way -18.52% (n=10) |
| 6 | Semiconductors SMHon Hyperliquid 📈 chart | Equity | ▼ -0.9% hist -0.8–+1.24% · other way +2.12% (n=12) |
| 7 | Hyperliquid (HYPE) HYPEon Hyperliquid | Crypto | ▼ -0.8% model prior · unmeasured |
| 8 | High-yield credit HYG 📈 chart | Rate | ▼ -0.8% hist -0.52–-0.23% · other way -0.24% (n=12) |
| 9 | Volatility (VIX) VIXon Hyperliquid 📈 chart | Vol | ▲ +0.7% hist -1.43–+3.84% · other way -6.47% (n=12) |
| 10 | Nasdaq 100 NDXon Hyperliquid 📈 chart | Index | ▼ -0.7% hist -0.85–-0.07% · other way +0.43% (n=12) |
| 11 | Bitcoin BTCon Hyperliquid 📈 chart | Crypto | ▼ -0.7% hist -8.36–+3.18% · other way +2.89% (n=11) |
| 12 | Ether ETHon Hyperliquid 📈 chart | Crypto | ▼ -0.7% hist -11.53–+4.94% · other way -0.75% (n=10) |
| 13 | Financials XLF 📈 chart | Equity | ▼ -0.6% hist -0.48–-0.17% · other way -1.52% (n=12) |
| 14 | S&P 500 SPXon Hyperliquid 📈 chart | Index | ▼ -0.5% hist -1.82–+0.52% · other way +0.51% (n=12) |
Probable recommendation
Historical precedent — what analogous events actually did
Across 35 analogous events (overlap‑weighted), as abnormal returns — market beta stripped, so it's the event's own effect, not the market backdrop. Shown at 20 days (persistent) and 5 days (immediate); ↺ fades = the two horizons disagree. Confidence = consistency × sample × significance.
| Asset | History says | Abnormal (20d · 5d) | Hit | n | Confidence | vs cascade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| SOL SOL | SHORT | -16.2% · 5d -6.9% | 100% | 11 | 0.66 | ✓ matches cascade |
| ETH ETH | SHORT | -10.8% · 5d -3.9% | 75% | 12 | 0.37 | ✓ matches cascade |
| Bitcoin BTC | SHORT | -7.6% · 5d -2.1% | 71% | 14 | 0.34 | ✓ matches cascade |
| COIN COIN | SHORT | -1.4% · 5d +3.2% ↺ fades | 64% | 11 | 0.22 | ✓ matches cascade |
| SMH SMH | LONG | +1.5% · 5d -1.2% ↺ fades | 61% | 31 | 0.20 | ⚠ differs |
| MSTR MSTR | SHORT | -2.9% · 5d -2.6% | 61% | 31 | 0.19 | ✓ matches cascade |
| 10y yield DGS10 | SHORT | -15bp · 5d -5bp | 60% | 35 | 0.18 | · |
| AVGO AVGO | LONG | +2.9% · 5d -1.0% ↺ fades | 59% | 22 | 0.17 | ⚠ differs |
| ASML ASML | SHORT | -1.5% · 5d -3.8% | 58% | 31 | 0.12 | ✓ matches cascade |
| Gold XAU | LONG | +0.2% · 5d -0.1% ↺ fades | 55% | 31 | 0.09 | · |
| High-yield credit HYG | SHORT | -0.1% · 5d +0.1% ↺ fades | 54% | 28 | 0.06 | ✓ matches cascade |
| QCOM QCOM | SHORT | -1.6% · 5d -3.2% | 53% | 32 | 0.04 | ✓ matches cascade |
| NDX NDX | SHORT | -0.4% · 5d -1.7% | 52% | 33 | 0.03 | ✓ matches cascade |
| SPX SPX | SHORT | -1.5% · 5d -0.5% | 51% | 35 | 0.03 | ✓ matches cascade |