Asteroid UW-158 is set to wizz past Earth today, carrying an estimated five trillion dollars in platinum.
Spectroscopic analysis has revealed the composition of the asteroid, and made it a prime target for future asteroid-mining missions. It is approximately 452 metres by 1,011 metres in size. If the analysis is correct, it could be carrying an astonishing 90 million tons of platinum. It will swing past Earth at a distance of 2.4 million km, and will not be visible to the naked eye.
Paging Bruce Willis...
(Score: 3, Informative) by draconx on Tuesday July 21 2015, @03:14PM
I asked Wolfram how much platinum would be worth $5 trillion (at current value)...
http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=5+trillion+USD+in+platinum [wolframalpha.com]
...and the result is ~1.6 x 10⁸ kg, or ~160 million kg. Since that's still several orders of magnitude less than 90 million tonnes, I think you are right that someone confused the units.