Five years ago, the Mars Perseverance Rover landed on the surface of Mars. Unlike previous probes and rovers sent to the surface of the Red Planet, Perseverance had a unique potential. The rover was equipped with drilling tools to obtain rock samples from where it traveled within the Jezero Crater and stainless steel tubes in which to store them for transport back to Earth.
The following video depicts the rover's arrival to the surface of Mars on 18 February 2021:
It's the storage of the rock samples that makes the Perseverance rover's mission so unique, because it marks the first time true economic activity has taken place on Mars. The robot rover extracted raw materials, packaged them, then placed them into inventory for the purpose of facilitating their export to Earth. This aspect of the rover's interplanetary trade mission represents the birth of the Martian economy.
As of 18 February 2026, the Perseverance rover has collected 28 rock samples, all stored in their packaging for transportation back to Earth. While most of those samples are still onboard the rover, ten of the samples have been deposited to the 'Three Forks' Sample Depot, where a future mission to Mars would be sent to collect and transport them to Earth.
Except that's not going to happen anytime soon. The original planners behind the Mars Sample Return mission left a pretty big, undefined hole in how that would realistically happen. Their basic concept was essentially a version of South Park's Underwear Gnomes' business plan:
- Phase 1: Collect rock samples for return to Earth.
- Phase 2: ?
- Phase 3: Samples delivered to Earth. Profit!
NASA was very unhappy with the rough concept that had been originally developed for "Phase 2" and directed other engineers to develop more effective and less costly replacement plans to send new landers to Mars' surface, collect the rock samples from their depots where they are being held as inventory, and transport them to Earth.
Here is an animation featuring RocketLab's Mars sample return concept, which gives an idea of the complexity that's involved in a "Phase 2" for a sample return mission:
After more than a year of studies for the mission with little prospect of affordably achieving its goal, the U.S. Congress pulled the plug on the sample return mission as it had been defined on 6 January 2026 by declining to fund it. The appropriations bill funding NASA and cutting off the Mars Sample Return mission ultimately passed with a bipartisan majority of the U.S. Congress on 16 January 2026.
The Mars Perseverance Rover will continue to collect and store additional rock samples as its mission will continue, but exports from Mars will be on hold until the right combination of an achievable return mission at an affordable cost has been realized.
The following chart presents our latest estimates of Mars' GDP by Martian year and quarter:
Mars GDP has been in recession since the first quarter of Martian Year 38 (MY38-Q1), with no new rock samples collected or placed into inventory for export on Mars since March 2025. We anticipate that lack of economic activity will continue through the current Martian quarter (MY38-Q3), which will end on 24 April 2026.
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