SpaceX has reached a milestone nearly two decades in the making. The company, after completing a successful roadshow and pricing its offering, begins trading today on the Nasdaq under the ticker SPCX at $135 per share. At roughly 555.6 million shares and a ~$75 billion raise, that implies a valuation near $1.75–1.77 trillion — the largest IPO in market history, surpassing Saudi Aramco’s 2019 record. An event of this size matters to investors on three fronts: access, composition, and price.
Access is the headline feature. SpaceX set aside a far larger retail allocation than the customary 5–10%, and demand was exceptional — retail investors placed more than $100 billion in orders. Such openness is rare for a company that stayed private for over twenty years, though heavy oversubscription means most retail requests will be only partly filled.
Composition is the deeper appeal because a single share spans three businesses. These are the launch business, Starlink, and Musk’s AI venture xAI, which, since February’s merger, has valued the combined entity at $1.25 trillion. The current growth engine is clear: the Starlink-driven Connectivity segment generated $11.4 billion of revenue in 2025, about 61% of the total, and reached 10.3 million subscribers by the end of March 2026.
Price warrants discipline. In 2025, with revenue of $18.7 billion, the group posted a net loss of $4.9 billion, with EBITDA of $6.58 billion — the red ink driven by the AI segment’s $6.35 billion operating loss, which Starlink’s profits are effectively subsidising. At around 94 times revenue, the valuation leaves little room for error.
SpaceX shares previously changed hands only through occasional insider sales (last December’s offering at $421 a share). So this is the first continuous public market and a real exit for early backers and staff. Notably, the tradable float is thin, barely 4% of shares, with founder and key-backer stock staying locked for 366 days. Most other insiders begin selling in staggered tranches. This starts with the first earnings report. The float, while very thin at debut, widens within weeks. Under Nasdaq’s new fast-entry rule, effective May 1, 2026, SpaceX could also join the Nasdaq-100 within 15 trading days, compelling index funds to buy. Early trading may therefore be driven as much by scarcity and index flows as by fundamentals.
The overall assessment is constructive. SpaceX brings a category-defining franchise to public markets. A debut of this scale signals renewed confidence in public markets. It also hands ordinary investors a front-row seat to the space and connectivity economy.
