SpaceX IPO Pricing Confirmed Thursday, Nasdaq Opening Cross Set for Friday
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SpaceX will begin trading on Nasdaq Friday at $135 a share, targeting $75 billion in proceeds and a $1.78 trillion opening valuation — the largest IPO in history, whose first-day performance will set the pricing tone for Anthropic, OpenAI, and other AI companies lining up to list this summer.
$75 billion — how does this compare to anything?
SpaceX plans to sell roughly 555.6 million shares at $135 each, targeting about $75 billion in gross proceeds and an initial market cap of roughly $1.78 trillion.
This means → it will dwarf Saudi Aramco's 2019 record of $29.4 billion, becoming the largest IPO ever by a wide margin.
Underwriters hold a greenshoe option — the right to sell extra shares if demand exceeds the initial allotment — covering about 83 million additional shares, worth roughly $11.2 billion.
Four-times oversubscribed — why isn't that simply good news?
Reuters reports subscription demand reached roughly four times the shares on offer; SpaceX stopped taking orders on Wednesday.
In plain terms = oversubscription figures are routinely inflated — institutional investors deliberately overstate demand to ensure they receive their target allocation, so the real appetite is uncertain.
Underwriters have all of Thursday to finalize the allocation list. The Thursday-night pricing is a formality: $135 was set by Musk before the roadshow even began.
Retail gets 30% — what happens at the open?
Retail investors were allocated roughly 30% of the offering, far above the typical 5%–10% in large IPOs.
This means → a higher retail share makes post-open selling behavior less predictable, raising first-day volatility risk.
Individual investors can participate through Schwab, Fidelity, Robinhood, SoFi, and Morgan Stanley's E-Trade, though Robinhood moved its cutoff to Wednesday at 4 p.m. ET.
After Friday's opening bell, Nasdaq market makers will match buy and sell orders to set the opening price — for a high-profile IPO of this size, that auction process can stretch well beyond the bell.
Price-to-sales above 90× — what does Morningstar say?
SpaceX reported $18.7 billion in 2024 revenue. At the IPO price, the implied price-to-sales ratio exceeds 90× — dwarfed in revenue terms by the top ten U.S. listed companies.
Morningstar analyst Nicolas Owens previously pegged SpaceX's intrinsic value at roughly $780 billion, only about 44% of the IPO-implied valuation.
In plain terms = Morningstar considers this a "priced for perfection" stock — the current price already bakes in every optimistic scenario, and any operational miss could trigger a pullback.
Governance risk and the ripple effect — who is watching?
Musk retains firm control through special shares carrying 10× voting power, leaving ordinary shareholders with almost no say in corporate decisions.
Senator Elizabeth Warren wrote to SEC Chair Paul Atkins this week demanding the IPO be paused.
This reflects a broader stakes: SpaceX's first-day performance will directly shape pricing expectations for Anthropic, OpenAI, and other companies waiting to list this summer.
Content is for reference only, not financial advice.