‘SpaceX is going to be the bellwether’ for the IPO market this summer, says Mark Klein, president and CEO at SuRo Capital.
Elon Musk’s SpaceX began trading on June 12 at 10 a.m. under the SPCX ticker on the Nasdaq in what is the largest initial public offering (IPO) in history.
It has been looking to raise $75 billion by selling 555.6 million shares at $135 apiece.
By the end of the trading session, Musk could become the world’s first trillionaire.
“The IPO parade, which now looks like it’s turning into a stampede, has been coming for a while,” Mark Klein, president and CEO at SuRo Capital, said in a note emailed to The Epoch Times.
“SpaceX is going to be the bellwether. From our perspective, we’re excited.”
Investors will next set their sights on two other mega-IPOs: Anthropic and OpenAI.
Both companies—aiming for trillion-dollar valuations—have confidentially filed for IPOs with federal regulators in the past month.
Several space-related stocks were tanking at the opening bell.
AST SpaceMobile Inc, a Texas-based satellite designer and manufacturer, declined 8 percent. Spaceflight company Virgin Galactic Holdings fell 25 percent. EchoStar, which owns a 3 percent stake in SpaceX, dropped 7 percent.
The tech-driven Nasdaq Composite Index declined about 0.3 percent. The broad-market index S&P 500 was little changed, while the blue-chip Dow Jones Industrial Average picked up more than 100 points, or nearly 0.3 percent.
$1.77 Trillion and Beyond
Market watchers have questioned whether the $1.77 trillion valuation is justified.
Based on its filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, the company has defended the lofty valuation goal. It cited the Starlink satellite internet service, xAI, and reusable rockets.
Additionally, SpaceX believes its space endeavors will have a spillover effect into the broader marketplace.
“We believe that our current space efforts will catalyze transformative breakthroughs that could reshape terrestrial industries and lead to the emergence of new trillion-dollar markets on the Moon, Mars, and beyond,” the company said in its regulatory filing.
Building a sustained presence on the moon, for example, will unlock terawatt‑scale annual growth in AI computing, enable more ambitious deep‑space missions and industrial activity, and ultimately act as a bridge toward creating a permanent society on Mars, the company added.
Musk’s track record and the fact that SpaceX is the only vertically integrated AI company are reasons enough to believe it can succeed, says Nancy Tengler, CEO and chief investment officer at Laffer Tengler Investments.
“They’ve got the capital, the data, the large language models, the hardware, manufacturing capabilities, and engineering talent,” Tengler told The Epoch Times in an emailed note.
“There are a lot of Elon haters. I don’t really get it. As a result, I think you often hear more of the bear case than the bull case in the media. But this is a narrative stock. You’re buying it for the vision and the excitement.”
SpaceX stressed that it is focused on accomplishing its aims in the years ahead.
By Andrew Moran
