SpaceX potential IPO

[Tywin]

Well maybe is time to talk about this possibility.

https://twitter.com/JackKuhr/status/1997028639503012153

[Tywin]

Some opinions contrarian to the IPO vs the Mars goal...



https://twitter.com/KenKirtland17/status/1997056518148313282

[Tywin]

Agree;

https://twitter.com/trengriffin/status/1997037339093377351

[envy887]

Agree;

https://twitter.com/trengriffin/status/1997037339093377351

Disagree. The whole point of an IPO is to raise a large amount of cash, so they could then easily afford to pay list price for launch less some volume discount. This is justifiable to investors now that Starlink has a large customer base and good cash flow, so the capital investment in the satellite build out will be paid back in a short and definite period of time.

If Starlink MUST launch at cost in order to survive as a business, then its not a viable business, and no IPO should happen of either the Starlink segment nor of the whole combined company.

[Greg Hullender]

They can still be serious about Mars if the intention is for the Federal Government to pick up the tab. And, given how Elon operates, I think that has always been the plan--even though I know a lot of people have liked to fantasize otherwise.

[M.E.T.]

I don't think they will IPO the holding company. Let's say it goes to $800B in the current share sale as reported, and to maybe $1T by middle next next year (still as a private company).

Elon owns 42% of that, so his stake is then worth $420B. If they IPO at that point in late 2026, and issue say 50% new shares to the public, Elon's stake gets diluted from $420B to $210B. Even if the market cap of the company then doubles immediately to $2T due to insane market demand for the shares, Elon only gets back to his old $420B, but now he has public shareholder laws to deal with for the rest of SpaceX's existence, and his stake his reduced by half. Sure he has majority voting shares entrenched, but it still has a different dynamic if his common share percentage is now so much lower than before.

This presents little value to him personally. The only reason would be to access a mountain of cash overnight, but why would they do that, given that SpaceX already prints cash at will, and can raise more at any time in gradual increments on the private market.

The only reason Elon would do this, is if he is looking for cash for XAI, to buy a mountain of GPU's and beat Sam Altman to Digital Super Intelligence. As we saw, he had Spacex invest a couple of billion in XAI already, and with say half a trillion in new cash from an IPO, that would be quite a piggy bank for XAI.

I hope that is not the motivation, because he loses a lot of his freedom once SpaceX goes public.

Better to IPO the Starlink subsidiary and issue maybe 20% of it as shares to the public. Due to the small number of shares and massive demand, this will likely raise a couple of hundred billion dollars in its own right. And still leave Elon with 42% of SpaceX, which in turn will own 80% of Starlink.

[thespacecow]

The only reason Elon would do this, is if he is looking for cash for XAI, to buy a mountain of GPU's and beat Sam Altman to Digital Super Intelligence. As we saw, he had Spacex invest a couple of billion in XAI already, and with say half a trillion in new cash from an IPO, that would be quite a piggy bank for XAI.

I hope that is not the motivation, because he loses a lot of his freedom once SpaceX goes public.

I think this could be part of it. But the money wouldn't just be buying GPUs, it would also be building up gigantic fleet of Starship and Starlink for orbital data centers. Note given the news about Sam Altman looking to fund SpaceX competitors, this is not just about xAI's competition with OpenAI anymore. If OpenAI goes public and throws huge amount of money to SpaceX competitors, it would create a threat to SpaceX in their own arena, SpaceX goes public and gets huge amount of money is a legitimate way to fight back, helping out xAI in the process is icing on the cake.

But there could be other areas where SpaceX may need more funding for expansion. For example if they do have ambition to become another US mobile carrier, they'll need funding to build out terrestrial networks. There's also Starfall, if they want to vertically integrate in space manufacturing, for example creating pharmaceutical products, that would also need non-trivial amount of money. There's also the Starlink phone idea, I don't think Elon wants to go there, but raising $100B would be a nice way to remind Apple that they shouldn't mess with SpaceX.

PS: I don't think getting half a trillion is realistic, Grok estimate maybe $100B.

[M.E.T.]

The only reason Elon would do this, is if he is looking for cash for XAI, to buy a mountain of GPU's and beat Sam Altman to Digital Super Intelligence. As we saw, he had Spacex invest a couple of billion in XAI already, and with say half a trillion in new cash from an IPO, that would be quite a piggy bank for XAI.

I hope that is not the motivation, because he loses a lot of his freedom once SpaceX goes public.

I think this could be part of it. But the money wouldn't just be buying GPUs, it would also be building up gigantic fleet of Starship and Starlink for orbital data centers. Note given the news about Sam Altman looking to fund SpaceX competitors, this is not just about xAI's competition with OpenAI anymore. If OpenAI goes public and throws huge amount of money to SpaceX competitors, it would create a threat to SpaceX in their own arena, SpaceX goes public and gets huge amount of money is a legitimate way to fight back, helping out xAI in the process is icing on the cake.

But there could be other areas where SpaceX may need more funding for expansion. For example if they do have ambition to become another US mobile carrier, they'll need funding to build out terrestrial networks. There's also Starfall, if they want to vertically integrate in space manufacturing, for example creating pharmaceutical products, that would also need non-trivial amount of money. There's also the Starlink phone idea, I don't think Elon wants to go there, but raising $100B would be a nice way to remind Apple that they shouldn't mess with SpaceX.

PS: I don't think getting half a trillion is realistic, Grok estimate maybe $100B.

Since we are taking the latest reports as at least somewhat legitimate as the basis for this discussion, their new private market value is supposedly $800B. It is then quite reasonable to expect them to reach $1T by mid next year.

If they then IPO by end of 2026, the IPO valuation would have to be a lot higher than the pre-IPO $1T, else they could just raise the new capital in the private market instead. So IPO value say $1.5T. Maybe $2T, even. If they issue 20% new shares upon IPO that could raise many hundreds of billions.

[meekGee]

Yeeesh all the detractors are spinning up scenarios where SpaceX shoots themselves in the foot in order to satisfy them...  Either because SpaceX are too dumb to understand the consequences, or because SpaceX is a big hoax to steal investor money on the false premise or Mars.

We also previously had a wave of "SpaceX can't attempt a 2026 Mars launch because of HLS demo.".

Whatever floats your boat guys.

But...  SpaceX is going for Mars as its main goal, and everything else is subservient to that.

Starlink, HLS, orbitalAI, p2p...

It's just that on the way to Mars, it's gonna eat up a lot of other competing companies, partly BECAUSE it's so focused....

[Tywin]

Yeeesh all the detractors are spinning up scenarios where SpaceX shoots themselves in the foot in order to satisfy them...  Either because SpaceX are too dumb to understand the consequences, or because SpaceX is a big hoax to steal investor money on the false premise or Mars.

We also previously had a wave of "SpaceX can't attempt a 2026 Mars launch because of HLS demo.".

Whatever floats your boat guys.

But...  SpaceX is going for Mars as its main goal, and everything else is subservient to that.

Starlink, HLS, orbitalAI, p2p...

It's just that on the way to Mars, it's gonna eat up a lot of other competing companies, partly BECAUSE it's so focused....

I don't know why you said this...

But for me is a good news, and give a LOT of money to SpaceX...

[meekGee]

Yeeesh all the detractors are spinning up scenarios where SpaceX shoots themselves in the foot in order to satisfy them...  Either because SpaceX are too dumb to understand the consequences, or because SpaceX is a big hoax to steal investor money on the false premise or Mars.

We also previously had a wave of "SpaceX can't attempt a 2026 Mars launch because of HLS demo.".

Whatever floats your boat guys.

But...  SpaceX is going for Mars as its main goal, and everything else is subservient to that.

Starlink, HLS, orbitalAI, p2p...

It's just that on the way to Mars, it's gonna eat up a lot of other competing companies, partly BECAUSE it's so focused....

I don't know why you said this...

But for me is a good news, and give a LOT of money to SpaceX...

Your emphasis is about how this prevents (in your opinion) a Mars colony effort, just like your previous posts on the matter.

It's one thing to say "I think a Mars colony is too difficult today".  It's quite another to agitate and celebrate every real and perceived difficulty, which is what you're doing.

Let me ask you this: if SpaceX and Musk are able in fact to both go IPO and use the funds towards a Mars colony, would that be a good thing?

[jstrotha0975]

PS: I don't think getting half a trillion is realistic, Grok estimate maybe $100B.

How wise to ask things about Musk to Grok. The damn biased (and nazi) thing - I mean the A.I, obviously. Brainwashing, here we go...

Are their NAZI's in the room with you right now? Rent free. Most people that disagree with you are not NAZI's.

[StraumliBlight]

https://x.com/elonmusk/status/1997399963509150089

There has been a lot of press claiming @SpaceX is raising money at $800B, which is not accurate.

SpaceX has been cash flow positive for many years and does periodic stock buybacks twice a year to provide liquidity for employees and investors.

Valuation increments are a function of progress with Starship and Starlink and securing global direct-to-cell spectrum that greatly increases our addressable market.

And one other thing that is arguably most significant by far.

[meekGee]

PS: I don't think getting half a trillion is realistic, Grok estimate maybe $100B.

How wise to ask things about Musk to Grok. The damn biased (and nazi) thing - I mean the A.I, obviously. Brainwashing, here we go...

Are their NAZI's in the room with you right now? Rent free. Most people that disagree with you are not NAZI's.

The funny thing is that the last posts are actually not making the thread worse by much.

(3... 2... 1...  And nothing of value was lost)

[catdlr]

https://x.com/elonmusk/status/1997399963509150089

There has been a lot of press claiming @SpaceX is raising money at $800B, which is not accurate.

SpaceX has been cash flow positive for many years and does periodic stock buybacks twice a year to provide liquidity for employees and investors.

Valuation increments are a function of progress with Starship and Starlink and securing global direct-to-cell spectrum that greatly increases our addressable market.

And one other thing that is arguably most significant by far.

Here is a follow up post from Elon just a few minutes later

Elon Musk

@elonmusk
While I have great fondness for @NASA, they will constitute less than 5% of our revenue next year. Commercial Starlink is by far our largest contributor to revenue.

Some people have claimed that SpaceX gets “subsidized” by NASA. This is absolutely false.

The SpaceX team won the NASA contracts because we offered the best product at the lowest price. BOTH best product AND lowest cost. With regard to astronaut transport, SpaceX is currently the only option that passes NASA safety standards.
12:25 PM · Dec 6, 2025
·

https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1997401910635278368

[Vultur]

I hope they don't. It  would open them up to lawsuits from shareholders if risks they take don't work out, and would start the transition of SpaceX toward "a normal corporation".

[spacenut]

The only way I see this would work is if Musk had the controlling shares, like 51% of all stock.  That way he could keep the company focused on Mars and Xai.  I would think if he is going to build the Xai servers in orbit, he will need a fleet of Starships to build it as well as go to Mars and the moon for NASA. 

I would also believe that Musk thinks he will have Starship operational by the end of the 2026, and have another million or so customers for Starlink services.  This would make SpaceX worth more. 

I would also wonder if Bezos would do the same for Blue Origin once New Glenn 9x4 is operational. 

[Vultur]

The only way I see this would work is if Musk had the controlling shares, like 51% of all stock.  That way he could keep the company focused on Mars and Xai. 

Even the xAI thing I think is a problematic distraction.

[meekGee]

The only way I see this would work is if Musk had the controlling shares, like 51% of all stock.  That way he could keep the company focused on Mars and Xai. 

Even the xAI thing I think is a problematic distraction.

Indeed, it's certainly a greater leap of faith than Starlink was, but in terms of "distraction" Starlink is worth its weight, so maybe this one will too - if it's successful.  i mean xAI is already there in that respect.  The distraction already exists.  Might as well make it support the cause.

And yes - the company will have stated goals of 'expanding into space", which has long term profitability, so it'll be free to operate, i don't see a legal obstacle.

[Vultur]

The only way I see this would work is if Musk had the controlling shares, like 51% of all stock.  That way he could keep the company focused on Mars and Xai. 

Even the xAI thing I think is a problematic distraction.

Indeed, it's certainly a greater leap of faith than Starlink was, but in terms of "distraction" Starlink is worth its weight, so maybe this one will too - if it's successful.

Potentially,  but I don't think it's entirely parallel, for two reasons:
- Starlink had a very clear lead over other LEO satellite internet (OneWeb planned a much smaller constellation, Kuiper started much later). The competition seems more even for AI.

- unlike Internet, a lot of AI services currently aren't really being charged at real cost, and it's not clear much of the current demand would exist at prices sufficient to make up real costs.

On the positive side, though, Artemis needs HLS Starship, and Starlink v3 and any space data center projects need Starship launch. So both Starship in general and some version of crew Starship should be "safe" even if an IPO limits Musk's control of the company eventually, so Mars in some form should still be possible. (Hopefully this wouldn't happen until Starship is more proven, anyway.)