SpaceX shares soar following record-breaking $75 billion IPO

SpaceX is set to begin trading Friday after completing the largest initial public offering in history, marking the long-awaited Wall Street debut of Elon Musk’s rocket and satellite company.

SpaceX on Thursday priced its shares at $135 each, raising $75 billion to finance its ambitious plans, which include establishing a human colony on Mars and putting solar-powered data centers in space. 

The shares will start trading after the Nasdaq Stock Exchange opens at 9:30 a.m. ET.

Friday’s offering leapfrogs SpaceX to become the largest global IPO, surpassing the current record holder, Saudi Aramco. When the state-owned Saudi Arabian oil company went public in 2019, it raised nearly $26 billion, according to Renaissance Capital.

SpaceX’s public stock offering has generated strong investor interest, with Bloomberg reporting on Thursday that the IPO received more than $100 billion in retail orders. Investors are also gaining exposure to businesses beyond rocket launches, with SpaceX owning Musk’s artificial intelligence company, xAI, as well as satellite internet provider Starlink.

The IPO gives SpaceX a market valuation of $1.77 trillion, making the Texas-based manufacturer one of Wall Street’s most valuable companies. By comparison, Nvidia, the world’s most valuable company, has a market cap of $4.96 trillion, while Apple, the second most valuable, is valued at $4.34 trillion.

The IPO has made SpaceX CEO Elon Musk, already the world’s richest person, a trillionaire — at least on paper. Musk owns 4.8 billion shares of SpaceX, or about 42% of the company, as well as 350 million stock options, according to the IPO filing. With 82.4% of the company’s voting power, he will continue to wield significant control over SpaceX’s future.