SpaceX closes 19% above IPO price after Musk’s AI shift
Fortune reported that SpaceX ended its first trading day at a $2.2 trillion market value after investors backed its AI-heavy pitch.
By Daniel Okafor · Business Editor
3 min read
SpaceX shares finished their first day of trading well above the offering price, giving Elon Musk’s company a $2.2 trillion market value, Fortune reported. The debut showed strong investor demand for a company Musk has recast from a rocket-and-satellite operator into an artificial intelligence bet.
According to Fortune senior editor-at-large Shawn Tully, SpaceX priced its initial public offering at $135 a share and closed June 12 at $160, a gain of 19%. Fortune reported that the closing valuation made it the largest U.S. IPO on record, surpassing Alibaba’s 2014 debut by roughly tenfold.
The offering followed a major internal shift. Fortune reported that Musk folded xAI into SpaceX in February, changing the company’s public story from one centered on launches, rockets and Starlink service to one built largely around AI.
AI dominates the company’s growth case
Fortune cited SpaceX’s prospectus as showing a projected total addressable market of $28.5 trillion for the company. Of that amount, AI accounted for $26.5 trillion, or 93%, while the satellite and rocket businesses together accounted for $2 trillion.
The figures underline how much of SpaceX’s valuation depends on businesses that are not yet its main revenue base, according to Fortune. Musk’s AI vision includes low-cost orbital data centers powered by solar energy, Fortune reported.
SpaceX’s existing operations remain significant. Fortune reported that the company’s space segment produced $4.1 billion in revenue last year and lost money, while Starlink generated $11.4 billion in 2025 sales, up 50% from the prior year and more than half of SpaceX’s revenue.
Starlink has 9,600 satellites in orbit, about three-quarters of the total satellite fleet, and more than 10 million subscribers for mobile and broadband service, according to Fortune. The report described Starlink as a steady cash generator with a strong position in commercial satellites.
Starship is central to the Starlink case
In a June 6 interview hosted by J.P. Morgan CEO Jamie Dimon, Musk argued that Starship gives SpaceX a cost edge, Fortune reported. Musk said the rocket is fully reusable and that its main flight cost is fuel, which he described as cheaper than jet fuel.
Fortune reported that Musk said Starship can carry as many as 50 satellites per launch. He also projected that SpaceX could expand the Starlink network tenfold to 100,000 satellites in the years ahead.
The first-day surge also raised expectations. David Trainer, CEO of New Constructs, told Fortune through a discounted cash-flow analysis that SpaceX would need at least $1.1 trillion in sales by 2035 to support the $1.75 trillion underwriting valuation.
Fortune estimated that the stock’s first-day gain lifted that revenue requirement to nearly $1.5 trillion. Reena Aggarwal, a Georgetown University professor who studies IPOs, told Fortune the debut reflected supply and demand for shares rather than valuation based on fundamentals.
This story draws on original reporting from Fortune.