Elon Musk’s SpaceX beats Saudi Aramco in landmark IPO, raising $75 billion

Elon Musk’s SpaceX has completed the largest initial public offering on record, raising $75 billion and positioning its founder to become the world’s first trillionaire. The company priced 555.6 million shares at $135 each on Thursday, according to a regulatory statement. The sale more than doubles the previous record set by Saudi Aramco.

The pricing closes a months-long effort by Musk to take his aerospace firm public on his own terms. SpaceX will rank as the seventh-largest U.S. company by market value when trading begins Friday on the Nasdaq. The valuation comes despite the company posting a net loss last year while older peers generated higher revenues.

The offering values SpaceX at $1.77 trillion, making it worth more than JPMorgan Chase, Berkshire Hathaway, and Meta Platforms. Financial analysts note that the ultimate test for the stock will be how the market absorbs the high volume of shares over the coming weeks rather than its performance during the opening session.

SpaceX IPO surpasses Aramco listing

The transaction surpasses the 2019 listing of Saudi Aramco, which raised a historical $25.6 billion on the Riyadh exchange. SpaceX’s current valuation could climb higher if underwriters choose to exercise their overallotment options to sell additional shares. That standard operational decision is expected within the next 30 days, according to banking sources.

In an unusual move, SpaceX executives communicated the final offer price at 3 p.m. New York time while U.S. markets were still open. The detail was disclosed in a free-writing prospectus filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Musk handled the debut by breaking traditional investment banking norms. SpaceX allocated 30 percent of the entire offering to retail investors, an exceptionally high ratio for a mega-cap listing. Furthermore, management finalized the share price before completing the traditional institutional roadshow used to gauge investor demand.

The massive share sale takes place amid a broader recovery for new U.S. listings following two years of quiet market activity. Investment banks, including Goldman Sachs, forecast that total IPO volume could reach $160 billion this year. That pipeline is heavily driven by capital-intensive artificial intelligence firms seeking public capital.

SpaceX targets $28.5 trillion market

SpaceX told investors in its marketing materials that its long-term addressable market sits at $28.5 trillion. The company currently commands more than 80 percent of the commercial payload mass launched into orbit. Its Starlink satellite internet division provides the majority of current revenue, serving millions of active users across 164 countries.

The commercial outlook is tied closely to a major corporate consolidation. In February, SpaceX absorbed Musk’s artificial intelligence startup, xAI, in a deal valuing the combined entity at $1.25 trillion. The company is now actively monetizing the heavy technology infrastructure it originally built to run its internal AI models.

To support this infrastructure, Alphabet Inc.’s Google recently signed a $30 billion data center agreement with SpaceX running through mid-2029. Under the filing terms, Google will pay SpaceX $920 million monthly starting this October. Google will lease 110,000 Nvidia graphics processing units housed directly within SpaceX’s Tennessee facilities.

The tech arrangement marks a reversal of roles from a 2021 corporate pact where Google acted as the cloud vendor for Starlink. Under the new contract, Google maintains complete ownership of its proprietary data and models. The agreement includes strict operational benchmarks that give Google the right to terminate if performance slips.

Bloomberg Index places Musk near trillion-dollar mark

The public listing occurs 16 years after Musk took Tesla public. Musk holds a 12 percent stake in the electric vehicle manufacturer, worth an estimated $355 billion, alongside billions in unexercised stock options. His SpaceX equity forms the final piece of a personal wealth calculation that places him at the trillion-dollar threshold.

The path to the listing involved several private restructurings. After leading a group that acquired X for $44 billion in 2022, Elon Musk later merged the platform with xAI last year. Musk holds a 41 percent stake in the consolidated entity. According to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, Musk has a net worth of $971 billion, bringing him closer to the $1 trillion threshold.