SpaceX has raised $75bn ahead of its long-anticipated US stock market debut on Friday, in what is set to become the largest initial public offering in history and a landmark test of investor appetite for high-valuation technology companies.
The space and satellite group, founded by Elon Musk, said in a filing with the US Securities and Exchange Commission that shares were priced at $135, implying a valuation of $1.77tn (£1.3tn) when trading begins on Nasdaq.
The float surpasses Saudi Aramco’s 2019 listing, which raised $25.6bn in what was previously the world’s largest IPO.
If sustained in secondary trading, the valuation would place SpaceX among the most valuable listed companies globally and further extend Musk’s influence across public markets, alongside Tesla and X.
However, the scale of the valuation has prompted scrutiny among investors, particularly given that SpaceX remains loss-making and is still heavily reliant on capital-intensive expansion programmes.
Market participants said the listing would serve as a key test of sentiment towards large-scale, founder-led technology groups amid a broader wave of planned flotations, including artificial intelligence companies OpenAI and Anthropic.
The company has allocated an unusually high proportion of shares — between 20 and 25 per cent — to retail investors, significantly above the typical IPO range of 5 to 10 per cent, in a move likely to broaden market participation but also increase sensitivity to volatility in early trading.
In the UK, retail demand reached just under $1bn, with £364m-worth of shares allocated via a subscription process that was reportedly more than four times oversubscribed globally.
While initial demand has been strong, analysts cautioned that post-listing performance may be volatile given the scale of the valuation and uncertainty over long-term earnings.
Susannah Streeter, head of money and markets at Wealth Club, said investor enthusiasm was being tested by “growing scepticism around the durability of long-term growth assumptions” attached to the company’s expansion plans.
SpaceX’s prospectus highlights ambitious growth areas, including the expansion of its Starlink satellite network and development of reusable launch systems designed to reduce marginal launch costs over time. The company has also pointed to potential opportunities in AI-enabled space-based infrastructure, though analysts have questioned the timeline to profitability.
The IPO comes amid increasing debate over valuations in the US technology sector, with investors weighing strong revenue growth expectations against elevated capital expenditure requirements and interest rate uncertainty.
Trading in the shares on Nasdaq will be closely watched for signals of broader appetite for mega-cap private technology companies transitioning into public markets.
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