SpaceX President and Chief Operating Officer Gwynne Shotwell celebrates with family and other SpaceX employees at the Nasdaq Marketsite in New York after SpaceX’s initial public offering on June 12, 2026.
Spencer Platt | Getty Images News | Getty Images
Days after Elon Musk’s SpaceX made its debut on the Nasdaq, a lot of ink is being spilled on the company, its valuation, and its place in the burgeoning technology landscape.
The company’s stratospheric IPO made founder Elon Musk the world’s first trillionaire, and if the first day’s price action is anything to go by, investors are still very optimistic. SpaceX closed at $161, a 19% jump from its offering price of $135 per share.
Speaking to CNBC’s “Squawk Box Asia,” Steve Westly, founder and managing partner of The Westly Group and board member of Musk’s Tesla, noted that the company has attracted many retail investors, but added that it must deliver results, and quickly.
“Retail investors bought 100 billion dollars worth of shares, and you have to ask the question, will some of them get panic if SpaceX misses a few places, because these things are not easy to do.”
In a now-deleted post on X, Musk said SpaceX “could” reach about $1 trillion in revenue by 2030, and added that he would be “surprised” if revenue isn’t higher than that figure by 2031.
“Investors in SpaceX, I believe, will be disappointed after three or four months if they don’t achieve some of the growth indicators that they did in S1,” Westly added, referring to SEC filings used by companies planning to go public.
Some ideas that a trillion-dollar IPO was too important were circulating before SpaceX’s launch.
Matthew Maley, Chief Market Strategist at asset management firm Miller Tabak. he said “we will just say we agree.” [the IPO] it went very well, but we also think it’s very important.”
Although the stock does not have an official price-to-earnings ratio, Musk’s $1.75 trillion valuation currently represents a P/E ratio of nearly 100 times.
Compared to, Nvidiaarguably the most valuable company in the world, trading at a P/E ratio of just over 31 times, while an apple it trades around 35 times.
This critical view is shared by Morningstar financial analyst, Nicolas Owens, who said last week that the stock is “very valuable.”
The company estimated SpaceX’s value at $63 per share, and said on June 11 that the company had only a 7% chance of achieving its “moonshot” target of $154 per share.
Still, the stock can be a good buy if investors are willing to shell out.
“We believe long-term investors will do well,” said Maley, with Westly also expressing optimism about the company’s future direction.
“No one is going to give them this. He and the team there, I think Gwynne Shotwell is amazing, he has a tough mountain to climb, but if anyone can do it, it might be a combination of Gwynne and Elon,” said Westly, referring to SpaceX’s president and chief operating officer.
