SpaceX lists on Nasdaq at $1.77 trillion valuation, making Elon Musk world's first trillionaire

Back in 2001, Elon Musk's plan to start a rocket company seemed so misguided that his friends urged him to abandon it.

Last Friday, Musk listed SpaceX on the Nasdaq at an initial valuation of $1.77 trillion — the largest flotation in history. The listing propelled Musk into the stratosphere as the world's first trillionaire.

Eye-Popping Valuation

What makes the flotation doubly extraordinary, said Boris Johnson in The Mail on Sunday, is that it amounted to a punt — a gamble on one man's vision for the future.

In short, Musk plans to use the $86 billion capital injection to build thousands of huge, fully reusable Starship rockets, which will slash the cost of sending mass into space. These rockets will be used to:

• Launch data centres into orbit, tapping into solar energy to power the growing use of AI
• Deploy thousands more Starlink satellites to bring reliable internet access to the three billion people who still lack it

With the revenue this generates, Musk intends to build a city on Mars. How exactly this will "butter our parsnips" on Earth remains unknown — but it is a thrilling prospect for humankind.

On paper, the flotation makes little sense, said John Rapley on UnHerd. SpaceX has never generated a profit. Its eye-popping valuation is based on a price-to-sales ratio of 92 to one — far above the 3.6 to one average in the S&P 500. The IPO succeeded largely due to excitable forecasts by investment banks that stood to make vast sums from it. Yet many investors also have faith in Musk's ability to turn science fiction into reality.

A Move to Mars?

Musk's plans are hugely ambitious, said The Economist. They depend on Starship, which is already late, and technology that does not yet exist. But Musk has defied sceptics before: people said he would never land rockets for reuse; now his firm does it twice a week. And 10,000 Starlink satellites are already beaming internet access to 12 million people — as well as to various arms of the U.S. government.

Of course, some will oppose anything that adds to Musk's wealth and power, said Will Dunn in The New Statesman. Others, who do not object to his hard-right political interventions, may worry that his commercial vision is crackpot. Cities on distant planets sound exciting, but one must wonder how many people will want to move from Earth — which has "terrific amenities including a magnetic field and an atmosphere" — to the toxic deserts of Mars.

But most people will be giving Musk money, like it or not. SpaceX and Tesla are now such a huge presence in the market that there will hardly be a retirement or savings fund not invested in them.

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