SpaceX’s IPO filing sheds light on the finances and operations of the world’s largest private company. It is expected to set a record for the biggest stock debut and could make its founder Elon Musk the world’s first trillionaire.
The company aims to go public on Nasdaq in June under the ticker symbol “SPCX.” Wednesday’s filing did not disclose the proposed share price or initial valuation. Here are some highlights from the IPO documents.
$4.9 billion loss
SpaceX, which is expected to have an initial valuation of $1.5 trillion or more, has a significantly worse financial picture than any other megacap US company. Last year it lost $4.9 billion on revenue of $18.7 billion.
The financial situation tells two stories. The first is an established business launching satellites and astronauts into space on the company’s original Falcon rocket as well as the development of its Starlink satellite internet business. The space business had revenues of $4.1 billion last year, although it is unprofitable. Starlink generated revenues of $11.4 billion.
The second is the loss caused by its February merger with artificial-intelligence startup xAI, which has burned through huge amounts of cash building massive data centers in an effort to stay competitive. xAI’s revenue last year was $3.2 billion.
The company recently signed a deal with Anthropic, whose cloud AI tool competes with SpaceX’s Grok. In the deal that runs until May 2029, SpaceX will rent $1.25 billion per month of compute capacity in its two large data centers.
Total capital spending came to $20.7 billion, the majority of which came from xAI, which spent $12.7 billion. The launch and satellite businesses spent a combined $8 billion in capital expenditures last year.
Musk has 85% control
Musk, who founded SpaceX in 2002 with the goal of colonizing Mars, has a strong hold on leadership and ownership. The CEO is the largest shareholder and controls 85% of the voting power as of May 1, thanks to supervoting Class B shares, which receive 10 votes for every 1 vote of Class A shares sold to the public.
Along with other board members and executives, insiders owned about 20% of the Class A shares and 94% of the Class B shares, giving them 86% of the combined voting power. This structure would make it nearly impossible for investors to oust Musk from the role of chief executive.
Make-or-break pay packages
Musk takes home $54,000 in pay in 2025, but the majority of the billionaire’s compensation is made up of two large equity packages.
In January, SpaceX gave Musk a package of 1 billion Class B shares that vest if the company establishes “a permanent human colony on Mars with at least one million inhabitants” and achieves a series of market-cap targets that expand the company to $7.5 trillion.
In March, the board granted him another 302.1 million shares, replacing an earlier xAI award that vests if the company meets “non-Earth-based data centers” as well as 12 market capitalization targets that boost the company’s value to $6.6 trillion.
The SpaceX package comes just months after Tesla shareholders approved a separate compensation package for Musk that could be worth nearly $1 trillion if he achieves ambitious goals at Tesla, where he is also CEO.
eight board members
SpaceX has eight directors, with Musk serving as board chairman. Other directors include longtime SpaceX chairman Gwynne Shotwell, Google executive Donald Harrison, as well as investors Antonio Gracias, Steve Jurvetson and Luke Nosek. Randy Glenn, a longtime board observer, joined the board in February, as did Ira Ehrenpreis, a longtime Tesla board member.
Gracias, founder of Valor Equity Partners, has served on the board since 2010 and is one of the company’s largest investors with a 7.3% stake. It would be worth more than $100 billion, based on an expected valuation of $1.5 trillion.
SpaceX’s top executives have a stake in the company that could make them billionaires. Shotwell, who earned $86 million last year, mostly in the form of stock options, has 5.5 million Class A shares and 7.1 million Class B shares.
many concerned parties
Musk’s companies are helping each other, including sharing corporate aircraft and buying each other’s products or services. For example, SpaceX purchased $131 million worth of Cybertrucks from Tesla in 2025 at “manufacturer suggested retail price.” The SpaceX prospectus provided the first glimpse of dollar figures for payments made to Musk’s other companies. In 2025, SpaceX also purchased Megapack energy storage products worth $506 million from Tesla. Meanwhile, Musk’s xAI has paid Tesla about $731 million from early 2024 to February 2026.
SpaceX and Tesla are also collaborating on a giant chip factory called TerraFab and an artificial-intelligence project called Macrohard. Overall, Tesla is mentioned 87 times in the SpaceX prospectus. “We plan to explore other areas of strategic cooperation with Tesla in the future,” the document said.
government contracts
Spending by US federal agencies accounted for about 20% of SpaceX’s revenue last year. Federal government customers include the Pentagon and intelligence agencies in addition to NASA.
The company did not provide further details about its national-security work, but noted that the National Reconnaissance Office, a US spy agency focused on space-based intelligence work, is a client. SpaceX has been working with the NRO for the past few years to develop a classified satellite network.
sequential lockup
Musk and some key investors have agreed not to sell their stock for 366 days after SpaceX begins trading. Other pre-IPO investors are kept in a lockup of 180 days. However, those investors have the chance to sell first through “early-release.”
Up to 20% of early-releasable shares may be sold immediately after SpaceX reports its first quarter results. An additional 10% of those shares are issued if SpaceX’s stock remains at a certain level by its first earnings date.
Additional releases of shares occur at varying intervals, including after the company reports its second quarter earnings as a public company. Musk and other Insiders are not eligible for early release.
Write to Becky Peterson at becky.peterson@wsj.com and Theo Francis at theo.fransis@wsj.com.
