SpaceX stock falls 13% as AI spending surge rattles investors and massive share unlock looms
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- SpaceX shares sank 13.6% on Wednesday after Q2 capital expenditures jumped sixfold to $18.4 billion, with the majority directed toward AI; the stock closed at just over $125 on Tuesday, below its $135 IPO price and far off its $200+ all-time high hit after its June 12 trading debut.
- CFO Bret Johnsen defended the spending as "efficient," claiming SpaceX is achieving "less than a one-year payback" on AI compute investments built with Nvidia chips.
- CEO Elon Musk raised SpaceX's revenue target to $1 trillion annually by 2030, pulling forward a prior 2031 forecast.
- SpaceX's own AI models are seen as behind OpenAI and Anthropic, yet the company is positioning itself as an alternative cloud player by renting out computing capacity rather than competing head-on in model development.
- Insider lockups expire Thursday, allowing insiders to sell shares for the first time — a fresh market-moving catalyst stacked directly on top of Wednesday's drop.
- Former Tesla board member Steve Westly, founder of The Westly Group, told CNBC's "Squawk Box Europe" that investors still have questions about how fast SpaceX can grow and how big costs get before profitability.
Why it matters: SpaceX is asking the market to underwrite an $18.4 billion AI infrastructure bet built on Nvidia chips — capacity it rents to others — while its own AI models lag OpenAI and Anthropic. The 13.6% sell-off landed one day before insider lockups expire, and Musk pulled a $1 trillion revenue target forward to 2030 to counter profit-path skepticism from investors like Westly.
