SpaceX's market value surged to roughly $2.18 trillion Friday afternoon as shares of Elon Musk's rocket company jumped 23% in their Nasdaq debut, capping what investors are calling one of the most anticipated public offerings in Wall Street history, CNBC reports.
The stock traded at at $166.41 shortly after 3 p.m. ET after opening at $150, above its $135 IPO price.
At its intraday high, SpaceX reached $176.52 per share, for a market capitalization of $2.18 trillion. SPCX closed at $161.59 Friday at a market valuation of $2.105 trillion.
The debut comes after nearly two decades of private investment in the company by major institutional investors and is expected to open the door for a new wave of high-profile IPOs — including artificial intelligence leaders Anthropic and OpenAI, both of which have confidentially filed prospectuses with regulators.
"This was a successful launch, no doubt about it," said Jay Woods, chief market strategist at Freedom Capital Markets. "The public demand is there, so that's a good thing. But now we'll wait to see if it can hold that open price, or was it a euphoric retail crowd driving it."
Woods cautioned against drawing conclusions from only a partial trading session.
"You have to give it a full trading day, which will be next week," he said. "The initial thoughts on the trading desks were that it could get up to $200."
WORLD'S 1ST TRILLIONAIRE
Friday's debut officially makes Musk the first trillionaire on record. The IPO is also expected to create thousands of new millionaires and multiple new billionaires among early investors and employees.
Goldman Sachs, the deal's lead-left bookrunner — the primary investment bank responsible for managing the offering and coordinating the underwriting syndicate — rose about 3% as investors applauded its role in bringing the blockbuster IPO to market.
According to market sources, 23 banks participated in the underwriting syndicate that structured and distributed the offering.
Retail investors raced to participate in the IPO, fueled by years of enthusiasm for Musk's ventures.
However, SpaceX allocated a smaller-than-expected portion of shares to retail investors, according to a source, despite expectations before the offering that individual investors would receive an unusually large allocation.
Even so, SpaceX was on pace to become the most-bought stock by retail investors Friday and the largest IPO debut for retail traders in recent memory, according to VandaTrack data.
'PRETTY ROBUST'
"Market sentiment is reflecting a book that looks like it was pretty robust," Dan Alpert, founding managing partner of Westwood Capital. "The folks who only got a portion of the shares they asked for are now looking for a stable market in which to buy."
Some analysts have questioned whether SpaceX's valuation fully reflects future growth prospects, particularly for its Starlink satellite internet business.
Nonetheless, investor demand remained strong throughout the offering.
Meanwhile, investors shifted money away from other space-related stocks. Redwire fell more than 10%, Rocket Lab dropped about 8%, and the Procure Space ETF declined more than 6% as traders focused attention on SpaceX.
SpaceX President and COO Gwynne Shotwell told CNBC she "wasn't sure we would go public," but said the current moment "actually feels like the right time."