SpaceX's Lock-Up Floodgates Open as Institutional Giants Reveal a $200 Billion Stake in the Company
Published on 08/18/2026 at 17:11 | Redaktion boerse-global.de
The arithmetic of supply and demand is about to get a serious workout at SpaceX. As roughly 319 million additional shares shed their trading restrictions this week, the company finds itself at the center of a tug-of-war between a swelling float and an institutional investor base that has just revealed it holds more than $200 billion worth of the rocket-and-AI conglomerate.
That disclosure wave — triggered by mandatory filings from over 1,500 institutional investors — has painted the clearest picture yet of who owns SpaceX. Alphabet emerged as the single largest holder, with roughly 551 million shares valued at nearly $94 billion. The Google parent's position traces back to a $900 million investment made in 2015, though about $80 billion of that stake remains under short-term lock-up, with another $14.1 billion tied up until the third quarter of 2027.
Nvidia's presence is equally notable. The chipmaker reported a stake of approximately 122.8 million Class-A shares worth around $21 billion, acquired through its $10 billion investment in xAI, which SpaceX absorbed in a $1.25 trillion deal back in February. Saudi Arabia's sovereign wealth fund PIF disclosed 154.1 million shares valued at roughly $26.3 billion, while Harvard Management Company said its 12.9 million shares — about $2.2 billion — represent its largest publicly known equity position in any company.
A Deal That Closed Early — and a Stock That's Pulled Back
The ownership revelations arrive alongside confirmation that SpaceX's blockbuster acquisition of Cursor parent Anysphere has been completed ahead of schedule. The $60 billion, all-stock transaction — funded with approximately 391 million newly issued shares — was sealed on August 14, earlier than the market had anticipated.
The stock has responded with a modest retreat. Shares currently trade at €122.02, down 3.5% on the day, following a slight dip from Monday's close of €126.46. The pullback does little to dent the longer-term picture, however: the stock remains up 5.7% over seven days and 16% over the past month.
Should investors sell immediately? Or is it worth buying SpaceX?
Cursor brings with it roughly $4 billion in annual recurring revenue and claims more than 50,000 corporate customers, including a significant slice of the Fortune 500. But the coding tool's market share has slipped from 41% to around 26% over the past year — a trend that has fueled skepticism among some investors about the price tag.
The Bull Case, the Bear Case, and a Wide Gap Between Them
Wall Street's opinion on SpaceX is anything but unified. Deutsche Bank's Edison Yu raised his 2027 revenue forecast from $97 billion to $115 billion following the Cursor deal, maintaining a Buy rating and a $235 price target. JPMorgan goes further with a $240 target, pointing to second-quarter results that saw revenue nearly double year over year.
Those numbers were indeed striking. SpaceX generated $7.81 billion in revenue in Q2, comfortably beating the $6.93 billion consensus, with growth of 92% year over year. Starlink expanded 66%, while the AI segment surged 250%. The net loss narrowed from $1 billion to $541 million, and CFO Bret Johnsen told analysts the company is on track to hit a $100 billion annualized recurring revenue run rate by year-end.
The catch: capital expenditures nearly sextupled to $18.37 billion, with $15.83 billion funneled into AI — well above the $13.22 billion analysts had penciled in. When those numbers first hit the tape, the stock initially tumbled around 8% in after-hours trading before the revenue strength took hold.
The bears remain unconvinced. Phillip Securities rates the stock a Sell with a price target of just $75 — a chasm of more than $160 versus JPMorgan's number that underscores just how contested this valuation is. Morningstar has also struck a cautious tone, pegging SpaceX's fair value at $780 billion, nearly half the level at which the company has recently traded on the private market.
Starship Is the Linchpin
Bernstein's Douglas Harned argues that the company's AI ambitions hinge entirely on the full reusability of the Starship rocket. His model — built on roughly 3,500 Starship launches — projects revenue of around $600 billion by 2031, a figure that falls well short of Elon Musk's internal target of $1 trillion, a goal the founder has since pulled forward from 2031 to 2030.
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SpaceX says it has already poured more than $15 billion into the Starship program. The company recently recovered Ship 40 after its 13th test flight, with the booster landing in the Indian Ocean and arriving near Christmas Island — an outcome Musk himself had doubted, given the potential for saltwater damage to heat shields and engines.
Supply Meets Demand
The immediate question for investors is whether the market can absorb the coming wave of unlocked shares. Tuesday's release of 319 million shares follows an early-August unlock of 911.5 million that more than doubled the free float — without triggering the selling panic some had feared. Further tranches of several hundred million shares each are scheduled for September and October, with a total of 4.9 billion shares expected to be freely tradable by year-end.
The second-quarter filings offer some reassurance on the demand side: none of the nine newly disclosed institutional entrants sold shares, and heavyweights like Alphabet, Nvidia, and PIF all built positions. Argus analysts upgraded the stock to Buy on August 7 with a $160 target, citing the rapid payback potential of AI investments despite the elevated capital spending.
The average analyst price target sits at $232.35, implying roughly 59% upside from recent levels. The stock currently trades about 35% below its 52-week high of €194.46 set in June, yet 39% above its August low. With a relative strength index of 57.4, the stock is neither oversold nor overbought — caught, like the broader debate around it, somewhere in between.
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