Same S-1, same page count, same underwriting syndicate — and the two lead banks just landed a trillion dollars apart on what SpaceX is actually worth. If you're just joining us, SpaceX came public at $135 and turned into the low-float test case for megacap AI-and-space enthusiasm after an IPO. Coming in, the tension was already there: the stock had backed off its early high, but it was still above the offer, with index demand, operating results, and future insider lock-ups all sitting on the tape, ready to move it. This is AI IPO Watch. Today: Goldman versus Morgan Stanley, a Nasdaq-100 inclusion date, and a stock that's given it all back. Let's start with the number nobody can agree on. This one comes via Yahoo Finance. So the quiet period lifts, and the two lead underwriters step to the mic — and they land more than a trillion dollars apart. Goldman at $205, Morgan Stanley at $300. One filing. One company. Right, and that gap tells you the story. The banks aren't just arguing over discount rates; they're valuing two different versions of SpaceX. Exactly. Goldman's pricing a rocket company that happens to own a satellite network. Morgan Stanley's pricing something else entirely. When the people who read every single page can't agree on what they underwrote — there's your repricing, right on Wall Street. And remember what these targets are. They were legally muzzled for 25 days. We're past the whisper-from-a-private-platform stage — now these are stamped, published numbers from the syndicate itself. Retail finally has real figures to trust, and there are two of them, a trillion apart. Which is worse than no number, honestly. A whisper you can discount. Two official numbers from your own underwriters shouting past each other — what does a retail buyer do with that? Here's Rich Duprey at 24/7 Wall St:
SpaceX surged from its $135 IPO price to $225 intraday before collapsing to $151, erasing nearly all post-IPO gains. SpaceX becomes the fastest newly public company ever added to the Nasdaq-100, triggering mechanical passive-fund buying that won't sustain the stock long-term. Morningstar warns SpaceX could be worth less than half its IPO price, leaving little margin for error if Starlink or Starship growth disappoints.
$135 to $225 intraday, then all the way back to $151. That round trip took, what, a couple weeks? The 60% pop was the giveaway — the float was mispriced, and the tape's writing the correction now. And it's sliding into the Nasdaq-100 inclusion, Eric. Fastest newly public company ever added to the index, per 24/7 Wall St — which means forced passive buying is showing up to catch a knife. Right — forced buyers meeting willing sellers. You're watching that dynamic on the tape today. Index inclusion gives you a one-time mechanical bid, and then you're back to fundamentals. Meanwhile Morningstar says SpaceX could be worth less than half its IPO price. So one house is modeling passive inflows, another is modeling a haircut, and retail's holding a stock that opened at $225. Same fight we just had with the Goldman–Morgan Stanley split. Even the underwriters can't agree on what they sold. And the person footing the bill is the day-one retail buyer who chased $225. Here's Nikhil Agarwal at The Economic Times:
Morgan Stanley has initiated coverage on SpaceX with an Overweight rating and a $300 target price, arguing its biggest opportunity lies beyond rockets. The brokerage believes SpaceX's vertically integrated AI infrastructure, combining terrestrial and orbital compute, could transform it into one of the world's most powerful AI infrastructure platforms.
So Morgan Stanley gets to $300 by going beyond rockets. Nikhil Agarwal's piece lays it out — Overweight, with a thesis built around a terrestrial-plus-orbital compute stack. They're pricing an AI infrastructure company that happens to own the launch pads. A 'secret AI weapon.' Cute framing. That phrase lives in the headline; the coverage note says vertically integrated compute, which is a real claim you can at least argue with. And that's the split with Goldman at $205 — same S-1, two lead underwriters, over a trillion dollars apart. The most bullish analyst on the deal is really betting on AI infrastructure, not rockets. Which tells you the Starlink subscriber math doesn't carry a $300 target. If it did, Morgan Stanley wouldn't need the orbital-compute story to get there. Right — the ARPU treadmill quietly got benched. The valuation's now riding on compute the retail buyer has never heard of. Meanwhile retail's still buying a rocket. From Bloomberg:
Raymond James analyst Brian Gesuale initiated coverage on SpaceX with a strong buy. He set an $800 price target, projecting significant future stock appreciation. Gesuale sees SpaceX revenue soaring to $5.2 trillion by 2035. This growth is primarily based on its nascent artificial intelligence business. The analyst believes AI will become SpaceX's largest revenue source by 2027.
So we've been sitting here all show with Goldman at $205, Morgan Stanley at $300 — and now Raymond James walks in and says $800. Same stock trading below its IPO price. Brian Gesuale. Strong buy, $800 target, and the model runs SpaceX revenue to $5.2 trillion by 2035. Five-point-two trillion. That number is not in any document SpaceX has filed. And here's the giveaway — Gesuale says AI becomes the biggest revenue line by 2027. Not launches. Not Starlink subscribers. His $800 case is an AI case with rockets pushed into the background. Which is why his downside case is so honest, actually. Launch failure, stock goes to $125 — below the $135 IPO price — because it would, quote, raise concerns about the pace of orbital AI. The whole thesis hangs off a business that barely exists yet. That's the dual-class bet in analyst form. Retail bought a rocket company. The bulls are pricing an AI infrastructure play they can't fully see, and that gap is the entire valuation. If AI IPO Watch helps you stay ahead of the market, take a moment to subscribe and leave a quick review wherever you’re listening. It helps other people find the show, and it really means a lot.
You’ll find links to every story we covered today in the show notes, along with the sources behind them. If one caught your ear, it’s worth taking a closer look.
That’s AI IPO Watch for this Wednesday. This is a Lantern Podcast.