Elon Musk, the trillionaire: pay packets go multi-planetary in SpaceX IPO

Elon Musk may never colonize Mars as promised, but enough investors consider the Space X founder to be a sort of miracle man that they’ll help him reach another fantastic goal Friday when he takes the rocket company public. The world’s richest man is set to become its first trillionaire. Musk on Friday marked the opening of trading on Nasdaq, where the company’s shares will be listed, by joining a ceremonial bell ringing from Starbase, the South Texas home of Space X. He reiterated his lofty goals “to make life multi-planetary.” “Not just a few astronauts, I mean literally you,” Musk said. “Whoever you are watching this, SpaceX wants to be able to take you to the moon, take you to Mars and ultimately beyond.” Known for his brilliant technology breakthroughs, as well as wild claims and missed deadlines, Musk is expected to break that trillion dollar mark in the biggest initial public offering ever as investors place bets on a company with losses as big as its ambitions. Ahead of the first trade in SpaceX, Forbes puts Musk’s net worth at $982.6 billion. In addition to establishing a one-million person Martian colony, the company has promised to save humanity by establishing other outposts in space, launch data centers the size of football fields into orbit and outdo rivals Anthropic and OpenAI in the race to make money from artificial intelligence. To reach its goals, SpaceX needs billions more than it currently takes in from its rocket and satellite business. Between the start of 2025 and March 31, 2026, the company lost $8.7 billion. Big institutional buyers and smaller-pocketed investors alike have indicated they are willing to take a chance, paying a high enough price for the 555.6 millions on offer to raise $75 billion. That easily tops the current title holder, Saudi Aramco, the oil giant that raised $26 billion in its 2019 initial offering. Trading in the stock — symbol, SPCX — is expected later Friday. Wall Street bankers that