SpaceX’s Specter and a €1 Billion Placement Test OHB’s Meteoric Rise

OHB shares crash 8.37% from all-time high amid profit-taking, but real threats loom: SpaceX's Starship milestone and IPO, plus a €1B secondary share sale by KKR.

The air is getting thin for OHB shareholders. After a dizzying ascent that pushed the stock to an all-time high of €642, profit-takers piled in and sent shares crashing 8.37% to €589 by the close of the week. The sell-off was swift, but the real story is more layered than a simple pullback: two powerful forces — an upstart rival’s blockbuster IPO and a looming secondary share sale — are now testing the thesis behind the European space champion’s 400%-plus rally this year.

The volatility has been extreme. Intraday swings have widened to roughly 17% between highs and lows in recent sessions, a level that suggests the market is recalibrating rapidly rather than abandoning the stock entirely.

At the centre of the nervousness is SpaceX. On 22 May, Elon Musk’s company completed the twelfth test flight of its Starship rocket in Version 3, reaching space and deploying test satellites despite glitches with some Raptor-3 engines. The milestone adds to mounting evidence that fully reusable systems could slash launch costs by up to 99%, a prospect that fundamentally challenges the cost and margin assumptions of traditional satellite builders like OHB.

Adding to the pressure, SpaceX is preparing a public listing. Plans for mid-June 2026 envision an issuance volume of up to $80 billion and a valuation that could hit $2 trillion. Such an event would not only divert capital away from European space stocks but also reset the peer comparisons that institutional investors use to price the sector.

Yet while SpaceX steals headlines, OHB has been quietly building its own case. The European Space Agency selected the SOVA-S Earth observation mission, led by OHB’s Czech subsidiary, for the next development phase. The mission, which carries a shortwave infrared imager to study gravity waves at altitudes of 80–120 kilometres, was chosen from four competing concepts. The budget is intentionally lean at under €35 million, with the implementation phase slated to begin in January 2027. For OHB, it is less about immediate revenue and more about reaffirming its place in Europe’s institutional space framework.

The same week brought another strategic move. On 19 May, OHB formed the joint venture KIRK alongside HENSOLDT and Kongsberg Defence & Aerospace, deepening its footprint in defence-related space technologies. Between the ESA nod and the KIRK announcement, the stock surged 11.4% on 21 May to close at €635 on Xetra — a gain of more than 400% since the start of the year, when the shares were trading at just €116.60.

But the rally’s tailwind comes with a significant overhang. KKR, the US private equity firm, holds approximately 29% of OHB and is preparing to place roughly 20% of the company’s shares on the open market. The offering, valued at over €1 billion, has already attracted a syndicate of seven banks, with Berenberg and Commerzbank joining the roster. The founding Fuchs family will retain 65% of the voting rights, while the free float — currently a wafer-thin 6% — is set to rise substantially. The sheer size of the placement has injected an extra layer of uncertainty into an already frothy stock.

Operationally, OHB’s underlying trajectory remains strong. The order backlog reached €3.354 billion after the first three months, an increase of nearly 45% year-on-year. Total output in the first quarter rose 15% to €279.3 million, while adjusted EBITDA climbed 37% to €27.3 million. Management is targeting full-year output of €1.4 billion in 2026, rising to €1.7 billion in 2027 and more than €2 billion in 2028, with EBITDA margins set to stabilise at 11%.

For traders, the immediate technical focus is the €580 zone. If OHB can reclaim €600, the chart picture would ease. But failure to hold that level, combined with the persistent drag of the SpaceX IPO narrative and the KKR placement, could keep the stock under pressure through the coming weeks.

The next major catalysts are the annual general meeting on 24 June, where a cash dividend will be voted on, and the second-quarter results due on 6 August. Until then, OHB is caught between the gravitational pull of its record-breaking run and the centrifugal forces of a changing competitive landscape.