SpaceX Clears Pad Test as 328 Million Shares Go Free

SpaceX cleared a Starship wet dress rehearsal for a Sept 28 launch window, won FCC and court approvals, and absorbed a 328.4 million-share lock-up expiry.

SpaceX has spent the past week proving it can move on two fronts at once — hardware on the launch pad and paperwork in Washington — while the market quietly tests whether the company's valuation can survive its own share count.

On Thursday, the company completed a wet dress rehearsal for its Starship system, fully fueling the ship and its Super Heavy booster and running through procedures right up to the ignition sequence. Flight 14, the first planned orbital attempt, is targeting a September 28 launch window, contingent on the Federal Aviation Administration granting final clearance in time.

The test came days after Exolaunch secured cargo capacity on a 2029 mission to carry payloads for microgravity research and in-space manufacturing, with the hardware slated to return to Earth. Reusability remains the lever behind the whole equation: driving down cost per ton is what would make orbital supply chains economically viable for industry at all.

Regulators Open Doors Faster Than Rockets Fly

Away from the pad, the legal groundwork moved just as decisively. The FCC granted SpaceX permission to offer international telecommunications services, clearing a path toward a global rollout of mobile connectivity over its own Starlink constellation. If ordinary smartphones can be reached directly from orbit, the network shifts from a niche fix for remote regions into a serious pillar of global connectivity.

A Texas federal district court removed another obstacle on Tuesday, rejecting an environmental coalition's emergency motion against a land swap. The ruling lets SpaceX trade more than 700 acres of protected land for company-owned parcels to expand its South Texas site.

The Lock-Up Lifts

Investors, meanwhile, are training their attention on the supply side of the stock. A staggered holding period expired Thursday, freeing as many as 328.4 million Class A shares for trading — a block worth close to $49 billion at recent prices. Fears of an overhang had already weighed on the shares midweek. President Gwynne Shotwell added to the mix on Tuesday, filing a notice of intent to sell up to 342,170 shares under a trading plan agreed back in June 2026.

The market absorbed the event with surprising calm. The stock closed Thursday's European session at EUR 130.20, essentially flat with a loss of 0.08%. Friday brought a modest recovery: the shares traded at EUR 131.22, up 0.8% on the day and 11% above their 50-day moving average. Measured against the 52-week high of EUR 194.46, however, the stock still sits 33% lower — a gap that traces the gradual sobering since its June listing.

Starlink Pays, AI Speculates

What keeps the story alive is Starlink's build-out. Mizuho analysts reiterated an "Outperform" rating and a $200 price target, calling the satellite business a dependable earnings engine. Elon Musk, for his part, is tying the space operation ever more tightly to the global artificial intelligence boom: after the xAI acquisition, computing capacity is meant to migrate into orbit over the long run, where solar energy is abundant.

Regulatory filings lay out the risks alongside the ambition. Some of these projects rest on untested technology, and the operating loss remains substantial as development spending balloons. Further lock-up dates in October will make hundreds of millions more shares tradable.

The question of whether SpaceX can justify its enormous valuation no longer hinges on spectacular launch footage. It rests on the shift to industrial-scale manufacturing in orbit — and, as the past week showed, on whether the market keeps believing the arithmetic.