SpaceX's Orbital Ambitions Grow Bolder, Even as Its Stock Trades Below Water

SpaceX hits 100 Falcon 9 launches and accelerates orbital AI, but shares slide post lock-up—analysts split on buying the dip.

The gap between SpaceX's operational achievements and its market reception has rarely been wider. This week alone, the company logged its 100th Falcon 9 launch of the year, unveiled plans to put Nvidia's most advanced AI computing platform into orbit two years ahead of schedule, and watched its shares slide to a level that has some prominent investors calling the dip a bargain.

A Record Flight Meets a Rocky Stretch

The Falcon 9 milestone came Tuesday, when booster B1067 lifted 29 Starlink satellites from Cape Canaveral on its 37th successful mission — a new reuse record for the workhorse rocket. The flight arrived as SpaceX informed NASA it intends to phase out commercial Falcon 9 missions as early as 2028, steering customers toward the Starship system, while keeping the rocket in service for International Space Station missions through 2030.

The stock, meanwhile, closed Monday at 115.84 euros, down 1.2 percent on the day and off 6.6 percent over the prior seven sessions. Tuesday brought a partial rebound, with shares at 117.48 euros, up 1.4 percent. The 30-day picture remains firmly positive at plus 18 percent, but the weekly figure sits at minus 5.3 percent — a whipsaw that reflects lingering unease since a lock-up expiration mid-month.

That August 20 unlock freed roughly 319 million shares held by former employees and early investors, representing about seven percent of insider holdings. The stock dropped five to six percent in response, closing below its 135-dollar IPO reference price for the first time.

The Bull Case, Loud and Clear

Morgan Stanley's Adam Jonas called the post-lock-up decline a "rare entry point" rather than a fundamental red flag. Cathie Wood's ARK Invest moved quickly to back that view, purchasing around 205,000 SpaceX shares worth roughly 27.5 million dollars across four ETFs, including ARKK and ARKX.

The bears have their own math, however. The DZ Bank rates the stock a "Sell" with a price target of just 100 dollars, while Morningstar's discounted cash flow analysis places fair value meaningfully below the current market capitalization. The consensus among analysts sits at "Moderate Buy" — a tepid endorsement for a company whose annualized volatility runs at 91 percent.

The Orbital Data Center Gambit

The most consequential news may be the accelerated timeline for SpaceXAI, Elon Musk's plan to deploy Nvidia's Vera Rubin NVL72 system in space. Musk said the platform — named for the late astronomer — would launch in the fourth quarter of 2027, a full year ahead of the original schedule.

The Vera CPU, built on Nvidia's Olympus architecture, packs 88 cores with 1.2 terabytes per second of bandwidth and is designed to run up to 1.8 times faster than conventional x86 processors. Musk touted "lower costs" and higher density, but the market greeted the announcement with skepticism: Nvidia shares fell roughly 2.9 percent, and SpaceX gave up ground as well.

The capital requirements are staggering. Reports indicate SpaceX plans to spend 53 billion dollars in 2026 and 130 billion dollars in 2027 on AI computing capacity alone. The Terafab chip factory under construction in Texas, a 16.8-billion-dollar project, will supply silicon for both the orbital data centers and Musk's Robotaxi ambitions.

Washington Ties Tighten, and Complicate

The company's government relationships continue to deepen. SpaceX has already secured more than 8 billion dollars in contracts from the Pentagon's Golden Dome missile defense program, which observers suggest could be just the opening tranche. That proximity to power drew fresh scrutiny after a financial disclosure revealed President Donald Trump purchased between 15,001 and 50,000 dollars worth of SpaceX stock on June 23, eleven days after the company's IPO. The White House said the portfolio is managed independently by third parties and merely tracks standard indices.

SpaceX also ended its 15-year lobbying relationship with Squire Patton Boggs, opting to handle Washington influence internally as its cumulative federal contracts approach 22 billion dollars. In South Africa, Senior Director Ryan Goodnight appeared before regulator ICASA to address the 30 percent local ownership requirement that stands between the company and commercial approval in that market.

What's Next on the Pad and the Calendar

The near-term launch schedule remains packed. August 30 brings the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope aboard a Falcon Heavy, following completion of the formal flight readiness review for the 255-million-dollar launch contract. The next Starship test flight is slated for September 15, though the upper-stage catch attempt has been scrubbed from that mission.

Investors will get their first hard look at the financials in November, when SpaceX reports its inaugural quarterly earnings since going public in June. That report will test whether the Starship transition, the AI buildout, and the orbital data center bet can justify a valuation that remains the subject of one of Wall Street's more spirited disagreements.