Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

SpaceX files to go public

nytimes.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

201–210 of 631 posts

Re: SpaceX files to go public

#201

Post by joyeuse6701 »

xenadu02 wrote: post #195
manquer wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>float a fairly small issuance SpaceX are widely reported to be planning to raise $75Billion in new capital. It may seem small a % for the valuation target. However that is about 3 times previous highest raise of $29B when Saudi Aramco went public few years back. The market simply may not be that deep[1] There is a good chance this one becomes the Wework of this decade. The valuation, amount being raised, cooling int…

I think you have to temper the skepticism a bit though. SpaceX has dramatically lowered the cost of launching things into space. They are still the leader here. They can put a kg into orbit cheaper than anyone, even heavily subsidized state operations (EU and China). Their order book continues to be full. Every single launch vehicle they roll off the line was pre-sold years ago, including its re-use flights. I agree…

Not one more cent should be given to that man.

Re: SpaceX files to go public

#202

Post by plqbfbv »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #163
mrinterweb wrote: post #140

I feel the global instability could easily be very disruptive to SpaceX. Just imagine if Russia gets vindictive and starts destroying these satellites or blowing up their satellites to create orbital debris that could knock satellites out of orbit. A really bad solar storm could be devastating. Just saying there are some decent risks, and pricing it at 1.75T IPO seems risky enough. I would not take that gamble.

> imagine if Russia gets vindictive and starts destroying these satellites Sounds like lots of demand for new launches from the military-industrial complex. > imagine if Russia gets vindictive and starts destroying these satellites Space is big. It’s almost always cheaper to individually target satellites than to try and blanket orbits. And with Starship vs ASAT, the cheap drones are the satellites. Russia would bank…

> It’s almost always cheaper to individually target satellites than to try and blanket orbits.

The problem is that even one satellite could start the Kessler syndrome due to how many are currently in orbit, and the numbers are expected to keep increasing rapidly - everyone wants their "sovereign" Starlink now that it has been shown to be feasible and performant.

Re: SpaceX files to go public

#203

Post by dahinds »

stickfigure wrote: post #74
jordanb wrote: post #15

You don't have to believe. If you have a 401k you will be an investor 15 days after launch. The IPO will go great, because the company will float a fairly small issuance. The big shareholders will not immediately sell. They will hold on and maybe even buy to support the price. Then, after 15 days, it will enter the indexes and everyone's 401k will start auto-buying this stock. You might say this is an obvious flaw in…

Serious question: Is there some ETF that is "Index of S&P500 minus anything that smells like Musk"?

The cheapest option might be to buy the index and sell short the appropriate amount of Musk companies.

Re: SpaceX files to go public

#204

Post by pilgrim0 »

kranke155 wrote: post #174
convexly wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The valuation only makes sense if you price in Starlink becoming a top 3 telecom and Starship opening up entirely new markets. Possible, sure, but the launch business alone doesn't get you anywhere near 1.75T. They're betting the multiple on revenue lines that don't fully exist yet.

Yep the only way it makes sense is a combo of Starlink + AI data centers in space in 10 years.

Which is a synonym for impossible. As far as the latest serious analyses have shown, data centers in space are a pipe dream. Starlink’s total addressable market was also shown to be way smaller than expected. The IPO in this case just signals they’re desperate for liquidity and with no clear path to profitability, if you discount unlikely, major breakthroughs happening very soon. They’re changing the rules of stock indexes just to shove SpaceX in. It goes to show how far the establishment is willing to go to save face. Elon’s company going under would poke an unpatchable hole in the US entrepreneurial mythology. They can’t afford that right now and they rather crash the whole economy.

Re: SpaceX files to go public

#205

Post by lacy_tinpot »

riffraff wrote: post #116
lacy_tinpot wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In order to be incredulous at xAI, you'd have to be incredulous of the AI business in general, which is fair. But then you'd also be basically betting against the entire tech sector, and really the entire US economy and against the value add of AI. That kind of bet is much more difficult to swallow.

That's not true at all. I am confident some companies will make bank with AI. I am also confident xAI is not one of those. It's as if you said "if you don't think Lycos is a good business you don't think search engines can work in general".

>I am also confident xAI is not one of those

Surely you're going to buy long Put options with that confidence, right?

Re: SpaceX files to go public

#206

Post by tristanj »

panick21_ wrote: post #184
tristanj wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not meant to replace terrestrial networks, it's a space-based alternative that serves areas carriers have no financial incentive to cover. Terrestrial cellular towers cost between $150k to $500k per tower, and are not economically feasible in less populated areas. There are also many dead-zones in mountainous regions, since cell signals are blocked by mountains. Starlink Mobile supplements this, it's simply chea…

Well if you make the argument that it will replace terrestrial networks and that's why its worth X trillion $ then yes, you do actually need to cover the 1% of earth surface where the waste majority of people actually spend most of their time. The question is not if its a good business, the question if its a 2 trillion $ business, and if you only cover the 95% of earth without coverage. That more like a couple 100 bi…

I never said it would replace terrestrial networks... you invented that claim yourself and are responding to a strawman.

Starlink mobile is for rural areas, and the other 90% of the planet that's not well served by traditional terrestrial networks.

And 40% of earth's population live in rural areas, so there is a large market for this kind of service.

Re: SpaceX files to go public

#207

Post by jrmg »

I wonder how many here are aware that SpaceX (not Musk) now owns X Corp. (nee Twitter), via its ownership of xAI.

Smells like great fiduciary responsibility!

Re: SpaceX files to go public

#208

Post by plqbfbv »

mrinterweb wrote: post #140

I feel the global instability could easily be very disruptive to SpaceX. Just imagine if Russia gets vindictive and starts destroying these satellites or blowing up their satellites to create orbital debris that could knock satellites out of orbit. A really bad solar storm could be devastating. Just saying there are some decent risks, and pricing it at 1.75T IPO seems risky enough. I would not take that gamble.

> A really bad solar storm could be devastating.

Starlink already accounts for these (e.g. https://www.theregister.com/2025/11/18/starlinks_method_of_d... ), and in any case they are put in orbit so that they eventually fall back to earth in case control is lost.

Re: SpaceX files to go public

#209

Post by ai_critic »

darth_avocado wrote: post #107
indoordin0saur wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I remember stage 1 being maybe 2011. There were plenty of Musk critics back then, as there are now, but they seemed to have been completely wrong on pretty much everything. I remember people saying he was a charlatan whose technology would never work and even if it did it would never get mainstream market penetration. I feel like you would have smugly chuckled if anyone told you the follo…

1. Tesla has sold ~2.5-3M cars since 2017 in the US. There’s more than 200M cars on the road in the country. Ford has sold more F series trucks in the last 4 years than Teslas have been sold ever. 2. The only reason Model Y is the best selling car in the world is because 3/4 of the sales come from the US and Tesla only sells one model of SUV. Other brands sell many different variants and multiple models in the same c…

Neuralink appears to be working, albeit slowly--as should be expected, because the space is hard.

Cybertruck shipped and is commonly seen all over my city, so "failed" seems to be incorrect.

Starship...works? Again, the space is hard.

The tunnels...are dug?

I'm not a Musk fanboy but you're just making a bad case.

Post reply on HN