🚀 From wanting to send plant seeds to Mars as a publicity stunt... to pulling off the biggest IPO in history.

SpaceX just went public, and shares jumped 19% on day one — making Elon Musk the world's first trillionaire.

But the real story isn't the money. It's what this represents: a generation of dreamers who were told that reusable rockets, electric cars, and private space travel were impossible.

Now those things are just... Tuesday.

The rockets land themselves. The cars outsell everyone. And a city on Mars? Still crazy — but maybe not forever.

Love him or hate him, the legacy of SpaceX might simply be this: permission to dare. 🌍➡️🔴

Are you passively investing your way into a massive AI gamble? 😳💸

If you have a 401(k), IRA, or pension, you need to know about a major shift that just happened on Wall Street.

Yesterday, Elon Musk’s SpaceX (which recently merged with his AI startup, xAI) went public on the Nasdaq at a staggering $1.77 trillion valuation—the biggest market debut in history.🚀

Normally, a brand-new stock has to go through a "seasoning period"—meaning it trades for months or years while active investors figure out its true worth and shake out the initial hype and volatility. Only then does it get added to the safe, steady index funds that power your retirement.

But the rules just changed. ⚠️

The Nasdaq 100 recently rolled out new “fast entry” rules. Instead of waiting, mega-companies like SpaceX can now be forced into major retirement indexes in as little as 15 days.

Why this matters for your wallet: Index funds are required to buy the stocks on their list. Because of these fast-track rules, your retirement fund might be forced to buy into the massive, unproven AI boom at peak hype—potentially paying heavily inflated prices.

While it's a sweet deal for Wall Street insiders looking to cash out, it hands off high-risk, high-volatility wagers to everyday savers whose primary goal is safety.

Fortunately, other major indexes like the S&P 500 are resisting this trend for now. But as tech giants grow massive behind closed private doors and "smash through the top" of the stock market, the line between safe retirement planning and high-stakes tech gambling is getting dangerously thin.

🚀 SpaceX just made history on Wall Street! 🌌

Elon Musk’s rocket, satellite, and AI giant officially went public today, and it’s a massive success. Shares opened at $150 (an 11% pop from the offering price!), giving the company a jaw-dropping $2 TRILLION valuation. It’s officially the biggest stock market IPO of all time, raising a staggering $75 billion. 💰📈

Love him or hate him, Musk knows how to put on a show. He’s being compared to a mix of a brilliant aerospace engineer and a 19th-century showman. Between Tesla, Starlink, and his wild dreams of colonizing Mars, investors are paying a massive premium for his imagination—valuing the company at a nonsensical 105 times the revenue it generated in 2025! 🤯

But is it too good to be true? 🤔 While the launch is a huge win, there are some precarious risks: ⚠️ The company is only selling about 5% of its shares, meaning insider sell-offs could impact the stock later. ⚠️ Its AI business has been a financial black hole so far. ⚠️ Critics are wondering if Wall Street is spreading itself too thin with multiple trillion-dollar Musk companies on the public market.

What’s next? This might just be the appetizer! 🍽️ With SpaceX out of the gate, AI heavyweights like Anthropic and OpenAI are likely next in line for their own massive (and maybe even crazier) IPOs.

Wall Street has an old saying: "When hungry ducks quack, you feed them." 🦆🍞 And right now, investors are clearly still hungry for these massive tech tales.

👇 What do you think? Is SpaceX a brilliant, once-in-a-lifetime investment, or is this a massive bubble waiting to pop? Let us know in the comments! 💬

Every Friday, Reuters Open Interest (ROI) will provide you with a wrap-up of the financial week that was with five key charts. We'll highlight major trends – but also surprising and sometimes overlooked moves.

We've said a lot this week, so now we'll ‌let the data do the talking.

(1) LOSS LEADER

A bar chart shows the IPO proceeds raised by companies with positive and negative earnings.

ANNA SZYMANSKI, ROI Editor-in-Charge: IPOs from loss-making companies have in the past two years represented an increasingly large share of total IPO proceeds - amid the rising AI boom - after equity issuance plummeted in 2022 with the rise in interest rates. This trend now looks set to kick up a notch with the blockbuster $75 billion IPO from Elon Musk's SpaceX, especially with both OpenAI and Anthropic coming ⁠down the pike. Is this simply laying the groundwork for the next technological era or a sign of overexuberance? Or both? Only time will tell.

(2) END OF AN ERA?

RON BOUSSO, ROI Energy Columnist: OPEC's share of global oil production has plummeted since the start of the Iran war and the closure of the Strait of Hormuz. The producer group will likely find it hard to build back its strength.

(3) NIMBY

Stacked bar chart showing dislike of datacenters

MIKE DOLAN, ROI Finance & Markets Columnist: Just one in three Americans approve of the fast pace of the data-center construction supporting artificial intelligence and most would oppose having one built in their own community, according to a new Reuters/Ipsos poll.

(4) SAFETY LAST

JAMIE MCGEEVER, ROI Markets Columnist: Gold, the classic "safe ‌haven" ⁠hedge against inflation and geopolitical risk, is tumbling, even as inflation is rising and geopolitical risk remains sky-high. It is down nearly 30% from its January peak above $5,500/oz and is on the cusp of breaking below $4,000 for the first time since November.

(5) COMEBACK

Liquefied natural gas demand in Asia is quietly recovering from the shock of losing almost 20% of global supply to the Iran conflict as ⁠top buyer China shows signs of returning to the market. The biggest-importing region is on track for arrivals of 21.83 million metric tons in June, the most for five months and also up year-over-year, according to data compiled by commodity analysts Kpler. Asia's ⁠LNG imports had dropped to a six-year low of 18.74 million tons in April after the effective closure of the Strait of Hormuz halted shipments from Qatar, which shipped 80.9 million tons in 2025.

Opinions expressed are those of ⁠the authors. They do not reflect the views of Reuters News, which, under the Trust Principles, opens new tab, is committed to integrity, independence, and freedom from bias.

In recent years, Elon Musk has been picky about whom he allowed to buy in to SpaceX, the rocket ship company making its highly anticipated stock market debut this week.

One investor said that when SpaceX (SPCX.O), opens new tab was privately held, he used a connection with a cousin of the billionaire entrepreneur to buy $10 million worth of stock in the satellite maker in 2018. A portfolio manager at a $500 billion U.S. fund said he had to use his relationship with a board member of the Musk-led Tesla (TSLA.O), opens new tab for an allocation of SpaceX shares in 2023.

Both pre-IPO investors said that even after getting their feet in the door, they had to visit SpaceX’s headquarters. There, in a reversal of roles, they were interviewed by Musk’s team, including CFO Bret Johnsen, before they were given the go-ahead ‌to invest. Ultimately, they needed personal approval by the world’s richest person, and despite pouring in millions of dollars, they said they were given limited financial information about the company.

Both of the investors — and at least 10 other pre-IPO investors interviewed by Reuters — are happy with the way things have turned out so far because the value of their investment has skyrocketed. Worth about $30 billion in 2018 when Lyndon Rive — Musk’s cousin and the former CEO of SolarCity, which is now part of Tesla Energy — sold his stake to the fund manager, SpaceX is expected to list at a market valuation of $1.75 trillion.

Other investors described similar dynamics. “When we invested, it was straight up: Elon controls everything, and you're not going to know anything unless you put in $250 (million),” said Ross Gerber, CEO of Gerber Kawasaki, an investment firm that owns SpaceX and Tesla shares. Gerber said he invested anyway because his investment in Tesla had been extremely profitable.

Now, as SpaceX debuts on public markets, Musk is dictating terms at every stage of the initial public offering process. The country’s largest and most powerful banks — including Goldman Sachs (GS.N), opens new tab and Morgan Stanley (MS.N), opens new tab — have been told how to market its stock and to whom. Some banks were told the specific order sizes they needed to “fill” — in some cases a few billion dollars — and were given instructions on what types of investors to bring, five sources familiar with the matter said. Banks signed ⁠on to underwrite the IPO without being told what they would be paid, the sources said.

The Nasdaq (NDAQ.O), opens new tab stock market’s CEO, Adena Friedman, lobbied Musk and SpaceX President Gwynne Shotwell over several months to secure the listing, sources familiar with the exchange said. In March, Nasdaq changed its index rules to speed up the entry of large-cap companies like SpaceX to become component stocks of the Nasdaq-100 soon after their listings.

This time, however, unlike the fund managers who got in early through their connections and are sitting on vast gains, the company’s lofty valuations have eroded the room for error — and 30% of the $75 billion offering is for individual investors, including mom-and-pop buyers.

SpaceX presents a multitude of risks to those who buy its public stock: weak corporate governance with Musk in absolute control, loss-making operations, deals between Musk’s companies, and hard-to-value goals such as colonizing Mars and putting data centers in space. But in the scramble to get a piece of the action, few are focusing on them.

"No fiduciary should accept this adverse combination of financial and governance risk," wrote Tejal Patel, executive director of the union-affiliated SOC Investment Group, in a June 4 letter sent to other prospective SpaceX investors.

SpaceX and Musk did not respond to requests for comment. Rive, the former SolarCity CEO, did not respond to a request for comment, nor did SpaceX's CFO, Johnsen.

Citi did not respond to requests for comment. Bank of America (BAC.N), opens new tab, Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan (JPM.N), opens new tab, Morgan Stanley and Nasdaq declined to comment.

MUSK’S UNUSUAL SCREENING PROCESS

The upcoming IPO promises to be a windfall for SpaceX’s early investors and employees. The fund manager who bought Rive’s stock for $10 million said he is now sitting on more than $200 million in gains. After the IPO, SpaceX would account for 20% of his $1.5 billion fund’s portfolio.

The fund manager, who requested anonymity to speak freely, said that when he was first introduced to SpaceX as a possible investor, he was asked to visit the spacecraft company's headquarters for an interview with Johnsen, the CFO. During the meeting, he said, he was quizzed on a range of issues, including his fund’s finances, intention to participate in future fundraisings, and source of funds.

The fund manager received some information about the company from Rive, who needed SpaceX's approval before he could sell the shares. In order to learn ‌more about SpaceX, the ⁠investor said he had to seek out information from other sources, including a vendor that manufactured parts for the satellite company.

While such tight screening of possible investors is becoming more common as private companies grow big and gain market power, it was unusual back then, the investor said, adding, “We felt like we were getting interviewed more than we were interviewing them.”

The investor said he eventually obtained high-level financial information — revenue and growth numbers — but no details, such as a copy of the balance sheet. This was a departure from most companies in his fund's portfolio, which give much more detailed information and frequent updates.

SpaceX maintains a relatively concentrated ownership base for a company of its size, six of the investors in the stock said. Reuters could not determine how many shareholders are on SpaceX's official ledger, but private companies can have at most 2,000 shareholders before additional regulations kick in.

A bubble chart showing the relative size of the biggest IPOs in the U.S. and their earnings at the time of debut

SPACEX UPENDS TRADITIONAL IPO PROCESS

While underwriting transactions, banks typically drive the investor outreach process using their own relationships and considerable discretion — reaching out to investors, gauging interest and making recommendations to the issuer on how much to allocate to each. During a company's roadshow, investors express indications of interest within a set price range, and the final price is determined based on ⁠that demand. The process puts a semblance of checks on the offering.

SpaceX turned the process on its head, assigning banks to specific investor pools and geographies in what market participants describe as a “lane” structure, directing firms to focus on defined parts of the offering rather than compete broadly across the deal. It then set a fixed offering price before the launch of the roadshow.

A source familiar with the deal defended the arrangement, saying it was born out of a desire by the company to make its army of underwriters — SpaceX has 23 banks on the IPO — handle their fair share of work and assign “accountability and ownership.”

The person said some bankers were camped at SpaceX’s headquarters for more than six months, designing the process as a “great collaboration.”

Another unusual feature of the offering is the large allocation to retail investors. During a kickoff virtual meeting with ⁠its entire syndicate of IPO banks on April 6, Johnsen told attendees that SpaceX was doing so “intentionally.”

“Those are folks that have been incredibly supportive of us and of Elon for a long time, and we want to make sure that we recognize that,” he said, according to a transcript of his comments seen by Reuters.

One of the bankers at the meeting said SpaceX was planning to market to retail investors internationally, including in the European Union, Australia, Canada, Japan and Korea, without a listing.

By many accounts, demand for the stock is expected to be high. Analysts working on the deal were fielding as many as 20 calls a day from investors, above the 10 to 15 typically seen on in-demand offerings, one of the sources said.

"I can see both ⁠sides of this. But betting against Elon Musk has been a mistake, in hindsight," said Bradford Briner, North Carolina state treasurer, in an interview. Briner expects his $149 billion state retirement system will wind up owning about $30 million worth of SpaceX shares as the company is added to the Russell 1000 index, tracked by a portion of the system.

Chart comparing SpaceX's price-to-sales ratio with big tech and space companies

Elon Musk Becomes the World's First Trillionaire — Here's What That Actually Means

Elon Musk has officially crossed into territory no human has ever reached. Fueled by the explosive market debut of his rocket company SpaceX, Musk is now the first person on the planet with a net worth exceeding one trillion dollars.

A figure this large, concentrated in the hands of a single individual, would have seemed impossible just years ago. Until now, the trillion-dollar threshold belonged to things like the GDP — or staggering national debt — of a few major economies, and in the past decade alone, the market capitalization of some of the largest companies ever to trade publicly.

Musk's milestone comes during a broader surge in extreme wealth. Year after year, his former (though now far behind) billionaires club has expanded — drawing in tech moguls, celebrities, and more. Meanwhile, a growing share of the global population struggles to cover basic living expenses. Many have pointed to the rise of the first trillionaire as the most striking symbol yet of the widening chasm between the ultra-rich and everyone else.

The Number Itself Is Almost Impossible to Grasp

One trillion dollars is 1,000 times larger than one billion. It is one million times larger than one million. The human brain simply wasn't built to intuitively understand a number this big.

According to Forbes, Musk's net worth actually surpassed $1.1 trillion on Friday, driven by SpaceX's soaring valuation in its market debut. The vast majority of that wealth is tied up in stock. But to truly appreciate the scale, consider what one trillion dollars could actually buy.

To the Moon and Back — More Than 200 Times

If you laid one trillion U.S. dollar bills end to end, they would stretch nearly 97 million miles — roughly 156 million kilometers. That's enough to cover more than 200 round-trip trips to the moon, which NASA estimates sits an average of 238,855 miles (about 384,400 kilometers) from Earth. The line of bills would even surpass the roughly 93 million miles (approximately 150 million kilometers) between Earth and the sun.

For a man whose company is literally trying to reach other planets, the comparison feels fitting.

$122 for Every Person Alive

There are roughly 8.2 billion people on Earth, according to the latest U.S. Census Bureau data. If you split one trillion dollars evenly among every single one of them, each person would get nearly $122.

More Than Double the GDP of South Africa

One trillion dollars dwarfs the entire annual economic output of South Africa — the country where Musk was born. According to 2026 figures from the International Monetary Fund, South Africa's GDP stands at roughly $480 billion. Musk's net worth is more than twice that.

Globally, only about 21 countries have a GDP exceeding one trillion dollars. The United States and China dominate the list at approximately $32.38 t r i l l i o nan d$ 20.85 trillion respectively — but they are light-years ahead of nearly every other economy.

About 2.5 Million Homes in the U.S.

The median home sale price in the United States is around $403,200, according to the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis. With one trillion dollars, you could purchase nearly 2.5 million homes at that price.

243 Billion Gallons of Gasoline

At the current national average of roughly $4.11 per gallon (as of Friday, per AAA), one trillion dollars could buy more than 243 billion gallons of regular fuel.

To put that in perspective, Americans consumed approximately 137 billion gallons of motor gasoline over the entire previous year. Prices at the pump have climbed sharply — the ongoing conflict involving Iran has pushed the national average above $4 a gallon for the first time in four years, a steep increase from 2025 levels.

More Than $700 Billion Ahead of the Second-Richest Person

The world's second-wealthiest individual is Google co-founder Larry Page, with a net worth of roughly $294 billion, as of midday Friday — a full 706 billion short of the trillion mark.$

In fact, the combined net worth of the four people ranked just behind Musk on Forbes' list — Larry Page, fellow Google co-founder Sergey Brin ( $271 bi l l i o n), A ma z o n^{'} s J e f f B ez os ($ 249 billion), and Oracle's Larry Ellison ( $232 bi l l i o n) — t o t a l s a pp r o x ima t e l y$ 1.05 trillion. Together, they still don't quite match Musk alone.

These fortunes can shift by tens of billions in a single day, sometimes in a matter of hours. Musk's own wealth has grown at a breathtaking pace. Just one year ago, Forbes valued his net worth at $342 bi l l i o n — up from 195 billion in 2024. The trajectory shows no sign of slowing.$

SpaceX shares jumped as much as 30% in its Nasdaq debut before finishing up 19%, as investors piled into the world's largest IPO pic.twitter.com/UkEti8oWnB
— Reuters (@Reuters) June 13, 2026

SpaceX shares surge in debut, making Musk a trillionaire