The company listed on Nasdaq under the ticker SPCX, pricing shares at $135 and opening at $150, before trading higher in its first session. The deal valued SpaceX at roughly $1.75 trillion, placing Elon Musk’s space business among the most valuable public companies in the world.
The Financial Times described the transaction as a remarkable feat of Wall Street storytelling: bankers persuaded investors to buy into a company built not only on launch services and satellite communications, but on a far broader vision spanning AI infrastructure, orbital data centres and long-term space colonisation.
For investors, the bet is clear. SpaceX is no longer being valued simply as a rocket company. It is being priced as critical infrastructure for the next phase of the global technology economy.
The legal line-up reflected the scale of the mandate.
Gibson Dunn advised SpaceX, led by Hillary Holmes, Harrison Tucker and Atma Kabad in Houston, alongside George Sampas in New York.
Davis Polk represented the US underwriting banks, led by Byron Rooney and Stephen Byeff in New York, with Alan Denenberg in Silicon Valley.
Latham & Watkins advised the underwriting banks on the UK and European retail offering, led by Mark Austin CBE and Ryan Benedict in London, with support from Oliver Seiler and David Rath in Frankfurt.
The deal also marks the first IPO to use the FCA’s new framework allowing retail investor participation across the UK and Europe.
For BigLaw, this was more than a record-breaking listing. It was a showcase of the legal infrastructure behind one of the most ambitious capital markets transactions ever attempted.