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SpaceX Shares Fall for First Time Since Blockbuster Debut

Carmen Reinicke

Wed, June 17, 2026 at 4:21 PM EDT4 min read

(Bloomberg) -- SpaceX shares declined for the first time since its record initial public offering, snapping a three-day rally that had reached nearly 50%.

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Shares of Elon Musk's rocket and AI firm fell about 5% after a volatile session that saw the stock initially gain as much as 6% before reversing. The decline dragged SpaceX back below Amazon.com Inc. in value, making it the sixth-largest company in the world with a market capitalization of about $2.5 trillion. Still, the shares are more than 42% above their $135 IPO price.

"Long story short, I think this is just noise so far. If we were to see a big down day, I think that'd be a different discussion," said Michael Monaghan, partner and portfolio manager at Founder Funds in Dallas, which holds shares of SpaceX. "If it really got hit more, we'd probably add," he said.

Some of the volatile intraday trading seen in shares of SpaceX can be attributed to low float, which might also be giving its stock price a boost. There is a relatively small portion of SpaceX shares available to trade, with only about 4.2% of total stock available on day one. As lockups keeping insiders from selling expire in the coming months, it could add downside pressure to shares.

The slip came during a broader selloff across US equities as investors digested the Federal Reserve's decision to leave interest rates unchanged and new projections that indicated officials are split over whether they expect to hike rates this year. After the announcement, which marked the first decision under new chairman Kevin Warsh, traders fully priced in a Fed rate hike by October. The S&P 500 Index fell 1.2%, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq 100 shed 1%.

Before Wednesday's decline, SpaceX had been the most-bought stock by retail investors each day since its IPO, matching the combined buying of Nvidia Corp., Alphabet Inc., Amazon, Meta Platforms Inc., and top exchange traded funds tracking the Nasdaq 100 and S&P 500 indexes, according to data from Vanda Research. Over the same period, Tesla Inc. saw roughly $61 million in net selling, the data show.

"Perhaps we're seeing a rotation from one Elon-linked trade into another, with SpaceX increasingly viewed as the cleaner AI & tech exposure," Vanda wrote in a note.

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If SpaceX's gain from its IPO price holds through its first five trading days, it will have easily beat both the median and average one-week returns of 30 major US tech IPOs in the past 15 years, according to Truist Advisory Services. The data also showed that while 57% of those IPOs produced positive returns after one week, one month and three months relative to their first-day close, only 43% were positive over longer six and 12 months periods.

Investor Michael Burry, made famous by The Big Short, wrote in a Tuesday Substack post that so far, put options on SpaceX — a bearish bet — are too expensive, so he hasn't bought any at the moment.

A ratio of puts to calls in SpaceX was nearly equal on Wednesday, in a sign that more investors were hedging against a drop in the company than on Tuesday, when options first began trading. More than 1.4 million SpaceX contracts changed hands Wednesday, 24% lower than Tuesday, making the company the third-most traded security in the US options market behind Tesla and Nvidia.

There's also the possibility for index inclusion in the coming weeks. Nasdaq Inc. changed its rules to allow faster entry to shares of huge companies like SpaceX, which would force funds that track indexes such as the Nasdaq 100 to buy the stock. SpaceX will become eligible for inclusion in that index after 15 days of trading.

S&P Dow Jones Indices decided not to change its rules to allow new IPOs faster entry, meaning SpaceX won't be immediately included in the S&P 500. That means SpaceX will have to wait at least 12 months, and meet existing profitability and public-flat requirements based on its size before being added to the key market gauge.

Forced buying would support the stock price. In the interim, however, some investors may be content to stay on the sidelines of SpaceX knowing that they'll hold a passive investment in shares once it's added to indexes.

"It could play into the fact that some investors are saying, well, I'm not going to panic because if you're able to then go ahead and just track that index with an investable instrument, you're getting exposure," said Shelby McFaddin, a portfolio manager with Motley Fool Asset Management.

--With assistance from Subrat Patnaik, Bernard Goyder, Anthony Hughes and Natalia Kniazhevich.

(Updates trading throughout.)

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