The company is aiming to raise $75bn, which would be a record high for an IPO. The current record is held by oil giant Saudi Aramco, which raised $25.6bn in 2019. Should the company's shares sell at or above the expected $135 price, it will immediately become one of the most valuable companies in the world.
And Musk, who controls more than 80% of SpaceX with his own stock holdings in the firm, could become a trillionaire.However, such an outcome is not certain.ReutersElon Musk is set to expand his already massive wealth with SpaceX's stock market debut.According to data from Dealogic, which conducts research on the capital markets, almost half of companies that have gone public in the last 30 years have seen their value decrease compared to when they listed."There is no doubt the valuation is incredibly rich," Samuel Kerr, head of equity capital markets research at Mergermarket, said.He noted that SpaceX was pricing itself compared to its sales at a ratio that is higher than any other major company included in what investors refer to as the "Mag 7" - Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, Meta, Nvidia, Microsoft and Tesla, another of Musk's companies."But SpaceX is being valued on future earnings and revenue rather than the here and now, so some investors might be willing to overlook that," Kerr added.Last year, Space Exploration Technologies - as SpaceX is officially known - brought in $18.6bn (£13.8bn) in revenue but had a net loss of $4.9bn.In the first three months of this year, it achieved $4.7bn in sales but made a net loss of $4.3bn. Its balance sheet shows it has $102bn in assets, such as rockets and other equipment, but also carries $60.5bn of debt.Besides space exploration, the company is investing heavily in artificial intelligence (AI), social media, space-based internet services and data centres.Who is Elon Musk and what is his net worth?Musk could become world's first trillionaireEarlier this year, SpaceX acquired xAI, another one of Musk's businesses which is known for its Grok chatbot.xAI started as part of X, formerly known as Twitter, and used its access to live text and information on the platform for AI training data.Musk has long believed that developing infrastructure in space is the best way to secure the resources needed to power AI, given that land on Earth is scarce.He has outlined plans to launch AI satellites and eventually build data centres in orbit."SpaceX used to be a simple business, it was a launch company and then it was also a satellite broadband provider, and now it's a social media company and it's an AI lab," Laurence Pevsner, a partner at venture capital firm Lux Capital, told the BBC's Today programme."The AI lab is what's really spiking the valuation and I think it's a risky bet to put onto shareholders," he added.SpaceX's listing comes as other tech giants are looking to raise more cash to fund their spending on AI.Earlier this week, AI firm Anthropic revealed its plans for a public share sale later this year, while Google's owner Alphabet said it wanted to raise $80bn to spend on AI investment.OpenAI is also reportedly considering going public this year.Additional reporting by Osmond ChiaCompaniesElon MuskBusinessSpaceXStock markets
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