What SpaceX's IPO Means for Tech Stocks, and Coping With Panic Attacks

In less than two weeks after SpaceX went public, investors watched nearly $750 billion in market cap evaporate. The stock had opened at $150, peaked at around $230, and briefly gave the company a $2.8 trillion valuation. Then it fell every trading day, shedding $400 billion in a single day — the second largest one-day wipeout in stock market history. By Friday, June 26th, shares closed at $153, leaving the company worth about $2 trillion. Scott Galloway’s take on this is not alarm. It’s context: the stock was still above its IPO price, and the company had simply been valued at an enormous base. The question is what this means for the next wave of AI IPOs, and for investors trying to figure out what to do.

What SpaceX’s IPO Actually Signals

Galloway pushes back on the idea that SpaceX’s weak aftermarket performance will make boards and underwriters more cautious about timing future IPOs. “They got a pop,” he says. “All people care about was it was up.” An IPO, in his view, is a once-in-a-lifetime branding event, and the first-day pop is what matters. He had predicted a 20% first-day gain, and the stock delivered 21–23%. The underwriters — JP Morgan and Goldman Sachs — are “not really bankers or engineers” anymore; they are managing scarcity of engineering talent and manufacturing capacity, which lets them command 20% fees.