SpaceX Shares Near Record Low as Analyst Schism Widens and Short Sellers Pile In
Published on 07/18/2026 at 20:32 | Redaktion boerse-global.de
The euphoria that surrounded SpaceX’s market debut just over a month ago has been replaced by a stark reality check. The stock closed Friday at €108.40, shedding 5.39% on the day and extending its 30-day slide to nearly 35%. The shares now trade just 0.99% above their 52-week low of €107.34, set on July 17, and the relative strength index of 34.6 signals deeply oversold conditions. With the company’s market capitalization having shrunk from a peak of $2.64 trillion on June 16 to roughly $1.63 trillion, the valuation debate on Wall Street has never been more intense.
The immediate trigger for the latest sell-off was the automatic abort of Starship’s 13th test flight on July 16. Four of the 33 Raptor engines on the booster stage failed to ignite during the countdown, forcing SpaceX to replace two of them. A fresh attempt is scheduled for July 20. The mission was intended to deploy 20 Starlink V3 satellites and test in-space engine reignition. The failure follows a May flight that ended with a booster landing mishap, leaving Starship’s overall test success rate at 58% — seven successful launches out of twelve. The stakes are enormous: NASA’s Artemis IV moon landing, targeted for 2028, depends on the system, while Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin lobbies for a piece of the same missions.
The stock’s weakness has drawn a stampede of short sellers. According to data from Bloomberg and S3 Partners, short interest has climbed to roughly 30% of free float, with about 185 million shares now sold short — up from fewer than 40 million three weeks ago. The open short positions represent a notional value of around $25 billion, and bearish traders are sitting on paper profits of about $4 billion. Pressure is also building in the credit markets: the yield on SpaceX’s 30-year bond has risen from 6.7% to 7.4%, pushing the bond price to 91% of par, while the cost of insuring SpaceX debt via credit default swaps has widened to 158 basis points. The company placed $25 billion in bonds alongside its IPO.
Should investors sell immediately? Or is it worth buying SpaceX?
Adding to the uncertainty is the impending expiration of the lock-up period. After SpaceX reports second-quarter earnings in early August, roughly 20% of shares — representing about 900 million stocks — will become freely tradeable. By September, as much as 44% of the company’s equity could be in circulation. Elon Musk’s 42% stake is locked until June 2027, but with fewer than 5% of all shares currently in public hands, the potential supply glut has already been priced in by the market. The 30-day annualized volatility sits above 93%, a reflection of the extreme thinness of the float.
Despite the rout, the analyst community is sharply divided. Over 80% of analysts maintain a buy rating, but the price targets span an extraordinary range. At the bullish extreme, Raymond James’ Brian Gesuale issued a “Strong Buy” with a target of $800, citing SpaceX’s cumulative investment of more than $15 billion in the Starship program. Morgan Stanley sees fair value at $300, Goldman Sachs at $205, and Deutsche Bank at $255. The median target hovers around $225 to $235, depending on the source. More cautious voices include MoffettNathanson’s neutral rating and $131 target, while Morningstar values the stock at a mere $63 — well below even the current €108 level.
Proponents of the high valuation point to growth engines beyond the core rocket business. Starlink delivered operating profit of $4.423 billion in 2025 on revenue of roughly $11.4 billion, with an EBITDA margin of 63% and more than 10 million subscribers. The SpaceX AI subsidiary generated $3.2 billion in revenue last year from computing contracts with Anthropic and Google Cloud. Yet critics counter that the company posted a net loss of $4.9 billion in 2025, that xAI lost $6.36 billion on an operating basis, and that the price-to-sales ratio still stands at about 100 times trailing revenue of less than $19 billion. The coming Starship test on July 20 will likely determine whether the stock can mount a technical rebound or whether the selling pressure will push it to a new low.
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