SpaceX joins the Nasdaq-100 on Tuesday, 25 days after Elon Musk took the rocket company public.
For millions of Americans with passive funds inside a 401(k), the company that made Musk the first trillionaire in recorded history may soon land inside their retirement account too.
SpaceX opened at $150 a share on its first day of trading, moved higher, pulled back, and closed Monday at $160.42. Nasdaq confirmed SpaceX would enter the Nasdaq-100 on July 7.
Funds that track the index will buy the stock. Many of those mutual funds and exchange-traded funds live inside retirement plans held by workers who never bought SpaceX directly and never made a personal call on Musk.
That part will be funny for the people who spent June melting down over his wealth.
Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) wanted a wealth tax after Musk crossed the trillionaire mark. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) used the milestone to pitch lifting the Social Security tax cap. Graham Platner, the disgraced Democrat running for Senate in Maine, posted, “Let’s make sure he’s also the last.”
Despite their whining, a few weeks later, SpaceX heads into the Nasdaq-100.
JPMorgan estimated the inclusion could draw $4.3 billion in passive inflows. Funds tied to the Nasdaq-100 include Invesco’s QQQ and QQQM.
No government body made SpaceX valuable, and none of these crusty senators built the rockets. Investors looked at the company, the vision, and the future and bought.
SpaceX did not wait years for index entry either.
Read More: Elon Musk Becomes the First Trillionaire in Human History — and the Left Immediately Lost Its Mind
The Elon Musk Trillionaire Talk Is Back As SpaceX Locks in a $1.77 Trillion Valuation
Major indices relaxed requirements this year for newly listed companies, including rules tied to profitability, trading history, and shares available for public trading. SpaceX became eligible after 15 trading days.
That number will make some people sweat.
SpaceX also has an actual business behind it, which makes the usual political whining harder to take seriously. The company dominates commercial launches, operates Starlink, holds major NASA and Defense Department contracts, and sits in the middle of the artificial intelligence infrastructure race.
The old space order had decades. Musk beat it with a company founded in 2002.
Investors did not need Elizabeth Warren’s permission to notice.
The first exposure inside index funds will be limited. SpaceX sold less than 5 percent of its total shares in the June public offering, and employee lockups keep most shares off the public market for now.
Nasdaq adjusts for the amount of stock available to trade, so SpaceX will enter the index below 1 percent.
A retirement account holding a Nasdaq-100 fund did not become an all-in SpaceX bet overnight.
But roughly $800 billion in mutual funds and exchange-traded funds track the Nasdaq-100. Those funds now need SpaceX shares to mirror the index.
One financial planner gave the standard retirement-account answer.
"You are picking strategies, not stocks. If that strategy includes SpaceX, it might still be appropriate, even if you don't like individual stocks in that strategy."
Which is fine, until the index changes under you.
The saver picks a strategy. The index moves without asking.
One market strategist said demand helped drive the fast-track move, while warning that some skeptics think the stock remains overvalued.
"Clearly, there's a lot of demand, that's why they fast-tracked the integration into the index. A lot of people will be happy with it. Some fund managers less so, the skeptics amongst them, us included. We think the stock is overvalued."
S&P Global took a slower route. It said it would not change requirements for SpaceX and would wait at least 12 months before considering the company for its major indexes.
Maybe SpaceX stumbles. Newly public stocks punish overconfidence all the time.
Musk has punished plenty of overconfident critics, too.
SpaceX went public on June 12. By July 7, funds tied to hundreds of billions of dollars were preparing to buy.
Warren can call for a wealth tax.
Sanders can write another plan.
Retirement funds may buy the rocket company anyway.
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