The author is a Reuters Breakingviews columnist. The opinions expressed are her own.

By Karen Kwok

NEW YORK, June 10 (Reuters Breakingviews) - SpaceX’s impending initial public offering may plot a trajectory for the rest of the market. If investors’ appetite for all things AI is strong enough to devour a $1.75 trillion company with ludicrously lopsided governance and a valuation untethered from near-term profits, then chatbot labs OpenAI and Anthropic will have a blueprint for their own listings. It would leave precious little room for everyone else, though.

Boss Elon Musk is super-sizing a slice of the IPO market that lay dormant after interest rates began climbing. Proceeds for loss-making debutants like SpaceX, excluding blank-check companies or foreign dual-listings, fell from $94 billion in 2021 to just $3 billion in both 2022 and 2023, according to data collected by Jay Ritter of the University of Florida. That was painful for typically growth-focused and capital-hungry tech trailblazers.

Now, AI-crazed investors are more receptive. Thus far in 2026, loss-making companies account for nearly two-thirds of listings, though less than half of proceeds. That is still far from 2021’s giddy peak, when they raised almost 80% of the money. Musk is here to push the dial further.

He’s doing so with characteristic boldness. SpaceX fixed its offering price early, rather than through typical investor back-and-forth. It aims to sell a huge chunk to retail traders. Musk’s super-voting shares give him unquestionable control.

Quite reasonably, some investors have protested. The gamble is that the rest of the market is desperate enough for AI exposure and a gigantic listing that it doesn’t care.

Sustained, post-debut strength for SpaceX shares would send a strong signal to push that wager further. After all, its xAI unit is practically an also-ran next to market-leading OpenAI and Anthropic, which have both filed confidentially for a listing.

Assume both AI labs aim to raise $75 billion, matching SpaceX. Add in other listings year-to-date, and the trio would lift U.S. proceeds including SPACs and dual-listings for 2026 to about $285 billion, judging by Dealogic data. That’s manageable next to the $318 billion raised in all of 2021. But that boom comprised over 1,000 deals. Include the three mega-listings, and this year is spread across just 165.

That’s asking investors to put a lot of eggs in very few baskets, potentially straining both big, institutional investors’ typical safeguards and retail traders’ wallets. And if Musk’s offering stumbles and OpenAI and Anthropic push on nonetheless, the triple launch threatens to burn through all the available oxygen for other, smaller aspirants. This year could be a boom for the big, and a bust for the masses.

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CONTEXT NEWS

SpaceX is expected to begin its public trading debut on June 12, Reuters reported. The company is aiming to raise $75 billion in an initial public offering valuing it at $1.75 trillion.