How Big Do Elon Musk Backers Think SpaceX Can Be? This One Says $10 Trillion—Or More

SpaceX is reportedly preparing an IPO this year with a targeted valuation at or above $1.75 trillion and a possible launch as soon as June. Ron Baron said Baron Capital’s initial $1.7 billion investment made in 2017 is now worth about $15 billion, and he thinks SpaceX could ultimately reach a $10 trillion to $30 trillion market cap over 10 to 15 years. The article is highly constructive for SpaceX and late-stage private tech names, though the immediate market impact is limited until IPO terms are confirmed.

Analysis

The market is underpricing how much a public SpaceX can become a forced liquidity event for passive capital, not just a headline IPO. If index providers accelerate inclusion, the first-order move is a scarcity squeeze; the second-order move is benchmark ownership creating a persistent bid that compresses volatility and lowers the company’s cost of equity over time. That matters because the real valuation expansion likely comes not from the IPO itself, but from the mechanical adoption cycle in the 3–12 months afterward.

For TSLA, the more important issue is not that Musk gets wealthier; it is that a higher SpaceX mark effectively strengthens the collateral base around his broader ecosystem and reduces balance-sheet anxiety around future capital needs. That can support a higher narrative multiple for Tesla if investors begin to view Musk’s capital allocation stack as one integrated option set. The counterpoint is that the market may be extrapolating optionality faster than execution, especially if SpaceX’s public-market disclosure brings margin, capex, and governance scrutiny that private investors have tolerated.

NVDA’s connection is more indirect but still meaningful: space-based AI data centers are a very long-duration demand story, and the market will likely trade the headline before the buildout economics are proven. The contrarian read is that the biggest beneficiaries of a SpaceX IPO may be index funds and late-stage private market marks, while the main tradable risk is disappointment if the IPO terms are aggressive and the stock trades like a crowded, story-rich megacap rather than a scarce asset. In that case, the post-IPO air pocket could arrive within days, even if the 2- to 5-year equity story remains intact.

Key Decisions for Investors

• Buy TSLA into any SpaceX IPO-related volatility pullback over the next 2-4 weeks; use it as a sentiment hedge on Musk ecosystem beta. Risk/reward: favorable if the market starts pricing integrated optionality, but size modestly because the catalyst is narrative-driven.
• Sell short-dated put spreads on TSLA after the IPO pricing window, targeting 30-45 DTE, to monetize elevated event premium. Best case is sideways-to-up action as the market digests the first index-inclusion headlines.
• Long NVDA via call spreads dated 6-12 months out if SpaceX commentary explicitly ties the company to AI compute infrastructure. This is a low-conviction, high-upside way to express the long-duration data-center angle without paying full multiple expansion.
• Pair trade: long private-market/IPO beneficiaries and short high-multiple hardware peers if the deal books at a premium and the stock gaps up hard on debut. The thesis is that benchmark buying, not fundamentals, will drive the first leg higher; fade that if trading looks indiscriminate.
• For holders of TSLA, consider trimming into strength if SpaceX listing mechanics are more aggressive than expected. A rich IPO with heavy benchmark demand can still create a short-term top before the passive bid stabilizes the name.