NEW YORK -- Elon Musk’s SpaceX has drawn more than US$250 billion of investor demand for what stands to be the largest-ever IPO, said people familiar with the matter on Tuesday, dwarfing the $75 billion the firm is seeking to raise.
The deal’s oversubscription rate is running at three and a half to four times the planned offering size, sources said, which bankers and investors say is the latest sign that demand is strong, as Reuters reported on Friday.
Long-only funds have put in what one source described as sizable orders. Musk briefly joined some Zoom meetings with potential investors, a source said.
The company remains in the midst of the marketing process, sources said. On Tuesday, SpaceX President Gwynne Shotwell and finance chief Bret Johnsen were expected to attend a lunch meeting at Morgan Stanley in midtown Manhattan with about 300 institutional investors and hosted by Morgan Stanley Co-President Dan Simkowitz, said a source familiar with the plans.
Investor demand is still subject to change before the IPO prices, expected on Thursday afternoon.
Subscription figures reflect indications of interest rather than final allocations, which will be set at pricing. The sources added that some large institutional investors tend to submit orders late in the IPO process. The sources requested anonymity because the matter is confidential.
SpaceX did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The offering comes at a time of extreme volatility in markets, with the Nasdaq composite trading lower on Tuesday after posting its steepest decline in more than a year on Friday and bitcoin falling 2.8% on Tuesday, putting it 37% below its January high. Some analysts have speculated that one factor in the market retreat could be selling by SpaceX buyers raising funds for the IPO.
SpaceX’s roadshow presentation and IPO paperwork emphasize the unique nature of SpaceX’s rocket-launching business, which it said has accounted for the lion’s share of mass lofted into orbit in the past three years, and the strength of the company’s Starlink internet business.
SpaceX also touted a $23 trillion market opportunity it says awaits its artificial intelligence offerings, adding it is the only company that can escape the limitations of earthbound businesses and use space to build AI compute capacity that it expects to draw enormous demand in the future.
U.S. electricity generation and computer-capacity growth have lagged behind that of China, partly because of hurdles facing large projects in the U.S., according to SpaceX. The company said that shortfall can be remedied by putting data centers and other infrastructure in space using SpaceX launches.
“By dramatically reducing the cost of access to space, we have been able to expand our mission to address some of the Earth’s most pressing challenges, including bridging the digital divide by aiming to connect over three billion unconnected people to the internet and humanity’s collective knowledge,” SpaceX said.
(Reporting by Milana Vinn and Echo Wang in New York; Editing by Colin Barr and Nick Zieminski)
