SpaceX stock climbed to its highest level since June. Elon Musk is a trillionaire again. The shares jumped 60% since early August. None of this matters because SpaceX doesn't trade publicly.
Retail traders cannot buy this stock. They cannot sell it. They cannot lose money on it in their Robinhood accounts. Yet here they are, reading headlines about price moves in a market they'll never access. It's like getting excited about the weather on Mars. Sure, it's happening. No, you can't go there.
The article credits SpaceX's AI business for the bounce. SpaceX builds rockets. Now it has an AI business. Every company has an AI business now. My dentist probably has an AI business. He uses it to send me appointment reminders I ignore.
Starship progress also boosted the shares. Progress means the rocket didn't explode as spectacularly as before. Wall Street values this. The bar sits so low it's underground.
Someone somewhere traded these shares at a higher price than they did in June. A billionaire sold to another billionaire. A venture capital firm marked up its position. Some hedge fund analyst updated a spreadsheet. The trillionaire became more of a trillionaire. The rest of us got a headline.
Day traders will spend tonight Googling "how to buy SpaceX stock." They'll find secondary markets and special purpose vehicles and minimum investments of $500,000. They'll close the tab. They'll buy Tesla instead and pretend it's the same thing.
Musk's net worth increased by tens of billions based on private market pricing that moved because someone said it moved. No actual liquidity required. Just vibes and a Bloomberg terminal. This is how wealth works at the top. The number goes up because the right people agree it went up.
Somewhere a retail trader just put his life savings into rocket company ETFs that don't hold SpaceX.
Photo by Sven Piper on Unsplash
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