SpaceX's $2.6 trillion market cap nearly double that of bitcoin

Markets SpaceX's $2.6 trillion market cap nearly double that of bitcoin Eight days after its IPO, SpaceX has surged past $2.5 trillion to become the world's sixth-largest company. And market watchers say it is pulling the risk capital crypto wants. By Shaurya Malwa | Edited by Stephen Alpher Updated Jun 17, 2026, 12:50 p.m. Published Jun 17, 2026, 12:09 p.m. 2 min read Make preferred on Share Share this article Copy link X icon X (Twitter) LinkedIn Facebook Email Make preferred on Summary Show SpaceX shares have surged more than 40% since their June 12 debut, giving the company a roughly $2.5 trillion valuation that makes it the world’s sixth-largest firm and nearly twice the size of the entire bitcoin market. The rally is being driven in part by a very limited float and investor enthusiasm for SpaceX’s push into artificial intelligence via its acquisition of xAI and a $60 billion deal for coding startup Cursor, putting it in direct competition with OpenAI and Anthropic. Analysts warn that SpaceX’s lofty valuation—more than 130 times 2025 sales despite a nearly $5 billion net loss—leaves little room for error, and a stumble could rattle broader markets, AI highfliers and crypto just as risk appetite returns. SpaceX (SPCX) has climbed more than 40% since its June 12 debut to a roughly $2.5 trillion market value, making it the sixth-largest company in the world and worth nearly twice the entire bitcoin market. Some of that move is a supply-side quirk. Only about 4.2% of SpaceX's shares were available to trade on day one, so a small pool of stock is setting the price for the whole company. SpaceX's appeal for investors is that it is no longer just a rocket company. The Elon Musk-owned firm's February acquisition of xAI - also owned by Musk - brought the Grok models and data centers with it, putting the company in direct competition with AI heavyweights Anthropic and OpenAI, both of which have filed to go public. That is the same innovation complex crypto trades alongside, and such a rise is a sign of where risk capital and retail attention are going. The entire bitcoin market is worth about $1.2 trillion as of Wednesday. SpaceX, at $2.5 trillion, is worth nearly twice that, and it is drawing from the same risk budget that flows to crypto - the point ARK made earlier this week when it funded its SpaceX buying by selling other holdings. The caution is that expectations now leave little room for error, with some analysts warning that a SpaceX stumble would hit the broader market and the AI winners with it. "With the expectations already sky high, there is little room for error," Lukman Otunuga, head of markets at FXTM, told CoinDesk in an email. "Should SpaceX disappoint down the line, the fallout will hit the broader stock market, as well as the beneficiaries of the AI boom." The numbers support that worry. SpaceX posted a $4.94 billion net loss in 2025 on $18.67 billion of revenue, and at $2.5 trillion, it trades at more than 130 times sales, a multiple some call meme-stock territory. As such, SpaceX announced Tuesday that it has formally agreed to take over Cursor in a deal that values the AI coding startup at $60 billion. Cursor investors will have the right to receive SpaceX stock based on the implied equity value of Cursor, according to a company filing. The surge lands in a heavy macro week, meanwhile. The Bank of Japan raised rates to 1%, the highest since 1995; the Federal Reserve is expected to hold today in Kevin Warsh's first meeting as chair, and gold is holding above $4,300 as oil and inflation fears ease. Risk appetite is back, which helps bitcoin as the high-beta member of the complex, but the hottest trade is an expensive, unprofitable stock. If SpaceX stumbles, everything around it feels the fallout. 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