Elon Musk becomes the first trillionaire in human history SpaceX investors are oscillating between two distinct feelings a month after the company went public on the US stock market: euphoria and concern. When shares of the company, co-founded and led by Elon Musk, became available for purchase by individuals on the stock market on June 12, there was a frenzy among investors. ?? Do you have any reporting suggestions? Send to g1 Although the company had decided to price its shares at US$135 each, the price immediately rose to US$150 on the first day, reaching US$176, before closing at US$160.95. This consolidated SpaceX as the largest initial public offering (IPO) of all time. The following week, its shares rose even more, reaching an intraday high (maximum price in one day) of US$225, surpassing Amazon and Microsoft in total market value. "In Elon Musk's case, any company he's involved in generates excitement," said Keith Snyder, an analyst at investment research firm CFRA. "But this was also the first time that people felt like they could invest in something that was being marketed as an artificial intelligence (AI) business." Willy Lee, an investor at Neosteller, a company that facilitates the application of capital by individual investors in private companies, agrees that the enthusiasm around the IPO was very much linked to AI. "Everyone saw SpaceX as a case of artificial intelligence," he said. Earlier this year, SpaceX acquired Musk's AI startup xAI, recently rebranded as SpaceXAI and best known for its controversial Grok chatbot. Additionally, the company began leasing data center capacity to other technology companies. But its main business is manufacturing and launching rockets and telecommunications satellites called Starlink. When Starlink announced it was cutting prices in the Memphis, Tennessee region amid local concerns about a massive data center project, SpaceX shares fell 8% the same day. As it became clear how SpaceX generates its revenue, the company's shares began to fall. Amid a turbulent few weeks for technology stocks, SpaceX has taken an especially hard hit. When it was added to the Nasdaq100 stock market index on July 7, for example, SpaceX shares fell 4.4% (versus an overall index drop of 1.7%). An earlier inclusion in the FTSE Russell index had given shares a slight boost. SpaceX did not respond to a BBC request for comment. At the end of the first month of trading, SpaceX shares were trading at about $145 each, approximately 18% below the high of the first day of trading and 35% below the peak reached. Elon Musk BBC News Also read: SpaceXAI launches its most powerful AI and promises more savings for users 'Definitely sinking' This drop in price means that retail investors who bought SpaceX shares during the first five days of trading could suffer a loss on their investment. “If you bought it in the first batch, you are definitely at a loss,” said Snyder. "It started to look a lot like a meme stock," added the expert, referring to stock-traded stocks that go viral on the internet, driven by campaigns on social media rather than financial fundamentals. Snyder cites as examples the shares of the game store GameStop and the burger chain Wendy's, where retail investors boosted the share price solely through internet memes. He predicts SpaceX shares will fall further, to around $115, based on the company's performance. That would value the company at about $1.5 trillion. Samuel Kerr, markets analyst at Mergermarket, notes that fluctuations in share prices to date have had different impacts on different investors. "If you're an IPO investor, that's fine," Kerr said, referring to groups of investors who were able to buy SpaceX shares at the company's proposed listing price of $135 or who had an equity stake in the company before the public trading. "But if you bought it in the early days, you're probably not very happy now." Musk, on the other hand, has shown enthusiasm for SpaceX's business prospects. After the company's IPO, which made him the world's first trillionaire, Musk stated that SpaceX would earn US$1 trillion per year by 2030. He also demonstrated his willingness to use SpaceX shares, and their volatility, as currency. As its stock price soared on June 16, SpaceX announced the acquisition of Cursor, a startup that created an AI robot to write computer code, in a deal valued at $60 billion. In doing so, Musk essentially bought Cursor for free, given how much SpaceX shares had appreciated at that exact moment. "It demonstrated a level of market sophistication that almost no other [stock] issuer has," Kerr said of the Cursor acquisition. SpaceX shares have since fallen. Attention to profits Morgan Stanley, which was one of the main banks operating SpaceX's IPO, appears to believe that the drop will only be temporary. Last week, the company set a $300 price target on the stock, a 33% increase from its peak trading price to date. SpaceX currently operates at a loss and last year had revenue of $18 billion, according to the financial statements required for its IPO. Musk's projected revenue of US$1 trillion is approximately 55 times greater. At this moment, expectations are growing around the company's first public earnings report. SpaceX has not yet announced a date for this, but financial analysts expect it to happen in early August. The company's results will likely coincide with the end of the so-called "lockup" period, when SpaceX employees who were prohibited from selling the company shares received as part of their compensation will be able to transfer them to the open market. More shares for sale, in addition to a potentially more detailed explanation of SpaceX's business and future growth, could generate even more drastic price swings. "If SpaceX can do everything it says it will do, yes, investors will be looking at the most valuable company of all time," Kerr said. "But there's still a lot of work to do to get there." We use artificial intelligence to translate this report, originally written in English. The text was reviewed by a BBC journalist before publication. Find out more here about how the BBC is using artificial intelligence (link to English text). Read also: Global smartphone sales fall to lowest level in 13 years after shortage of memory chips Ministry decides to notify Apple and Google for irregular supply of betting apps Brazilian startup creates 'brain' with AI to make robots smarter