Leaked financials show SpaceX's Starlink division is more profitable than established aerospace giants, underpinning the company's push for one of the largest public offerings in history.
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SpaceX targets $1.75 trillion IPO on back of 60 percent Starlink margins
SpaceX is targeting a June listing at a valuation of up to $1.75 trillion, according to its public IPO filing, after leaked financials revealed its Starlink satellite internet division operated at an estimated 60 percent-plus EBITDA margin in 2025, generating roughly $10 billion in revenue.
"Starlink’s Ebitda profit margins are north of 60 percent," Al Root reported in Barron's, citing numbers from a pre-IPO analyst meeting. "That is high for an aerospace and defense company. TransDigm’s Ebitda margins are closer to 50 percent."
The private aerospace firm, led by Elon Musk, generated total sales of approximately $16 billion in 2025, with Starlink accounting for over 60 percent of that figure from its base of 9.2 million subscribers. The company's S-1 filing confirms it is seeking to raise up to $75 billion, which would surpass Saudi Aramco’s $29.4 billion 2019 offering, with an unusually large 30 percent allocation reserved for retail investors.
The valuation hinges on convincing investors that SpaceX is an AI infrastructure company, not just a launch provider. The IPO proceeds are earmarked to fund the buildout of space-based AI data centers and the expansion of Starlink, which faces emerging competition from Amazon's Project Kuiper and a direct-to-cell venture from AST SpaceMobile.
A Balance Sheet Reshaped by AI Ambitions
The IPO narrative was fundamentally altered by the February 2026 all-stock acquisition of xAI, Musk’s artificial intelligence startup. The deal, which valued the combined entity at $1.25 trillion, brought AI development and the debt-laden social media platform X under the SpaceX umbrella. Leaked financials show the company ended 2025 with approximately $50 billion in liabilities, much of which is tied to xAI's data center buildout and pre-merger debt from X.
The prospectus also confirms a dual-class share structure that will leave public investors with minimal influence. Musk will retain roughly 79 percent of voting control despite holding approximately 42 percent of the company's equity, an arrangement that has drawn criticism but is common among founder-led technology firms like Meta and Alphabet.
Early Investors See Trillion-Dollar Payday
The massive valuation represents a historic windfall for early strategic investors. A regulatory filing in Alaska revealed that Alphabet's Google unit held a 6.11 percent stake in SpaceX at the end of 2025, a position originating from a 2015 investment when the company was valued at just $12 billion. At the upper end of the IPO target, Google's stake could be worth over $100 billion.
Satellite operator EchoStar also holds a significant position, having received $11.1 billion in SpaceX stock as part of a 2025 deal to sell spectrum licenses to the company. That stake, valued at a $400 billion valuation at the time, could be worth over $30 billion at the IPO price, turning EchoStar into a de-facto tracking stock for SpaceX. The offering is being led by a syndicate of top-tier banks, including Bank of America, Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan Chase, and Morgan Stanley.
This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute investment advice.
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