FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: May 20, 2026
CONTACT: Jarice Thompson, jarice@ourfinancialsecurity.org
SpaceX IPO Poised to Augment Musk’s Power and Leave Retirement Savers Holding the Bag
Washington, D.C. — SpaceX publicly filed its Initial Public Offering (IPO) paperwork with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) today. If the SEC approves it as is, the public offering will lock in Elon Musk’s control over SpaceX and curtail the rights of regular shareholders. The company is proposing a dual class share structure, strict restrictions on lawsuits, and drastic limitations on shareholders’ ability to bring important issues to the attention of Musk and the rest of the company’s management.
“Musk is pushing the boundaries of how much power one person can have over a public company,” said Natalia Renta, associate director of corporate governance and power at Americans for Financial Reform Education Fund. “The Trump administration’s SEC and Texas lawmakers have facilitated this power grab, bending over backwards to rig the rules in ways that benefit Musk at the expense of everyone else.”
Musk has a history of self-serving behavior, including giving himself loans at terms much more favorable than market rates; making grandiose promises about future achievements that have not come to pass, such as claims that Tesla would produce fully self-driving cars by 2020; making misleading statements, including those related to his Twitter purchase that a jury found him liable for with damages of over $2 billion in March 2026; and siphoning off resources from one of his companies to another, like when he told Nvidia to prioritize delivering processors to X and xAI over Tesla, delaying Tesla’s access to over $500 million in processors by months.
“Musk’s long record of self-serving behavior perfectly exemplifies why it is dangerous to insulate CEOs from accountability,” said Renta. “Musk has routinely put his interests above those of his companies’ shareholders, workers, and affected communities. Now there will be little recourse, if any, if this pattern of behavior continues or becomes even more extreme due to fewer checks.”
Many retirement savers can expect to be exposed to SpaceX quickly even if they do not directly buy its shares, as NASDAQ recently changed its rules to allow the NASDAQ 100 index to fast-track inclusion of recently-public large companies and relaxed other standards. SpaceX can now be included in the index as quickly as fifteen days after trading begins instead of approximately three months. The S&P is also contemplating changing its index standards such that it would allow SpaceX to be included in various indices — including the S&P 500 — six months after trading begins. FTSE Russell is also considering making similar changes.
“This IPO is poised to benefit early investors by allowing them to cash out at an arguably inflated share price,” said Renta. “The corresponding reality is that regular investors, including workers saving for retirement, are likely to end up holding the bag by being exposed to index funds that buy SpaceX shares soon after the public offering and before the market has had a meaningful chance to properly price them.”
Related commentary: SpaceX Took Official Step To Go Public, But Being a Public Company Isn’t What It Used To Be
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