Part of the Investing in Public series.
CNBC called me about the SpaceX IPO.
They were talking to a handful of small investors trying to get a piece of one of the most hyped public offerings ever, and they wanted to know why a guy who builds businesses for a living was lining up for a few shares through Robinhood.
I’ll be straight with you about something: that’s the whole point of this series. I told them I was on the fence about whether it was even a good trade. And they printed it.
Right there in a national business outlet, next to a Cornell finance student and a portfolio manager who runs a founder-led ETF, is a quote from me basically admitting I wasn’t certain. I’m fine with that. I’d rather you see the real thinking than some cleaned-up version where I pretend I have it all figured out.
So here’s the honest breakdown.
What I actually did
I requested 20 shares. I got 11. SpaceX priced the IPO at a fixed $135 a share, which put the valuation at $1.77 trillion, and it opened around $150 before running up from there on day one. Big numbers. Big hype.
And yeah, I called it the Super Bowl of IPOs, because that’s what it felt like. SpaceX, Starlink, xAI, Elon — that’s a beautiful storm of attention. When CNBC asked me why, my answer was simple: how do you not want to be part of the biggest?
That’s not a valuation model. That’s a feeling. I want to name it as a feeling so you don’t mistake it for analysis.
The part I want you to pay attention to
Here’s where I have to confess something, and it’s the same thing I’ve talked about before, because I clearly haven’t fully learned it.
Back in 2018, I bought Tesla. Held it for about two weeks. Took my little profit and got out because I told myself to quit while I was ahead. You know what Tesla did after that. It went up something like 1,700%. Getting out of Tesla too early is one of the worst trades of my life, and I’ve never really shaken it.
So when CNBC asked about SpaceX, I told them straight up: this one’s a short-term play for me, not a long-term hold. I’m willing to take a little risk on the first-day pop and then probably move on.
And the second I said it out loud, I heard Tesla. Same setup. Hot Elon name, my instinct is to grab a quick win and bounce. The difference this time is I’m catching myself doing it in real time instead of regretting it in eight years.
That’s not me telling you I’ve solved it. It’s me telling you the pattern is still in me, and the only edge I have is naming it before it bites.
Why I leaned in anyway
It’s hard to bet against Elon Musk.
I’ve watched him do the thing nobody thought he could do too many times. People smarter than me have shorted his companies into the ground. I’m not interested in being the guy who’s technically right about a valuation while the stock triples.
That said, the skeptics in this piece weren’t wrong either.
You genuinely cannot multiply your way into a $1.7 trillion market cap with a spreadsheet. It hinges almost entirely on future execution. So I’m not pretending the bears are dumb.
I’m betting on the operator, with eyes open, with money I can afford to be wrong on.
What this is actually about
If you take one thing from this, it’s this: every investment has a job, and you’d better know which job you handed it before you click buy.
SpaceX is not in the same bucket as the boring ETFs I never sell. That’s my foundation — the stuff that does its job quietly for decades. SpaceX was a small, high-risk, short-term swing, and I labeled it that way before I made it.
The mistake isn’t taking a hype trade. The mistake is taking a hype trade and lying to yourself about what it is, then panicking when it doesn’t behave like a long-term hold.
I don’t know how this one ends yet. That’s the honest answer, and that’s why I’m writing it down now instead of after the fact when I could pretend I knew all along.
I’ll update you in public, win or lose.
Not financial advice. This is for educational and entertainment purposes only. Always do your own research before making any investment decisions.