Key takeaways

  • With SpaceX stock down sharply from its IPO price, the company’s first results as a public company come as investors are growing wary of some high-priced AI stocks.
  • As the earnings engine for SpaceX, Starlink revenue and subscriber growth will be key metrics, says Morningstar’s Nicolas Owens.
  • AI revenue and capex will be in the spotlight, with more investors appearing skeptical of returns on massive AI infrastructure investments.

It’s been a rough ride for SpaceX SPCX stock after its blockbuster IPO. Now, a key test looms: its first earnings report as a public company. The results, due after the market close on Aug. 4, come as investors appear skeptical of some of the market’s highly valued artificial intelligence stocks. And while SpaceX is predominantly a space and communications company, it has been investing heavily in its AI business.

SpaceX’s massive IPO saw huge demand from investors willing to bet that Elon Musk’s unprofitable company was worth nearly as much as Amazon AMZN. SpaceX priced its IPO at $135 per share, and its stock price jumped to nearly $200 on its third day of trading. But it has tumbled since then, hitting a closing low of $112.55 on Wednesday. That makes for a loss of roughly 17% from the IPO price and more than 44% from its closing high.

The selloff comes amid declines in many stocks at the center of the AI trade. That includes semiconductor and other hardware stocks, which had seen gains well in the triple digits earlier this year, as well as declines in mega-cap hyperscalers like Alphabet GOOGL and Meta Platforms META. For SpaceX, the relevant concern is whether the massive investment in the AI buildout will generate the returns needed to support valuations.

Nicolas Owens, who covers SpaceX for Morningstar, will be looking at second-quarter revenue for its AI business. This “will include infrastructure rental payments from Anthropic, Google, and possibly Reflection, as well as their cost and capex run rate. I don’t expect AI to be profitable for a long time,” he says. The other key area will be revenue and profits for the Starlink satellite communications business, “to see what kind of trendline for subscriber growth they are experiencing.”

One nuance is that Wall Street won’t have any previous earnings reports to compare this one against. As a newly public company, SpaceX’s year-ago second-quarter results are not yet available; they will be released along with the company’s second-quarter earnings.

Here’s a closer look at the key stats Owens will be watching when SpaceX reports.

Overall profits

Overall, SpaceX is in the red, having lost nearly $5.0 billion in 2025 on $18.7 billion in sales. In the first quarter of 2026, the company lost roughly $4.28 billion. Starlink, however, made just shy of $1.2 billion. “Starlink is currently the earnings engine for the company, and it can partially fund the AI expansion plans. In the second quarter, we are looking to see what kind of trendline for subscriber growth they are experiencing,” Owens says. He expects Starlink subscriber growth of 93% in 2026, following a 229% surge in 2025 and a near doubling in 2024.

AI revenue

Amid the market’s widespread questions about the monetization of AI investments, SpaceX’s AI segment revenue will be a big unknown, though it’s a relatively small part of the company’s overall profit equation. In 2025, the AI business pulled in $3.2 billion in revenue, and in the first quarter of 2026, sales totaled $818 million.

“Second-quarter AI revenue will include large infrastructure rental payments from Anthropic, Google, and possibly Reflection. Those deals could surprise some investors on the upside,” Owens says.

Massive capital expenditures

In recent weeks, investors appear increasingly wary of SpaceX’s massive (and still growing) investments in AI infrastructure. Within the AI business, capex has already more than doubled between 2024 and 2025, and Owens expects that figure to nearly double again in 2026: “AI spending and capex are still mushrooming, and we don’t expect AI to be profitable for a long time.”

Rocket launches and data centers in space

Despite the focus on AI, the company’s space business is critical to its bull case. That includes launching data centers into space as part of the expectation for multiple rocket launches each week using reusable launchers. While that’s out of reach today, SpaceX does still dominate the private launch industry.

“Starship will extend SpaceX’s long lead over the industry in launch cadence and capacity. The Starship is designed to launch up to 10 times more payload weight than a typical Falcon 9 launch,” Owens explains.

Market valuation vs. fundamentals

FactSet has Owens as the sole Wall Street analyst who thinks SpaceX stock is overvalued. Trading near $112.00 per share, the mean target price for SpaceX is $236.72, according to FactSet. Owen’s fair value estimate is $63 per share. “We see the shares as overvalued based on the fundamentals and the uncertainty around ROI on AI investments,” he says.