On 12 June, the day SpaceX shares first became available to ordinary investors, something close to a frenzy broke out. Priced at $135, the stock immediately surged to $150 and climbed as high as $176 before closing at $160.95 — making it the largest initial public offering in history. The following week, shares hit an intraday peak of $225, briefly pushing SpaceX's total market value above both Amazon and Microsoft.

For many retail investors in the United States and beyond, it felt like a once-in-a-generation moment. What was driving that excitement? According to analysts, it was not primarily rockets. Keith Snyder at investment research firm CFRA noted that SpaceX was being marketed as an artificial intelligence play — and that many investors responded accordingly.

SpaceX had recently acquired Elon Musk's AI start-up xAI, since renamed SpaceXAI, which is best known for the controversial chatbot Grok. The company had also begun leasing data-centre capacity to other technology firms. Willy Lee, an investor at Neosteller, which helps individuals put money into private companies, was direct: "Everyone saw SpaceX as an AI story." Yet the company's actual revenue still depends largely on building rockets and operating Starlink, its telecommunications satellite network.

When Starlink announced price cuts in Memphis, Tennessee — linked to local concerns about a nearby data centre — SpaceX shares fell 8% in a single day. On 7 July, when SpaceX was added to the Nasdaq 100 index, the broader index slipped 1.7%, but SpaceX dropped 4.4%.