SpaceX tumbles 23% from its high as investors see gains wiped out

Shares of Elon Musk’s SpaceX tech conglomerate plunged 16% Monday to close below their price on June 12, the date of the company’s massive initial public offering.

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It was its third-straight trading day of declines for a company that just 10 days ago orchestrated the largest IPO ever.

At Monday’s closing price of $154.60, the average investor who bought SpaceX shares on the open market after its debut has now seen most of their gains disappear, market data shows.

Shares closed at $160.90 on June 12, the day the stock began trading on the Nasdaq exchange. On June 16, they hit a high of $201.80 per share.

When trading ended Monday afternoon, the shares were down about 23% from their peak a week earlier.

The company itself — and holders of its previously privately held shares — made more than $85 billion in the initial public offering. And with a market cap of about $2 trillion, SpaceX remains more valuable than either Walmart or Facebook parent Meta.

SpaceX’s sell-off came amid a broader market drawdown Monday that also saw shares of Google parent Alphabet notch their worst one-day performance in over a year.

The broad S&P 500 Index closed down 0.43%, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq fell 1.3%.

Oil prices declined Monday to lows not seen since March amid progress in talks between the U.S. and Iran.

But that was little comfort to tech investors, who are concerned that short-term inflation will increase the debt burden of mega-cap companies that have borrowed large amounts of money to fund their artificial intelligence infrastructure.

Bloomberg News reported Monday that SpaceX was looking to raise at least $20 billion through a bond sale.

The move spooked investors who are “wary of the substantial cash required to fund technological ambitions,” said Jose Torres, a senior economist at Interactive Brokers financial group, in a note to clients Monday afternoon.

A host of consumer-focused stocks also saw significant declines Monday, including Amazon, Chipotle, McDonald’s, Home Depot, and Netflix.