SpaceX shares rose about 2.5% on Thursday even as the first wave of a staggered unlock freed up to 911.5 million restricted shares, more than doubling the company's public float. The release followed SpaceX's first quarterly earnings report as a public company, which showed a $541 million net loss alongside revenue that jumped more than 90% year over year. Further unlock waves are scheduled through December, when the remaining restricted shares become tradable.
SpaceX stock climbed about 2.5% on Thursday, even as the first wave of a staggered lockup expiration made up to 911.5 million restricted shares eligible to trade. That release was valued at roughly $101 billion. It also more than doubled the company's public float, from about 639 million shares to roughly 1.55 billion.
Yet SpaceX shares had fallen nearly 14% on Wednesday as the market anticipated increased selling pressure once the shares became tradable.
A staggered unlock, not a single cliff
Unlike a standard 180-day lockup, SpaceX uses a staggered schedule that releases shares in several waves rather than all at once. Thursday's tranche freed 20% of the company's shares, the second trading day after its Q2 2026 earnings report. Another 7% is due to unlock on Aug. 20, Sept. 9, Sept. 24, Oct. 9, and Oct. 24, with a 28% tranche following the third-quarter earnings report and the remaining shares unlocking on Dec. 8.
That schedule could roughly triple SpaceX's tradable float by year-end. Musk's own stake stays locked until June 2027.
Debut earnings show blowout revenue, deepening losses
The unlock arrived barely two days after SpaceX's first quarterly results as a public company. The company reported a net loss of $541 million, or $0.09 per share, for the three months ended in June. Revenue rose more than 90% year over year to $7.8 billion.
That figure comfortably topped Wall Street's consensus estimate of approximately $6.81 billion. The company also disclosed capital expenditures of roughly $18.4 billion during the quarter, as research, infrastructure and AI-related spending climbed.
Shares still well below their IPO peak
SpaceX went public at $135 a share on June 12 and surged to a record $225.64 by June 16, before pulling back toward $110 in recent trading. At its IPO price, the company carried a valuation of approximately $1.75 trillion. The Motley Fool put that same valuation at 76 times its 2025 sales.
The Motley Fool called the expanding float the least predictable of the stock's headwinds, since it could limit the stock's upside as more insiders become free to sell.
Sources: Proactive via Yahoo Finance, Crypto Briefing, The Motley Fool
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