This Is What SpaceX Could Be Worth By Al Root July 21, 2020 5:30 am ET Bill Ingalls/NASA via Getty Images With astronauts Bob and Doug floating in orbit, Morgan Stanley’s Adam Jonas, along with other research staff at the Wall Street broker, tried to answer the question: What is SpaceX’s valuation? SpaceX is, of course, the private company that launched NASA astronauts Bob Behnken and Doug Hurley—affectionately referred to as Bob and Doug by NASA Mission Control—into space. The pair were the first NASA astronauts to launch from U.S. soil since 2011 and the first to be carried on a commercial built spacecraft sitting atop a commercially built rocket. It’s an incredible feat for the company founded by Tesla (ticker: CEO) founder Elon Musk in 2002. What’s more amazing is the rocket launched was captured for reuse and the spacecraft will be reused as well. Bob and Doug are slated to come back to Earth on Aug. 2, 2020. SpaceX’s unique technology makes the company difficult to value. And because SpaceX isn’t publicly traded, analysts don’t have all the data they normally would to build models and predict a financial future. Both problems are reflected in Morgan Stanley’s valuation of SpaceX. “We update our hypothetical [discounted cash flow] valuation range for SpaceX, valuing the company between [roughly] $200 million and $175 billion,” wrote the team of analysts in a Monday research report. (Discounted cash flow is a valuation technique that estimates all the cash a company can generate in the future and determines what that cash is worth today.) That’s a wide range of outcomes. Let’s look at Morgan Stanley’s base case, which values the company at $50 billion, making it one of the top 10 publicly traded aerospace and defense franchises. Enterprise ValueValues of Large Aerospace and DefenseCompaniesSource: BloombergNote: Enterprise value is, roughly, marketcapitalization plus net debt RaytheonBoeingLockheedNorthropGDAirbusSafranSpaceX$0 billion$50$100$150 Impressive, but it’s a stealth $50 billion. Many public equity investors aren’t sure what SpaceX does to generate value beyond its contracts with the government for space launch. Those alone can’t account for $50 billion. Its space launch business alone wouldn’t, either. “We view SpaceX as four companies,” writes Morgan Stanley. First, SpaceX launches things into space. Second, SpaceX creates Starlink satellites. The company, eventually, plans to offer space-based high speed internet connectivity for a fee using those satellites. SpaceX’s third business is travel: ultra fast, rocket-based travel from any point on earth to another. Its last business is deep space exploration. The majority of the company’s value in Morgan Stanley’s base case comes from SpaceX’s Starlink satellites. That business, according to Morgan Stanley, is worth about $42 billion. Its launch business is a $1 billion business and its travel business is worth about $9 billion, according to their research. Deep space exploration, for now, is valued at zero. The difference between $50 billion and those figures is cash on hand, about $3.4 billion, and the cost required to develop a hypersonic flying machine. Starlink will cost hundreds of billions of dollars to develop but, based on Morgan’s math, the business model will work with a subscription fee as low as $50 a month—comparable with land-based internet providers. Morgan estimates up to $24 billion in Starlink annual free cash flow by 2040. While investors can’t own SpaceX stock, they can buy a basket of stocks to play similar trends. Virgin Galactic (ticker: SPCE) is working on hypersonic travel and space tourism. It’s valued at $4.5 billion. Morgan Stanley’s Jonas covers Galactic stock, rating shares the equivalent of Buy. He has a $24 price target for shares, close to where the stock is trading at currently. To own a space launch company, look at Aerojet Rocketdyne (AJRD). Aerojet supplies rocket components to defense and government entities. Its enterprise value is $2.7 billion. Starlink is difficult to replicate but there are satellite communications providers such as Maxar Technologies (MAXR) and Iridium Communications (IRDM). Those companies aren’t worth what Morgan Stanley suggests Starlink is worth and they don’t do exactly the same thing. Finally, to invest in deep space, consider defense stalwart Lockheed Martin (LMT), the company that built the Hubble Space Telescope. The five stocks in Barron’s SpaceX basket are up about 27%, collectively, year to date, better than comparable returns of the Dow Jones Industrial Average and S&P 500. Space, it appears, is hot again. SpaceX hopes it stays that way. Write to Al Root at allen.root@dowjones.com Source: https://www.barrons.com/articles/how-much-is-spacex-worth-51595293625?siteid=yhoof2
This is the next hyped sector....think they did the cannabis sector, 5G, AI now its time for space exploration hype, no one will be living in space anytime soon....probably 500 plus years away.
Good insight about the new hype. 500 ? Nahhh. 50-70 more likely (Over optimistic - maybe) Yet, what would be your argument - in the favor of 500 theory ?
If all goes according to plan, humans will have been living in space for more than 20 years when NASA's centennial celebration rolls around in 2058. As part of President Bush's "Vision for Space Exploration" plan, the agency announced in 2006 that astronauts would break ground on a lunar base settlement no later than 2020 [source: Johnson]. https://science.howstuffworks.com/living-in-space.htm
Haha, hey, meet ya in Mars. Yah...They're always late on those projects. But 700 years. That wayyy over the top. Current tech will be like stone age stuff in those times - given the expo geowth. (If some real flu/asteroid or a.i won"t bust us out in the first place)
"No, Sir. The Americans have need of the telephone, but we do not. We have plenty of messenger boys." -- Sir William Preece of the British Post Office Engineering staff "There is no reason for any individual to have a computer in his home." -- Digital Equipment Corp. founder Ken Olsen "They couldn't hit an elephant at this dist..." -- the last words of John Sedgwick, Union Army general
Good old Mars. Saw some 4k pics of Mars recently, cool place but talk about making it inhabitable, haha. Wishful thinking.