Elizabeth Warren

SpaceX is set to go public on Friday, at which time the company and the bankers it hired are hoping investors will buy at least $75 billion worth of stock, valuing the rocket- and satellite-maker/AI shop at something in the range of $1.75 trillion. The banks set to make hundreds of millions in dollars in fees are obviously jazzed about the whole thing as is, of course, founder Elon Musk, who is expected to become the world’s first trillionaire in the process. But not everyone thinks the SpaceX debut is something to celebrate. Senator Elizabeth Warren, for one, is hoping to convince the Securities and Exchange Commission to (temporarily) scrap the whole thing.

In a letter to SEC chair Paul Atkins, the Massachusetts lawmaker — and ranking member of the Senate banking committee — Warren writes that she has “extreme concern[s]” about the upcoming SpaceX IPO that comes down to three main points. First, the fact that the company is offering stock at approximately 100 times 2025 revenue, which does not appear to have any basis in reality. (Warren cites analysts who have called it “nonsensical” and “smoke-and-mirrors accounting” and told the New York Times’ DealBook “The idea of having Elon negotiate with Elon and decide that the value of this company is some astronomical number makes market analysts laugh — or maybe cry.”) Second, that the governance structure of the public company will basically make Musk unfireable (while leaving investors with “significantly fewer rights than those traditionally offered to purchasers of public shares”). And third, that because of the rewriting of rules that were created after the dot-com crash — rewritten by index providers expressly for the benefit of SpaceX — millions of Americans will be forced to own shares of the company through their retirement accounts.

Should SpaceX’s valuation fall, Warren writes, “the net results could be disastrous” and involve a scenario wherein “retirees’ and families’ investment accounts take a hit … with little recourse for any corporate misconduct, while the wealthiest man on earth becomes even wealthier due to a lack of oversight.” Because of these “unprecedented threats,” Warren writes, the SEC “must delay” the IPO and the agency “must investigate,” among other things, “whether index funds and other financial entities involved in SpaceX’s IPO are adequately protecting investors.” (An SEC spokesperson declined to comment to DealBook.)

As a reminder, Musk said in January that people shouldn’t “worry about squirreling money away for retirement in 10 or 20 years,” because with the coming AI revolution, it “won’t matter.” The soon-to-be trillionaire explained that thanks to our new robot overlords, the population will enjoy a “universal ‘you can have whatever you want’ income.”

While much of Wall Street is experiencing SpaceX IPO mania, Warren is not alone in her concerns about the public getting involved with the company. David Trainer, CEO of research firm New Constructs, has warned investors to stay away from the company, while Big Short trader Steve Eisman has declared he is “not a fan” of the IPO, saying, “The entire company is being bet on AI in terms of its future, not on space and not on Starlink.” Last month, the head of the American Federation of Teachers and New York City’s comptroller wrote to the SEC chair and Musk, respectively, to express their major concerns about the company landing in millions of Americans’ retirement accounts.