SpaceX Floats $800 B Valuation in Insider Tender Offer Ahead of Possible 2026 IPO

Privately traded giants fishing for near-trillion-dollar valuations evoke the Dutch East India Company’s 17th-century rise (market cap ≈ 78 million guilders in 1637, or trillions today) and the late-1990s dot-com tender-offer frenzy, when companies like Facebook sold insider shares long before IPO. The episode signals two systemic shifts: (1) private capital pools now rival public markets, letting firms like SpaceX and OpenAI command sovereign-scale valuations without the disclosure rigors that once capped them; (2) space infrastructure is morphing from state monopoly to commercial utility, with Starlink’s 9,000-satellite grid treated like a telecom cash-cow rather than a moon-shot. Whether this moment echoes the railroad bubble of the 1870s or the birth of the oil majors depends on execution: if Starship lowers launch costs as radically as Falcon 9 did, an $800 B tag could look cheap on a 100-year horizon where off-planet logistics become essential. If not, history may file it beside the South Sea Company’s 1720 valuation collapse as another instance of capital outrunning cash-flow. The tension between leaked banker enthusiasm and Musk’s denial reminds us that valuation is narrative-driven and contingent until liquidity—via IPO or sustained profits—tests the story.