To The Moon

SpaceX IPO Valuation Split: Oppenheimer Sees the TAM, Morningstar Sees Only $780B Fair Value

$Space Exploration Technologies Corp(SPCX)$   is heading toward one of the largest IPOs ever, with a planned US$135 per share price, a roughly US$75 billion capital raise and an implied valuation of about US$1.75 trillion.

The cleanest institutional split is between Oppenheimer and Morningstar. Oppenheimer focuses on the addressable market expansion. Morningstar focuses on the path from ambition to cash flow.

Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, BofA, JPMorgan, and Citi act as underwriters, not research coverage. They will likely not publish reports unless a specific public note is available.

Oppenheimer: SpaceX as a Space-Age Communications Platform

Oppenheimer's view is the more bullish one because it treats SpaceX as a communications and infrastructure platform, not as a rocket company.

The firm's key argument is that Starlink could disrupt the US$1.6 trillion U.S. communications industry. That is a major framing shift. Starlink started as a satellite broadband service, especially for rural and remote users, but Oppenheimer is effectively arguing that the opportunity could become much larger as satellite network density improves, service quality rises and direct-to-cell connectivity develops.

Oppenheimer also raised its 2035 global space revenue forecast from US$500 billion to US$800 billion. That matters because the firm's thesis is not built only on SpaceX's current financials. It is built on the idea that space becomes a larger commercial layer across communications, enterprise connectivity, defense, mobility and eventually AI infrastructure.

The firm's Starlink assumptions also moved higher. Oppenheimer lifted its 2030 U.S. broadband subscriber estimate for Starlink from 10 million to 15 million, a 50% increase. That provides a more concrete bridge between the big TAM argument and actual revenue potential.

The more aggressive part of the thesis is that SpaceX may eventually move beyond broadband into mobile connectivity. If Starlink becomes relevant not only for homes, ships, planes and remote users, but also for phones and direct device connectivity, the market opportunity becomes far larger than traditional satellite internet.

Morningstar: A Great Company Can Still Be an Expensive Stock

Morningstar does not dismiss SpaceX's strategic value. Its argument is more valuation-driven.

The firm estimates SpaceX's fair value at US$780 billion, which is about US$970 billion below the US$1.75 trillion IPO target. Put differently, Morningstar's fair value is roughly 55% below the targeted IPO valuation.

Morningstar appears most comfortable underwriting Starlink. That makes sense. Starlink is the clearest business line, with visible demand, a global service footprint and a structural advantage from SpaceX's internal launch capability. Morningstar sees Starlink as the main medium-term profit driver.

The caution is mainly around everything beyond Starlink. Morningstar is skeptical of assigning too much current value to xAI, Grok, orbital computing and space-based data centers. These businesses may eventually become valuable, but they are not yet proven enough to support a trillion-dollar-plus valuation uplift in a conservative DCF framework.

The Core Divide: Oppenheimer Sees TAM, Morningstar Tests Realization

Oppenheimer is asking how large SpaceX's addressable market could become if Starlink evolves into a global communications and space-infrastructure platform. 

Morningstar is asking how much of that opportunity can realistically be converted into cash flow, and what probability investors should assign to the unproven AI and orbital-compute businesses.

Three Things to Watch

Starlink Is the Floor

Starlink is the most important near-term valuation support. It is the business investors can most easily understand, model and compare with existing broadband or telecom markets. Oppenheimer's 15 million U.S. broadband subscriber estimate for 2030 makes the upside case more tangible. Morningstar also sees Starlink as the main medium-term profit driver. That overlap matters. Even though the two firms disagree on valuation, both see Starlink as the core asset. If Starlink revenue, margins and user growth accelerate faster than expected, the IPO premium becomes easier to defend.

Launch Creates the Moat

SpaceX's launch business is not just a revenue line. It is the infrastructure advantage behind the whole story. Reusable rockets lower the cost of deploying, replacing and expanding the Starlink constellation. That gives SpaceX a structural edge versus satellite competitors that need to buy launch capacity from others. The launch business may not be the main profit driver in the public-market model, but it supports the economics of Starlink and future space infrastructure. Without launch control, the Starlink bull case would be far less powerful.

AI in Orbit Prices the Dream

The biggest valuation question is whether SpaceX can turn AI infrastructure in space into a real business. This is where the gap between Oppenheimer and Morningstar is widest. The bullish view is that SpaceX's launch cost advantage, satellite operations and xAI integration could create a new compute layer above Earth. The cautious view is that orbital data centers remain technically and economically unproven. Morningstar's lower valuation effectively discounts this AI upside heavily until there is stronger proof of demand, economics and execution.

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