SpaceX stock surges 16%, nearing $135 IPO price after $327bn rally

SpaceX stock just had one of its best weeks since it went public. Shares of Space Exploration Technologies Corp, ticker SPCX, jumped more than 15% on Friday and closed near $133.

That put the price only a few dollars away from its original $135 IPO price from June.

The rally came right after a moment many traders feared. On Thursday, the first big lockup expired, freeing up 911.5 million insider shares to trade for the first time and more than doubling the public float. A flood of selling did not happen.

Why Is SpaceX Stock Up Today?

SpaceX stock price soared 15.8% after Argus upgraded the stock to Buy with a $160 price target. That move beat the wider sector, which only gained 0.2% on the same day.

The stock closed at $133.11, up $18.19 on the day, with a day's range of $114.56 to $133.48 and an open of $114.96. In after-hours trading, it edged up again to $134.11.

That single session added about $87 billion to SpaceX's market cap and marked the stock's largest one-day percentage gain since its June 15 trading debut.

Just days earlier, SpaceX share price had fallen 13% after its first earnings report as a public company. Shares touched $108.37 on July 31, down 32.67% from a month earlier, and traded as low as $104.83 to $107.01 in late July. 

That is far off the 52-week high of $225.64 hit right after the IPO, when SpaceX's market cap briefly topped $2 trillion. Even after this week's bounce, the stock is still roughly 53% below that peak.

What Happened After the SpaceX Lockup Expiration?

Analysts had spent weeks warning that the lockup expiry could trigger heavy selling. Instead, shares rose 6.1% on Thursday to close at $114.92, then jumped again on Friday.

Over those two days, shares rallied about 25%, adding roughly $327 billion in market value. This marked the first time SPCX has traded this close to $135 since falling below that level last month.

Elon Musk replied "I think so" to a post calling the dip an insane opportunity, posted the same day shares hit their recent bottom. Since that reply, the price has not fallen back below that low.

What Are Analysts Saying About SPCX Price Targets?

Wall Street views on where SPCX goes next are split between short-term caution and long-term optimism.

ARK Invest's ARKK fund added 114,815 SPCX shares on August 7, about 0.25% of the fund. That was not an isolated bet. The same day, ARKK also bought 114,134 shares of Cloudflare and 313,764 shares of Circle Internet Group, so SPCX was one of several tech names the fund added to.

A separate online disclosure also pointed to a large institutional stake of over 550 million shares, though this should be checked against official filings before it is treated as fact.

SPCX Key Numbers at a Glance

SPCX Technical Analysis: Key Levels to Watch

On the daily chart, SPCX carved out what some traders are calling a triple bottom, or W-bottom, near $105 after touching that zone three separate times over the past few weeks.

Bouncing off the same level repeatedly often gets read as a sign that selling pressure is drying up. Chart watchers using this pattern have pointed to $170 as a first target now that the stock has broken and retested the old $120 resistance level.

On the 1-hour chart, price has moved well above its short-term averages.

The Relative Strength Index sits near 72.5, which is generally seen as overbought territory. That does not mean a drop is guaranteed, but it does suggest the stock is stretched after such a fast move.

What Do SPCX Derivatives Markets Show?

Beyond the regular stock market, SPCX also trades as a perpetual contract on some crypto exchanges. That data tells its own story.

Price on these venues was near $132.31, up 15.77%, while 24-hour trading volume rose 34.21% to $5.74 billion.

Open interest climbed 32.17% to about $980.45 million, which points to fresh money entering positions rather than just existing traders shuffling around.

The long-to-short ratio across the market sat at 1.0214, fairly balanced. Binance leaned slightly long at 1.0942, while OKX showed a stronger long tilt at 1.36.

Liquidation data leaned bearish for short sellers. About $17.43 million was liquidated over 24 hours, and $14.80 million of that came from short positions versus $2.64 million from longs.

The same pattern shows up on a shorter timeframe too, with $28.14K in short liquidations over 4 hours against just $16.94K in longs. That imbalance often signals a short squeeze, where short sellers get forced to buy back in as price rises.

SpaceX Stock Price Prediction: What Could Happen Next?

There are two ways to read the SpaceX stock price from here.

The bullish case points to the break above the EMA cluster and the reclaim of the $120 resistance zone as a retest.

If SPCX holds a close above $133.36, chart watchers have flagged $140 to $144 as the next zone, followed by $151 to $152.

Some pricing models put the odds of SPCX topping $140 this month at roughly 53%, up from 27% a few days earlier.

Longer term, Starlink's planned move into the cellular market by late 2027 is part of the bull thesis some analysts are using to justify targets as high as $170 to $300.

The cautious case leans on the RSI reading near 72.5 and the sharp, fast nature of the two-day rally. A pullback toward the $128 to $130 zone, or even down to the $121 to $123 support area, would not be unusual after a move this size.

Whether SPCX can build a real base above $135 or simply fades back toward the recent lows is still an open question.

No one can say for certain which path plays out. SPCX remains a young, highly volatile listing, and both the bulls and the bears have real data behind their arguments right now.

Disclaimer

This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute financial, investment, or trading advice. Past performance and analyst price targets are not guarantees of future results. Always do your own research and consult a licensed financial advisor before making any investment decisions.