SpaceX is a $1.5 trillion company, and the options market is looking for a 17% move on tonight’s print.
Do that math with me, because it’s ridiculous. They’re looking for this thing to move something like $270 billion between now and the end of the day tomorrow, which means Elon Musk’s net worth is going to move a bit by lunch.
Normally I’d pull the median move from the last eight reports and tell you whether these options are expensive or cheap, because that’s the job. We don’t really have a median move here, folks, since this company has never reported anything in its life.
So the usual homework doesn’t exist, and that’s the whole reason I want to be in front of a screen when it lands instead of reading about it Wednesday morning.
Put AMD next to it
AMD is worth a little over $800 billion and the street’s looking for about a 7% move, so we’re only looking for a mere $56 billion in movement there, which seems downright reasonable by comparison. Both of these print in the same session.
AMD also sits at the center of AI on its own, and until we get to Nvidia in a couple of weeks, this may be the most important earnings date left in the season.
The part you need to pay attention to
Fewer than 5% of SpaceX shares actually trade, more than 30% of that little pile is sold short, and on Thursday another 911.5 million shares become eligible to sell.
Think about what that does to a 17% expected move. You’ve got almost no stock available, a crowd of shorts who may need to buy it back in a hurry, and a supply event sitting 48 hours behind the print.
If you’re selling premium tonight expecting a nice clean volatility crush on Wednesday, go look at Thursday first.
What actually reports tonight
Everybody talks about this like it’s a rocket company that got expensive, and they’re missing half of it. They also happen to own xAI, so they’re AI-centric, and they own what used to be Twitter, which means you’re not just getting space here, you’re getting Grok.
That’s why this one moves more than one sector. SpaceX is going to move the entire space business and drag the AI trade along with it.
Come sit with us
Hans, Tim and I go live at 4:15 PM ET, right after the bell, and we’re staying on it through both releases.
Save my seat for tonight’s live coverage
Everyone who joins us live gets our SpaceX Intel Brief, and I want to be clear about what that does for you tonight.
The problem with a first-ever earnings report is that there’s no bar. The company has never issued guidance, so nothing tonight can be a beat or a miss, and the analyst estimates run from a loss of $1.26 a share to a profit of 33 cents. That’s not a consensus, that’s a shrug.
So the brief gives you something real to measure against. There’s a pre-print table with the street numbers on one side and a blank column for you to fill in as the actuals cross.
Then it walks four questions, in order, that decide the reaction. Where the actual baseline sits when there’s no bar. Whether Starlink’s profit covers the AI spending.
Whether they issue guidance for the first time in company history. And what the market is most likely to get wrong over the next 48 hours, which is where Thursday comes in.
It ends with a verdict page. One direction, one sentence, no hedging, written by you before the noise starts.
It only does you any good if it’s open while the numbers land, so make sure you’re there.
Join us live at 4:15 PM ET and get the SpaceX Intel Brief
Your only option,
Mark Sebastian