Charles Payne: SpaceX IPO is an achievement of American-style capitalism

[00:00:00]This is making money. It's a big day in the market, so here's my take.

[00:00:03]Obviously, it's been one heck of a trip and well, they're just getting started, folks. I'm talking about SpaceX. Check this out. This is a cover of Aviation Week from March 29th, 2004.

[00:00:15]David and Goliath, can tiny SpaceX rock Boeing? Well, we know the answer to that. Today, SpaceX in fact pulled off the greatest IPO listing in history. Now, in recent years, we've celebrated all these IPOs that'll come through and this I love this little thing, but they only came to the Karman line, right? Even Rivian and all these big-time things. Saudi Aramco managed to get to the lower parts of the exosphere, but look at this one, SpaceX, right in outer space. It's absolutely phenomenal. By the way, the IPO only scratches the surface of just how we should be viewing SpaceX.

[00:00:50]In one way, it's an achievement of American-style capitalism. Think about this. 4,400 new millionaires and we're not just we're not just talking about the big-time folks, right? We're talking about people who worked in all parts of this business.

[00:01:04]And now, listen, for all the focus on Elon being a trillionaire, we're talking engineers, welders, technicians, cafeteria workers. They're now millionaires. Now, some people listen, took small paychecks, they went to work for this guy, they believed in him. Now, they're worth more than a hundred million dollars. There is intense focus on what happens to the stock in the near term. We understand that this is the stock market. Many are actually comparing this IPO even to Facebook. It went public under similar fanfare. It was crazy though. If you remember, initially it got hammered.

[00:01:36]Why? Because it listened to the financial media that kept hiking their offering price and making it bigger and hiking the offering price. They wanted to absorb every single nickel, every kernel of interest. They don't want to leave anything on the table. The stock opened low, went lower and went to freefall, regained its equilibrium, but that was about a year later. You know, ironically, SpaceX's is was on the financial media today. And the first question she was asked is why do you take advantage of the public? You could have went public at 175. I think, you know what? That's why people love Elon Musk. Yeah, the stock was over subscribed, but they did not try to abuse that. You know, my favorite Greek mythology story, and I've said this before in this show, is Icarus, who had the termidity to want to fly. So, his father put together some wings for him. Of course, you know the story. Part of it was made out of the wax can- candle wax, rather. And he warned him, "Hey, don't fly too close to the sun."

[00:02:27]Of course, Icarus didn't listen, and his wings melted, and he plunged to Earth.

[00:02:31]And as I think about that, I'm sure there were three kinds of people down below watching.

[00:02:35]Those who watched in horror as he descended faster and faster. Those who secretly cheered his fall, because let's face it, people hate dreamers. There's a lot of jealous folks out there, right?

[00:02:46]And they want you to fail.

[00:02:47]But then there were those who were inspired. And you know what they did?

[00:02:50]They went home that same day and made their own wings. This is an important story for many reasons, and for many and a lot of other things, right? The bottom line is today, in my mind, is lift off for the space economy, a reminder of American exceptionalism. Today is lift off for the next chapter in humankind to overcome the odds. And for the naysayers, and you know what? Just keep reaching for the stars.