Earnings
SpaceX posts its first profit as a public company as AI revenue overtakes Starlink
Third-quarter revenue rose 161% to $14.58 billion and beat forecasts, two days before up to 1.3 billion shares come out of lockup.
HedgeWeekly News Desk ·
SpaceX reported third-quarter revenue of $14.58 billion on Tuesday, up 161% from a year earlier and nearly double the $7.8 billion it booked in the second quarter. Earnings per share came in at $0.35, against analyst forecasts of about $0.12 to $0.13, and revenue beat estimates of roughly $12.7 billion to $13 billion.
Net income was about $4.4 billion, compared with a second-quarter loss of $541 million and a $1.1 billion loss in the same quarter of 2025. It is the company's first profitable quarter since its Nasdaq listing in June at $135 a share. The stock rose between 1.5% and 2% in after-hours trading, from a Tuesday close of about $148.
The AI segment drove the jump. It generated $7.6 billion of revenue, up 830% from a year earlier and larger than Starlink connectivity for the first time, helped by the August acquisition of Cursor and cloud service contracts; Forbes reported a $431 million operating profit for the unit. Connectivity revenue rose 69% to $5.2 billion with 13.6 million Starlink subscribers, while the launch business grew 6% to $1.8 billion and flew its first revenue-generating Starship mission. Capital spending of about $19.6 billion, mostly on AI infrastructure, left free cash flow negative.
For funds holding or shorting the stock, the supply calendar matters as much as the print. Up to 1.3 billion shares, about 28% of the main lockup pool, become freely tradable on Thursday, with a further 328 million on October 24, according to Stocktwits. The shares trade well below their all-time high near $226, and the company gave no formal forward guidance, leaving the earnings call and lockup-day flows as the next tests.