SpaceX had a rough July by any measure, with shares plunging 31 percent to around $108, well below the $135 price set at its initial public offering. But Cathie Wood sees something others don’t. The founder and CEO of Ark Invest has called SpaceX potentially “the most important company in history, and I mean in global history,” and she is putting her firm’s money behind that conviction. Across several of its exchange-traded funds, Ark Invest snapped up 229,651 shares of SpaceX on July 27 and 28, alongside 68,145 shares of Tesla, pouring a combined $47.3 million into the two Elon Musk-led companies.
SpaceX already ranks among the largest positions in multiple Ark funds. The flagship ARK Innovation ETF held roughly $283 million worth of SpaceX stock as of July 31, while the ARK Autonomous Technology & Robotics ETF owned another $113 million. For Wood, the sell-off looks like an opportunity to build on a bet she clearly considers foundational to her investment thesis.
Whether anyone else should tag along is another question entirely. Ark’s own performance record gives reason for pause. The Innovation fund has shed 41 percent of its value over the trailing five years, a period during which the S&P 500 surged 70 percent. Even the better-performing Autonomous Technology & Robotics fund, up 42 percent over five years, trails the broader market handily. Wood is known for bold predictions, particularly around artificial intelligence and cryptocurrencies, and her optimism doesn’t always translate into returns for shareholders.
There is also the matter of valuation. SpaceX came public at what many considered a stretched price, carrying a $1.77 trillion valuation and trading at roughly 95 times its projected 2025 revenue of $18.7 billion. When a stock starts from those heights, a pullback does not automatically make it cheap. Morningstar pegs the company’s fair value at just $63 per share, less than half its current trading level and far below where it changed hands at its debut. Upcoming earnings reports and the expiration of insider lockup periods beginning August 2026 could further test the share price as insiders look to cash out.
For now, SpaceX remains one of the most compelling stories in the market, led by one of its most ambitious chief executives. But excitement alone rarely sustains a valuation trading at these multiples, and investors considering following Wood into the dip may want to wait for more clarity before blasting off themselves.
