Elon Musk’s trillion-dollar meltdown: How SpaceX and Tesla erased $700 billion

Someone should check on Elon Musk. The world’s richest person is bleeding billions as his 42% stake in SpaceX (NASDAQ: SPCX) has shed roughly half its peak value in just five weeks, Since Space Exploration Technologies went public in a historic $75 billion IPO on June 12, 2026, the stock has gone on a brutal, value-shredding ride.

Priced at $135 per share, SPCX surged to an all-time high of $225.64 on June 16 before violently reversing course. As of Friday, the stock is trading at $112.96—down 4.47% on the session, plunging 16% below its IPO price, and resting roughly 50% below its peak.

The fallout? Musk’s paper wealth has vaporized. According to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, his net worth plummeted from a June 16 peak of $1.45 trillion to approximately $738 billion by the July 23 close. That is a staggering $650 to $700 billion wiped out in just five weeks.

Despite the freefall, Musk remains in absolute control. A June 17 SEC Form 4 filing reveals his Revocable Trust holds 842.09 million Class A and 663.8 million Class B shares, plus another 7.4 million Class A shares via the EM 2024 GRAT-A trust. While his economic interest sits at 42%, the dual-class structure grants him an ironclad 82% voting power. Public shareholders are absorbing the brunt of the price discovery while Musk maintains total operational control.

Meanwhile, short sellers are feasting. A July 21 Investing.com analysis revealed that bears have racked up roughly $15.5 billion in paper profits. Short interest has swollen to roughly a third of the public float. Musk recently warned shorts on X that their "survival probability... over time is very low," but bearish bets have only accelerated since his remarks.

The Twin Catalysts: Starship & Tesla

The unprecedented wealth destruction was triggered by two massive blows:

• The Starship Abort: On July 16, an engine failure scrubbed a Starship launch, sending SPCX down over 4% in extended trading. Forbes reported that this single misstep cost Musk more than $45 billion in paper wealth.




• Tesla’s Q2 Bloodbath: On July 23, Tesla (NASDAQ: TSLA) delivered a catastrophic earnings miss. Non-GAAP EPS came in at $0.33, missing the $0.50 consensus by over 30%. Operating income cratered 56.88% year-over-year to $398 million on a razor-thin 1.4% margin. Free cash flow swung to a negative $1.09 billion as CapEx surged 141.81% to $5.79 billion. Consequently, Tesla shares nosedived 14.52%—its worst single day since June 5, 2025—shaving another $18.6 billion off Musk’s net worth.

Merger Rumors & The Undisputed King

Despite the historic drawdown, Musk is still the wealthiest person alive by a massive margin. Forbes places him $650 billion ahead of the competition as of July 23, leaving Google’s Larry Page ($263.8 billion) and Amazon’s Jeff Bezos ($245.4 billion) trailing far behind.

To turn the tide, Musk is fanning the flames of a Tesla-SpaceX megamerger. On Tesla’s Q2 call, he noted "more and more overlap" between the companies—highlighting Starlink integration in Cybertrucks and TeraFab, a joint AI chip venture involving both companies and former xAI (now reportedly a SpaceX subsidiary). While insisting a merger requires "the appropriate process," he was decidedly blunter with Reuters: "If you were going to ask me yesterday I would have said it’s 80%."

The Road Ahead: Imminent Risks

The coming weeks are packed with binary risks that could dictate SpaceX’s survival narrative:

• August 4: SpaceX reports its maiden quarterly earnings—its first public financials since the IPO.




• August 6 (The Lockup Expiry): Insiders become eligible to sell up to 20% of their locked-up holdings. According to CNBC, this unlocks up to 911.5 million shares—a volume larger than the entire IPO float. If the earnings print disappoints, this could trigger an avalanche of selling pressure.




• Flight 13: A rescheduled Starship test launch looms without a confirmed date. A successful launch could stabilize market sentiment; another abort will likely send SPCX—and Musk’s net worth—into a deeper tailspin.

You May Also Be Interested In

• Ingram Micro Holding Corporation (INGM) Tops Q2 EPS by 4c
• Forrester (FORR) Tops Q2 EPS by 11c; Offers Guidance
• Penumbra, Inc. (PEN) Misses Q2 EPS by 28c