SpaceX Stock Dips Amid Chinese Competitor Milestone and New Share Releases
SpaceX (SPCX) shares fell 5% to $132 as Chinese startup LandSpace successfully landed an orbital-class rocket booster for the first time. The stock is also facing pressure from a staggered lock-up expiration for early investors and executives.
SpaceX (SPCX) stock is in focus after a Chinese company landed a rocket booster for the first time — just as a new release of shares by company executives and early investors adds pressure to the stock. The initial public offering (IPO) price of SpaceX, which stood at $135, recovered on August 10 — the first time since mid-July that the stock closed above the IPO price. Now the price is falling by 5% to $132 per share.
Meanwhile, the Chinese startup LandSpace landed the first stage of the Zhuque-3 rocket on a launch pad at the commercial space innovation test zone in Dongfeng, in northwestern China. This was the first time a Chinese company succeeded in returning an orbital-class rocket booster to the ground. The rocket's upper stage placed satellites into orbit on only its second flight. Its maiden flight in December 2025 reached orbit but lost the booster in what LandSpace described as an anomalous burn during descent.
This achievement narrows the competitive gap that separated SpaceX from any other launch provider, including American competitors like Rocket Lab (RKLB). The Chinese Zhuque-3 rocket stands 216 feet tall and can carry 40,350 pounds of payload to low Earth orbit, compared to SpaceX's Falcon 9 rocket, which is 230 feet tall and has a carrying capacity of 50,265 pounds.
However, SpaceX's performance record speaks for itself. Since 2015, the company has landed boosters more than 600 times. LandSpace has now done so only once. This may be why the stock's reaction remains moderate. The use of reusable rockets is no longer an exclusive achievement of SpaceX. Bullish investors will argue that SpaceX's advantage in the scale of re-flights, cost per launch, and revenues from the Starlink service keeps it at a comfortable distance ahead of its competitors.
Alongside the competitive news, another structural change is occurring that is negative for SpaceX stock. About 319 million shares held by senior employees and early investors are tradable today. This is a batch being released on the 70th day as part of a staggered lock-up period, during which about 88% of SpaceX's 13 billion shares will be released by 2027.
The stock showed surprising resilience in the face of a significant share release earlier this month. On August 6, up to 911.5 million shares became tradable. The stock absorbed the new supply and even rose by 6%, a particularly bullish move. But the larger supply tests are still ahead: a batch of 1.3 billion shares is expected to be released near the publication of SpaceX's third-quarter results in early November, followed by the expiration of the 180-day lock-up in December. The 6.42 billion shares of CEO Elon Musk will remain locked until June 2027.
