SpaceX and xAI supremo Elon Musk has made a mess of his $2 trillion IPO valuation story with an uncharacteristically pessimistic post on social media.
According to IBTimes, Musk has cast doubt on the revenue assumptions propping up SpaceX and xAI, leaving investors staring at a proposed $2 trillion valuation and wondering where the numbers came from.
The fuss began after claims spread that xAI’s Colossus data centre operations could pull in as much as $45 billion across three years by leasing compute power to AI outfits, including Anthropic.
That number rapidly became the shiny bauble in bullish IPO chatter, with Musk’s empire portrayed as sitting on stable, long-term revenue streams. Then Musk spoiled the party.
He on social media that SpaceX had not signed up to a multi-year leasing arrangement and described the deal as a short-term 180-day setup with a 90-day mutual cancellation option.
For investors, what looked like predictable cash flow suddenly looked conditional, reversible and a lot less comforting than first advertised. The reported relationship with Anthropic has come in for more poking.
The AI outfit only agreed to rent computing capacity, which makes the arrangement look less like a locked-down cash machine and more temporary. Industry reports point to short-term leases and flexible exit clauses, raising the obvious question of how much revenue can sensibly be baked into any IPO pitch.
Internal leaks have added more smoke, with references to procurement networks tied to Turkey, the United Arab Emirates and China in AI and energy infrastructure supply chains. That does not prove wrongdoing, but it does little to make the revenue forecasts look transparent.
Critics say the row exposes the wider nonsense in AI valuation culture, where projected earnings are often treated as near-certainties despite relying on twitchy contracts, compute demand and geopolitics.
Musk’s clarification has reminded everyone that headline numbers are not the same as durable revenue. Some analysts see Musk’s post as resetting expectations around revenue stability at a rather sensitive point in the IPO process.
That makes pricing any offering near $2 trillion look awkward, especially when key revenue assumptions remain as bendy as warm plastic. The gap between promotional valuations and verifiable long-term contracts is getting harder to ignore.
The wider problem is that AI and space projects chew through capital while offering uncertain monetisation timelines.
SpaceX faces operational scrutiny after rocket test setbacks, while xAI is trying to scrap in a crowded AI infrastructure market dominated by Anthropic and OpenAI. Analysts warn that investor excitement around AI is starting to resemble earlier tech cycles, where expectations got fat long before delivery showed up.
Compute leasing, satellite systems and defence-adjacent contracts need serious money and often depend on government or long-term commercial stability that has not yet been nailed down.
The $2 trillion IPO story now looks more fragile than the hype merchants would like.
