Privatised Power: When Strategic Infrastructure Goes Public
The SpaceX listing prices a sovereign dependency. It is the leading edge of a structural shift: sectors that were ordinary private businesses a decade ago now perform functions states cannot replace.
The issue
SpaceX filed a confidential S-1 with the SEC on 1 April 2026 and is targeting a June listing at a valuation of roughly $1.75 trillion, with a $75 billion raise — the largest IPO ever conducted. This note is not a financial assessment of the offering. It does not take a view on price, multiples, or growth assumptions. It addresses a strategic question with direct relevance for investors, counsel, and procurement authorities: in a valuation of this magnitude, how much of the value reflects what the company earns, and how much reflects what the company controls? The argument developed below is that a decisive share of the valuation remunerates a position rather than a cash flow: control of US access to space, of the largest satellite constellation ever deployed, and of communications on which Ukrainian operations and a growing share of Pentagon programmes depend. The listing prices a sovereign function. SpaceX is the most visible case, but the category is wider and expanding: orbital launch, frontier compute, subsea cables, and semiconductor fabrication have all acquired first-order strategic relevance while remaining in private — and increasingly public — hands. This note maps the dependency, the precedents, the policy instruments forming around the category, and the implications for how these assets should be analysed.