SpaceX shares advanced 2.0% to EUR 135.22 today, clawing back ground after a turbulent stretch that has thrust the company’s military satellite operations into the political spotlight. The rebound leaves the stock trading 4.3% above its 50-day moving average, though it remains 32% below its 52-week high — a gap that underscores lingering investor caution.
A Political Firestorm Around Starshield
At the center of recent volatility is Starshield, SpaceX’s military-grade satellite network, which became entangled in a geopolitical dispute this week. Ukrainian government officials reported Wednesday that restrictions on certain Starlink services had hampered combat drone operations. By Thursday, Reuters — citing Western and U.S. officials — reported that the order to slow Starshield access had originated directly from the White House.
The White House denied that President Trump had requested such a measure, and Axios reported Thursday that all services had been fully restored for Ukrainian forces. SpaceX declined to comment on the matter.
For investors, the episode lays bare a structural vulnerability: Starshield is not a conventional commercial telecom product but a tool of modern warfare. Operating such sensitive security infrastructure for Washington inevitably places the company at the mercy of shifting diplomatic and defense priorities. The question of who in the White House intervenes, and when, defies any conventional business calculation. When government agencies can throttle or restore transmission capacity at will, the reliability of the entire service suffers in the eyes of international partners.
Wall Street Sees Room to Run
Despite the political noise, analyst sentiment remains firmly bullish. Morgan Stanley’s Adam Jonas reaffirmed his “Overweight” rating on Wednesday with a $300 price target. Barclays analyst Dan Levy and his team added another layer of intrigue, floating the possibility that a Tesla-SpaceX merger could be announced ahead of Tesla’s annual shareholder meeting. Artificial intelligence was cited as a key driver behind such a move — though the analysts were careful to frame it as speculation rather than any official corporate signal.
Operational Momentum Builds
While headlines fixated on geopolitics, SpaceX’s core operations delivered dependable results. On Tuesday, the company successfully launched its CRS-35 Dragon cargo mission for NASA, ferrying approximately 2,860 kilograms of supplies and equipment to the International Space Station — including the final set of ISS Roll-Out Solar Array panels.
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The launch tempo extends beyond government contracts. A Falcon 9 rocket lifted 27 additional Starlink satellites into orbit from Vandenberg on Tuesday, with the first stage landing as planned — a cadence of technical routine that no competitor has matched.
Long-term infrastructure ambitions are advancing in parallel. Roughly a week ago, SpaceX agreed to acquire the nationwide 800 MHz spectrum portfolio from Grain Management for approximately $8 billion in cash, subject to FCC approval. Combined with the regulator’s recent clearance to launch 15,000 Starlink mobile satellites, the deal cements the company’s dominance in the direct-to-device segment.
The Double-Edged Sword of Strategic Importance
The Starshield affair carries a lesson that goes beyond this week’s headlines: the more indispensable SpaceX becomes to U.S. national security, the more it risks becoming a pawn in political battles it cannot control. That political exposure arguably weighs heavier than the everyday hazards of rocket science.
Yet the fundamentals — technological supremacy, rapid satellite deployment, and an expanding spectrum footprint — remain intact. With the stock recovering today and analysts holding firm on lofty targets, investors appear willing to look past the turbulence, at least for now.
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