Goldman Sachs grabs the top spot on a SpaceX IPO that could hand banks a record-breaking payday

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Elon Musk's SpaceX released its S-1 — a key step ahead of its public debut.
Goldman Sachs is leading the offering, according to the filing.
Here's a look at the banks advising Musk and the massive fees they stand to gain.

Wall Street's investment banks are prepping for the biggest IPO in history.

Aerospace giant SpaceX is planning to go public this summer, according to its newly released S-1 filing. While the company did not disclose a formal valuation target in the document, prior reports value SpaceX at up to $2 trillion, making it one of the most valuable companies in the world. The S-1 filing shows that the company posted a $4.9 billion loss in 2025 on $18.7 billion of revenue.

For the investment banks anchored to the deal, the stakes are measured in both prestige and a historic payday.

The core of the offering is led by five bookrunners: Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, Bank of America, Citigroup, and JPMorgan Chase, with Goldman in the lead left position. Morgan Stanley is listed as the stabilization agent, the bank tasked with supporting the stock price after the IPO. In total, 23 firms are named as bookrunners, including Wells Fargo and UBS. SpaceX will trade under the ticker "SPCX" and be listed on both the Nasdaq and Nasdaq Texas, the state where the company is headquartered.

This single transaction could account for a significant share of the year's total equity capital markets revenue at the nation's biggest banks. Jay Ritter, a finance professor at the University of Florida and a leading expert on IPOs, told Business Insider that the sheer scale of the private-sector valuation here is "unprecedented," setting the stage for a public issuance of groundbreaking scale and scope.

In the IPO market, fees for midsize deals have historically clustered around 7%, a figure documented in Ritter's past research that has stayed largely consistent over the years. However, for IPOs of this magnitude, those rates can be compressed significantly as banks jockey for a role on the mandate. But even a hypothetical fee in the conservative range of 1.5% applied to a $75 billion offering would yield a $1.125 billion pool for the underwriters.

A strong year for IPOs

The filing arrives as the window for massive primary issuances has swung wide open after years of subdued activity. During big banks' first-quarter earnings calls in April, leaders from the firms now linked to the SpaceX IPO reported surges in activity.

Citigroup CEO Jane Fraser noted an "exceptionally strong start" to the year as the bank's ECM fees jumped 64% year-over-year. A lead role in the largest IPO in history marks a significant coup for Fraser's bank, which has been vowing to push ahead of its rivals this year.

Morgan Stanley CEO Ted Pick spoke about a "record-breaking" quarter where equity net revenues rose 25% on the back of robust IPO volume.

For one star banker with deep-rooted connections to the Musk ecosystem, the deal marks a high-stakes homecoming. In February, after a brief stint at the US Commerce Department, former Morgan Stanley dealmaker Michael Grimes returned to the firm he'd left only a year before, this time with the title of chair of investment banking. Grimes has long been a fixture in the technology sector, having worked on the Tesla IPO in 2010 and later assisting with the acquisition of Twitter in 2022.

Behind closed doors, the heavy lifting is already likely unfolding, Ritter added. "They're probably testing the waters," he said, referring to early discussions between banks and top institutional investor clients ahead of the IPO roadshow, which is set to take off like a rocket the moment the S-1 drops.

Reed Alexander was a correspondent at Business Insider covering Wall Street, with a focus on investment banks like Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, and JPMorgan Chase.In this capacity, he's broken consequential stories that have defined the civic conversation in the financial-services industry. He's written hundreds of articles, unearthing JPMorgan's secretive corporate surveillance-monitoring tools tracking employees' comings and goings, to profiling the real-life former investment banker who built a digital alter ego as "Litquidity" and became a household name on Wall Street.Reed was previously an entertainment business correspondent at BI, where he reported on the media industry and Hollywood companies like Disney. Prior to joining Business Insider in 2020, Reed reported and wrote for publications ranging from Dow Jones Media Group's MarketWatch and Moneyish, to CNN International, where he began his career based in the Hong Kong bureau.Reed is also a professor of journalism at the University of Miami's School of Communication, where fellow faculty awarded him their highest honor — the distinction of Communicator of the Year — in 2022. In 2024, he teaches a course called "Covering Hollywood," a specialty journalism course which takes students inside the machinations of reporting on the global media industry, and equips them with the tools to tell stories about the figures who dominate it.Reed has been interviewed by leading national and international news broadcasts and publications, ranging from CNN and NBC's "Today" show to "People" Magazine and the Associated Press. LinkedIn also named him one of its ten Top Voices for the Next Generation, highlighting his leadership in business journalism.He holds a bachelor's degree from New York University and a master's degree from the Graduate School of Journalism at Columbia University.**Expertise

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