In addition to Elon Musk, SpaceX has quietly created nine more billionaires.

Image source: JAMEL TOPPIN FOR FORBES; JOE RAEDLE/GETTY IMAGES; MUSTAFA YALCIN/ANADOLU AGENCY/GETTY IMAGES

As SpaceX launched its IPO with a valuation of $1.8 trillion, Elon Musk's wealth portfolio soared to an unprecedented height. Meanwhile, a CFO who had managed his accounts for 14 years, a female executive who rose from the 11th employee to the president, a co-founder of Twitter, and a Saudi prince who made an early bet, all reaped huge fortunes in this space capital feast.

SpaceX's initial public offering (IPO) set a record price, and Elon Musk is just one step away from becoming a trillionaire. This listing also created a new billionaire and significantly increased the wealth of many investors.

On Thursday, June 11, SpaceX set the IPO offering price at $135 per share, corresponding to a total company market value of $1.8 trillion. According to Forbes' calculations, Musk's net worth will increase by $188 billion, bringing the total to approximately $982 billion. If Tesla's stock price remains the same and SpaceX's stock price rises to $138.50 per share after the opening on Friday, Musk will become the first trillionaire in human history. If Tesla's stock price rises from $399 to $424 and SpaceX's stock price remains at $135 (a less likely scenario), Musk will also become a trillionaire.

Musk serves as the chairman, CEO, and CTO of SpaceX, holding 4.8 billion shares of this aerospace company, worth $644 billion. In addition, he holds 350 million stock options with an exercise price of $8.4 per share, corresponding to a value of $44 billion. In total, Musk holds 38% of the company's shares, with a total value of $688 billion calculated based on the IPO offering price. In February this year, SpaceX completed a merger with xAI, an artificial intelligence and social media company under Musk's umbrella (xAI merged with X, formerly Twitter, in March 2025). At that time, the overall valuation was $1.25 trillion. Based on this, Forbes estimated that Musk's approximately 40% stake (not diluted by this IPO) was worth about $500 billion.

Musk also holds more than 10% of Tesla, which has a market value of $1.5 trillion, worth $165 billion. With his options, he can purchase nearly 8% of Tesla's shares, worth $114 billion. In addition, his wealth also includes a small stake in the brain-computer interface company Neuralink and the tunnel excavation company Boring Company, as well as billions of dollars in proceeds from selling Tesla shares in the early years.

Forbes did not include performance-based restricted stocks when calculating Musk's net worth this time. If certain conditions are met, Musk's shareholding ratios in SpaceX and Tesla will increase to 47% and 29% respectively (before deducting taxes and related costs for unlocking restricted stocks). To fully obtain these stocks, Musk needs to achieve a series of challenging goals: increase the market values of SpaceX and Tesla to $7.5 trillion and $8.5 trillion respectively, and establish a permanent human settlement on Mars with a population of at least one million.

Musk is undoubtedly the biggest winner of this listing, but not the only one whose wealth has skyrocketed.

A Saudi prince, a co-founder of Twitter, and several executives and board members of SpaceX have all reaped substantial rewards. Brett Johnsen, the long-serving chief financial officer, has become a new member of the billion-dollar club. He holds 0.07% of the company's shares (including options), and his net worth is estimated to be $1.2 billion.

When the aerospace company submitted its prospectus, it also disclosed another new billionaire: Luke Nosek. This venture capitalist is a co-founder of PayPal and has long invested in SpaceX and served on the company's board of directors. Nosek's shareholding ratio is at least 0.19%, worth at least $3.4 billion. The prospectus also shows that Gwynne Shotwell, the long-serving president and chief operating officer of SpaceX, currently holds a 0.10% stake, lower than Forbes' previous estimate of 0.27%. Even so, this 11th employee of the company now has a net worth of $1.7 billion.

Among the beneficiaries of this listing, many were originally investors in X or xAI, including Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal Alsaud and Steven Witkoff, the former U.S. President Trump's special envoy for Middle East issues. The two became investors in SpaceX in February this year when Musk merged the aerospace company with his artificial intelligence and social media entity, xAI Holdings. After the merger, the overall valuation of the company was $1.25 trillion.

In the February deal, SpaceX was valued at $1 trillion, and xAI Holdings was valued at $25 billion. Less than a year ago, in March 2025, Musk integrated the artificial intelligence startup xAI with the former Twitter, X, to form xAI Holdings, valued at $113 billion. Many critics believe that this move was actually to bail out the X platform. The reason is that the deal valued X at $33 billion, almost the same as the amount (excluding debt financing) paid by Musk, Prince Alwaleed, and a few other shareholders to acquire the platform in 2022. And Fidelity, an investor, valued the X platform at less than $10 billion at the end of 2024.

Other big winners include many well-known billionaires in the venture capital, hedge fund, and private equity fields. Their institutions bet on SpaceX many years ago. Antonio Gracias, a close friend of Musk and a director of SpaceX, is one of them. His Valor Equity Partners holds 3.7% of the company's shares, worth $68 billion.

 1. Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal Alsaud

SpaceX estimated shareholding ratio: 0.28%

Value of shares: $5.1 billion

Estimated net worth: $25.4 billion

Image source: ISHARA S. KODIKARA/AFP/GETTY IMAGES

Prince Alwaleed invested in Twitter as early as 2011 when the social media company had not yet gone public in 2013. He initially opposed Musk's acquisition of Twitter but ultimately retained $1.6 billion worth of Twitter (now renamed X) shares when Musk took the company private in 2022.

With this investment, plus a small investment in xAI, Prince Alwaleed now holds $5.1 billion worth of SpaceX shares. This does not include the shares he indirectly holds through the listed company Kingdom Holdings. When xAI Holdings merged with SpaceX in February this year, the xAI Holdings shares held by Kingdom Holdings were worth $4.5 billion; if the company still holds these shares, they would now be worth $5.7 billion.

 2. Luke Nosek

SpaceX estimated shareholding ratio: 0.19%

Value of shares: $3.4 billion

Estimated net worth: $3.4 billion

Image source: DAVID M. BENETT/NETFLIX/GETTY IMAGES

In 1998, Nosek co-founded PayPal with Peter Thiel and others. In 2000, PayPal merged with X.com, an online banking company founded by Musk. In 2002, the merged company was sold to eBay for $1.5 billion. In 2006, Nosek and Thiel jointly founded the venture capital firm Founders Fund and served as a general partner until he left in 2017. He then co-founded the venture capital firm Gigafund. In 2008, he and Founders Fund made their first investment in SpaceX and have since served on the company's board of directors.

Forbes' calculation of Nosek's net worth does not include the following: 0.06% of SpaceX shares held by Nosek Capital, LLC, worth $1.1 billion. Forbes was unable to verify whether other investors also hold these shares, and Nosek's representatives did not comment on this.

 3. Larry Ellison

SpaceX estimated shareholding ratio: 0.15%

Value of shares: $2.7 billion

Estimated net worth: $231 billion

Image source: EVAN VUCCI/AP

In October 2022, Larry Ellison, the co-founder, chairman, and chief technology officer of Oracle, invested $1 billion in Musk's acquisition of Twitter. In August of the same year, he had just completed his nearly four-year term as a director of Tesla.

Forbes estimates that Ellison still holds more than $14 billion worth of Tesla shares. Text messages disclosed in the legal proceedings related to the Twitter acquisition show that when Musk asked Ellison how much he planned to invest, Ellison replied, "One billion dollars... or any amount you suggest." His reason was, "This company has great potential, and it would be interesting to be involved."

 4. Jack Dorsey

SpaceX estimated shareholding ratio: 0.14%

Value of shares: $2.6 billion

Estimated net worth: $6.7 billion

Image source: JOE RAEDLE/GETTY IMAGES

Dorsey co-founded Twitter in 2006 and served as CEO until 2008. The following year, he left to co-found the payment company Block (formerly Square). He returned to Twitter as CEO in 2015 and completely stepped down in 2021 after serving for six years. In May 2022, Dorsey left the Twitter board of directors, but when Musk took Twitter private five months later, Dorsey still retained nearly $1 billion worth of Twitter shares.

 5. Gwynne Shotwell

SpaceX estimated shareholding ratio: 0.10% (including options)

Value of shares: $1.7 billion

Estimated net worth: $1.7 billion

Image source: LLUIS GENE/AFP/GETTY IMAGES

Many years ago, Shotwell was working at another small aerospace company. When she went to visit a former colleague who had joined SpaceX, she met Musk, who invited her to be the company's first vice president of business development. She once told Stanford University students that she "hesitated for about a month" before accepting the job. In 2002, Shotwell joined SpaceX as the 11th employee and was promoted to president and chief operating officer in 2008. Before X and xAI were merged into SpaceX, Musk had to manage six companies at the same time, and Shotwell took on the heavy responsibility of the company's daily operations. Now, with the company's stock option incentives she has received over the years, she has joined the ranks of billionaires.

 6. Bret Johnsen

SpaceX estimated shareholding ratio: 0.07% (including options)

Value of shares: $1.2 billion

Estimated net worth: $1.2 billion

Image source: VICTOR DECOLONGON/GETTY IMAGES

Johnsen is now one of the wealthiest certified public accountants in the world. He worked at semiconductor giant Broadcom for nearly a decade and was promoted to vice president and financial controller. In 2008, he left to become the chief financial officer of another listed semiconductor company, Mindspeed Technologies. After three years, he was hired as the chief financial officer of SpaceX in 2011.

 7. Tom Mueller

SpaceX estimated shareholding ratio: 0.06%

Value of shares: $1.1 billion

Estimated net worth: $2 billion

Image source: ETHAN PINES