SpaceX alum says wealth managers chased him with swag

A former SpaceX engineer says wealth managers bombarded him with handwritten letters, gift packages, and personal calls before the company's IPO, a window into how the private-wealth industry courted newly liquid employees.

Scott Morton grew up in Wisconsin. He was not tracking Wall Street.

"My family was not super financially literate," he said. "I didn't hear about the stock market until I was maybe a teenager, and even then it was a very abstract thing."

After SpaceX went public in a historic Nasdaq IPO, Morton became a target. Wealth managers sent him handwritten notes pitching their services, along with small gifts – company-branded swag, books, a handwritten letter from a managing director. The courtship started before the first public trade.

"They knew exactly when the lockup was going to expire," he said. "The letters started showing up about two weeks before."

The pitch was uniform: "Let us help you manage this life-changing wealth." Morton said he got calls from at least a dozen firms, each using a variation of the same script. One sent a fleece jacket. Another included a personalized investment roadmap printed on thick cardstock.

He kept none of them. The letters went in the recycling bin. The jacket went to Goodwill.

"It felt gross," he said. "I had not even sold a single share yet, and they were treating me like I had already won the lottery."

Morton left SpaceX in 2022, before the IPO filing. He now works at an AI startup in Austin. The shares he held through the IPO gave him what he called "a cushion, not a retirement." He sold about a third of his position on the first day the lockup expired.

The experience reshaped how he thinks about money, he said. He hired a fee-only financial planner recommended by a former colleague – one who did not send any mail.

"The firm that got my business sent a two-sentence email, no gifts, no follow-up calls," Morton said. "That was the difference."

SpaceX employees who held pre-IPO shares faced lockup periods of 180 days after the Nasdaq debut. The stock rose about 6% on opening day, giving early holders paper gains in the millions for some long-tenured engineers. Wealth management firms calculate that cohort was worth roughly $1.2 billion in new liquid assets across the first wave of unlock dates.

Morton said he knows former colleagues who signed with the first firm that called them. "Some people just wanted someone to tell them what to do with the money," he said. Others are starting their own angel funds, buying fast cars, or sitting on cash.

"The whole thing moves fast once the lockup hits," he said. "You either have a plan, or the plan gets made for you – by whoever writes the best letter."