Gate's SPCX token logged $700M of volume. SpaceX stock rose 6.1% through a record 911.5M-share unlock. Musk's own 40% stake stays locked to 2027.
Tokenized SpaceX shares drew nearly $700 million of trading volume on Gate around the company's largest-ever share unlock. When the float doubled on August 6, the underlying stock rose 6.1% to about $114.92.
Gate's tokenized SPCX product lets traders gain price exposure to SpaceX without holding shares in the company directly, and its volume tracks whatever is moving the real equity. On August 4 alone the token generated $332 million of trading volume. August 5 brought $360 million. Traders were positioning ahead of the largest share unlock since SpaceX's IPO.
Similar tokenized exposure trades on Kraken and Bybit, where non-U.S. users can buy SPCXx tokens issued by Backed Assets, backed 1:1 by shares held in third-party custody. The wrap fits a wider pattern of exchanges turning newly listed equities into crypto-tradable tokens; Bybit's version now covers Meta and Tesla alongside a $1.48 billion tokenized equities market.
The catalyst was arithmetic. 911.5 million Class A shares held by early employees and pre-IPO investors became eligible for sale on August 6, more than doubling SpaceX's public float from 4.9% of shares outstanding to 11.8%.
Supply shocks of that size usually press a stock lower as newly unlocked holders cash out. Tokenized markets like Gate's SPCX typically see volume spike when traders front-run or hedge the move. The outcome was the opposite.
SpaceX shares had already sunk almost 14% on August 5, their second-worst single-day drop on record. They closed at an all-time low of $108.27. Revenue had jumped 92% year over year to $7.8 billion. Investors focused instead on $23.6 billion in planned AI-related capital expenditures and uncertainty around a cancelable contract in SpaceX's AI division. Conventional wisdom said adding nearly a billion freshly tradable shares the next day should have compounded the selling.
It didn't. The stock closed August 6 at roughly $114.92 and has since climbed to $133.11, still below its $135 IPO price from June 12 and its 52-week high near $225.64. The biggest single-day supply increase in the stock's short public life produced a rally, and the session gave bulls an opening to argue the worst of the post-IPO selling is priced in.
Morgan Stanley's Adam Jonas framed the expiration as an entry opportunity, calling SpaceX a potential "generational compounder." Argus Research upgraded the stock to buy with a $160 target. Citi kept a buy rating and a $200 target after the AI segment beat estimates by roughly $1.5 billion. Bernstein raised its target to $248, more than double where the stock trades today.
There is a crypto-specific wrinkle beyond the token wrapper. SpaceX's IPO paperwork disclosed a corporate bitcoin treasury of 18,712 BTC, bought years ago for about $661 million and worth roughly $1.29 billion at the time of filing. That position puts SpaceX among the ten largest known public-company bitcoin holders, ahead of Coinbase and Riot Platforms.
Tesla, Musk's other public company, holds 11,509 more BTC. Musk's own SpaceX shares, more than 40% of the company, remain locked until June 12, 2027. He is not a source of unlock-driven selling for another year regardless of how the rest of the float trades.
Cathie Wood's Ark Invest bought $21 million in Block shares and $2.3 million in SpaceX stock.
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