04/06/2026

BIZ & FINANCE THURSDAY | JUNE 4, 2026

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SpaceX plans to set IPO price at US$135 per share

coming weeks, the OECD forecast global inflation rising to 4% this year from 3.4% in 2025. In this “time-limited disruption scenario”, the group expects US growth to slow to 2% this year and 1.8% in 2027, after growing 2.1% last year. In the eurozone, where many countries are highly dependent on energy imports, GDP growth will slump to 0.8% this year after 1.4% last year, assuming a Mideast ceasefire is secured in the coming weeks. – AFP US proposes tariffs of 10% or 12.5% on goods from 60 economies WASHINGTON: Donald Trump’s administration on Tuesday proposed imposing additional duties of 10% or 12.5% on imports from 60 economies after determining their failures to curb trade in goods made with forced labour are unreasonable and restrict US commerce. The proposal from the US Trade Representative’s office is the latest finding from a Section 301 unfair trade practices investigation to be released as the Trump administration seeks to rebuild its emergency tariffs, which were struck down by a Supreme Court decision in February. The USTR said it determined that it would impose 10% duties related to the forced labour investigation on imports from Canada, Ecuador, the European Union, Indonesia, Mexico, Pakistan, Argentina, Bangladesh, Cambodia, El Salvador, Guatemala, Indonesia, Malaysia, Taiwan and Britain. The trade agency said it would impose additional duties of 12.5% on the remaining 45 countries that it investigated. “The failure of our most important trading partners to address the importation of goods made with forced labour is unacceptable,“ US Trade Representative Jamieson Greer said in a statement. “This creates a dynamic where American workers are forced to compete globally on an unlevel playing field.” The USTR said it also was proposing a textile mechanism that would allow for a certain volume of apparel and textile imports to enter the US at a reduced tariff rate, though the duties and volumes were not disclosed. The announcement comes ahead of the July 24 expiration of a 10% temporary tariff imposed by the Trump administration on Feb 20, the day the Supreme Court struck down Trump’s tariffs under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act. On Monday, the USTR proposed a 25% duty on many Brazilian goods as a result of a Section 301 investigation into the country’s digital trade practices and preferential tariffs. The trade agency is also expected to soon unveil the findings of another major Section 301 probe into the buildup of excess industrial capacity in 16 trading partners, including China. In the forced labour findings, the USTR said it would exempt from the tariffs a number of products including energy, rare earths and certain other metals, beef, coffee, certain fruits and vegetables, pharmaceuticals, organic chemicals and aircraft parts. The USTR said it would accept public comments on the proposed tariffs and other remedies through July 6, with a public hearing scheduled for July 7. – Reuters

NEW YORK: In a surprise move ahead of its investor roadshow, Elon Musk’s SpaceX plans to fix its IPO price at US$135 per share to raise a record-setting US$75 billion, according to a source familiar with the matter. The rocket and satellite communications company plans to sell 555.6 million shares, the source said. It is aiming for a valuation of US$1.75 trillion, two other people said. The listing leads a wave of high-profile private companies preparing to test public markets after years of muted large-cap IPO activity, with SpaceX expected to be followed by artificial intelligence giants OpenAI and Anthropic. SpaceX aims to set records and break tradition with the public offering. A fixed price ahead of presentations to investors and bookbuilding is highly unusual. Companies planning to go public typically set a price range to frame valuation expectations and allow pricing to be adjusted based on investor demand. Strong demand can push the final price to the top of the range, or above it, ahead of the market debut. SpaceX’s roadshow begins on Thursday. It earlier held some “testing the waters” meetings with investors. The company’s plans, including the size of the raise, are subject to change as investor meetings get under way, the sources cautioned. There is no rule banning SpaceX’s unconventional plan for setting a fixed price for the IPO, said Weiheng Chen, a senior partner in Hong Kong at US law firm Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati. “Musk is simply taking a ‘take-it-or-leave-it’ approach which works for his followers and is also sensible given the market conditions and the lack of comparables,” Chen said. Musk has rewritten the IPO playbook for SpaceX in many other ways, from planning to give retail investors a larger role in allocations to pushing for early index inclusion, and structuring governance to preserve strong founder control. The company’s valuation relies on SpaceX dominating technologies and markets that do not yet exist – from Mars missions to AI data centers in space. Reuters previously reported that the company is considering allocating as much as 30% of the offering to individual investors, an unusually large retail tranche aimed at tapping into Musk’s cult-like following and broadening ownership of the company. The IPO is expected to be structured as an all-primary offering, meaning all proceeds o Roadshow begins today, expected to draw intense investor attention

A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket is displayed outside a Space Exploration Technologies Corp. facility in Hawthorne, California. – AFPPIC

price-to-earnings basis as it reported a net loss last year. The listing is expected to kick off a wave of mega IPOs, with SpaceX, OpenAI and Anthropic together poised to add almost US$4 trillion in market capitalization to public markets and intensify competition for investor dollars. For many investors, the bet is as much on Musk as on SpaceX. His track record at electric-vehicle company Tesla and his ability to galvanise retail traders could likewise spur strong demand for shares, as his reputation has done for past ventures. “When you’re the most anticipated IPO ever, you can ask investors to adapt to your process rather than the other way around,” said Craig Coben, former Bank of America co-head Asia Pacific global capital markets, referring to SpaceX’s unusual approach to the IPO. Still, two of SpaceX’s three businesses are burning cash, with only its connectivity segment, home to the Starlink satellite constellation, generating profits and widely viewed as the company’s cash cow. SpaceX revenue rose to US$4.69 billion in the three months ended March 31 from US$4.07 billion a year ago. Losses widened to US$1.27 per share versus 18 cents per share over the same period. In 2025, it swung to a net loss of US$4.94 billion from a profit of US$791 million. Since a large part of SpaceX’s pitch to investors hinges on Musk, some corporate governance concerns could give investors pause, experts have said. Measures, including a dual-class share structure laid out in the IPO prospectus, concentrate voting power in the hands of Musk and a small group of insiders. SpaceX is aiming to trade on the Nasdaq under the ticker symbol “SPCX”. – Reuters

would go to the company and existing SpaceX shareholders will not be able to sell any of their shares in the IPO, the sources said. Musk will be required to hold his SpaceX shares for 366 days after the IPO, one of the sources said, a signal to investors of his commitment to the company. Proceeds of the IPO will be used for purposes including expanding AI computing resources and SpaceX’s satellite network, the source added. SpaceX merged with Musk’s AI startup xAI earlier this year in a deal that valued the rocket company at US$1 trillion and the developer of the Grok AI chatbot at US$250 billion. The company has no direct peers, making valuing the company subject to interpretation. Morningstar placed a US$780 billion price tag on SpaceX, 48% below its current private-market valuation, according to a June 1 research note. Most of that comes from its Starlink satellite communications business, which drove most of its revenue, profits and growth last year. SpaceX, however, has tied most of its growth prospects to AI, and its plans rely on y et-to-be-built technologies for a significant portion of future revenue, including solar powered data centers in space, as it targets a potential US$28.5 trillion market, Reuters previously reported. At a US$1.75 trillion valuation with the company booking revenue of US$18.67 billion in 2025, SpaceX would trade at a trailing price-to-revenue multiple of 93.7 times. On the same basis, space company Rocket Lab is trading on a multiple of 118, data analytics firm Palantir Technologies at 81, and Tesla at nearly 17. SpaceX cannot be evaluated on a

OECD cuts 2026 global growth forecasts over Mideast war fallout PARIS: The war in the Middle East has dented economic growth prospects worldwide, with a more severe shock likely if no effective ceasefire is agreed before 2027, the OECD warned yesterday. global growth of 2.9%. But if the Mideast war continues into next year, however, global growth could slow to 2.1%, the OECD said – well below the average annual growth of 3.4% seen from 2013 to 2019, before the Covid pandemic. recession, he noted, and a drop in investment spending – “including in energy-intensive AI” – would likely push up unemployment.

Sustained high prices for energy as well as fertiliser and other key products from hydrocarbon production in the Gulf would weigh especially hard on developing countries that have “higher shares of energy and food in household consumption”. Even if the war sparked by American and Israeli strikes on Iran in late February ends in the

Global economic growth is now forecast to slip to 2.8% for 2026 if Gulf exports of oil and gas return to pre-conflict levels in the third quarter, the group of 38 industrialised countries said in its quarterly update. Previously the OECD had forecast full-year

“The longer the disruptions last, the larger the economic and social costs become,“ the group’s chief economist Stefano Scarpetta said in the report. Many countries would risk falling into