>Forcing it into our retirement funds, 401ks and IRAs.
Not just forcing it into. Forcing the funds to fight for it betting the stock rice higher and higher in a runaway style - the effect created by limited float and high valuation as the funds tracking indexes would try to get the amount reflecting the proportion of the valuation of the company vs. the whole tracked index valuation, and with such huge valuation the limited float leads to the price rise (similar to the short squeeze) and the higher the price on the float the higher the valuation, rinse and repeat...
Some index funds are not obligated to perfectly replicate the index by buying shares, FXAIX (Fidelity S&P 500 mutual fund) has the option to use futures, swaps, options, and statistical sampling in addition to buying equity shares to try and replicate the returns of the index.
That's exactly what happened with Nortel in the dotcom crash. Everyone's pension and retirement tied up in a company that couldn't turn a profit and was, at its peak, 38% of the TSE300.
I don't think dominating an index to anywhere close to that degree is likely here, but I wouldn't be surprised to see some similar strategies being used. Changing the rules is already from the Nortel playbook: The Nortel Rule allowed index funds to have over 10% of their holdings in a single stock.
I think this is poor advice. Its share of the index will be relatively small and if it is indeed a dud, the index will organically rebalance. If you’re a long-term investor, this would just be a temporary blip. On the other hand, if this is thr opposite of a dud, you’ll get the benefit of that.
Sure, it'll only be ~2% of the index if it opens where they want to. But in the downside case where it meanders long enough for significant amounts of its stock to make it in to public hands and then goes to 10x revenue (i.e. down 90%) , you've allowed a company to engineer dramatic changes in index rules resulting in a transfer ~1% of S&P 500 market cap from index funder holders to its bagholders^W privileged insiders^W^W investors.
Yes a -1% day should be nothing to a long term holder. Yes they're buying the market; if the market is wrong they shouldn't really have any recourse. But one can also understand that a -1% day that accrues ~entirely to the benefit a small group, who appear to have engineered that outcome has much more emotional valence than a typical down down. It doesn't feel like a bad day on the market, it feels like a heist.
> I think this is poor advice. Its share of the index will be relatively small and if it is indeed a dud, the index will organically rebalance.
If a 1 to $1.5t IPO that was fast tracked onto the S&P500 and then hoovered up a bunch of index fund money becomes a dud, the organic rebalance is going to start with a full reassessment of if index funds and the S&P can be TRUSTED.
Its very possible it will be more than a blip, although to be fair if it isn't it's going to be the sort thing you aren't going to dodge.
If one wants to gamble on the grift, that is what options are for. Otherwise, we might as well start adding NFTs to the indexes if fundamentals do not matter. Luck for some, risk management for others. Regardless, informed consent is important imho. Relevant precedence is ETFs that exclude Big Tech.
https://www.defianceetfs.com/xmag/ ("XMAG, the first ETF designed to provide investors with exposure to the S&P 500, excluding the “Magnificent 7” (Apple, Microsoft, Alphabet, Amazon, Nvidia, Meta, and Tesla). XMAG offers a unique opportunity for investors to access the broader market while reducing concentration risk in these dominant tech stocks.")
In 2025 VOO returned 17.82% vs VOOG returned 22.11%. XMAG’s trailing 1-year return through late 2025 was around 9–15% depending on the measurement date, as the Mag 7 dragged badly in early 2025.
VOOG has returned 18.28%/yr over 10 years vs 15.63%/yr for VOO, a meaningful gap driven almost entirely by Mag 7 dominance. XMAG has no 10-year track record.
Certainly, you have done well over the last ~18-24 months if you have exposure to the AI investment exuberance (VOO), just as you did well if you had exposure to certain securities during ZIRP or the pandemic. "Past performance is no guarantee of future results."
> Luck for some, risk management for others. Regardless, informed consent is important imho. Relevant precedence is ETFs that exclude Big Tech.
Yup. Coupling this change with "oh, and btw, we also want the option to be able to only put out annual or biannual earnings reports not quarterly" means "We want to offload even more risk."
There are many dubious companies in the S&P500. I don’t see the point in getting selectively heated about this one when everyone seems to be okay with the others.
That’s the way indexes roll. I don’t invest in indexes for this reason.
There is a separate structural issue with indexes that is being ignored here. Indexes were never really designed to accommodate companies going public so late with high revenue growth. A couple decades ago companies went public when they were so small that they could grow into the index. This reflects changes in the nature and structure of the capital markets, these new IPOs are just a manifestation of this reality.
Also given how the S&P weights, it'll have about as much sway as DoorDash.
Annoying they pushed it into the indexes, but like you said, we've also never had a company come out in the 1T range or even the x00B range. These indexes are supposed to represent the market and can't ignore a 1T market cap company for very long.
EDIT
One other thing to add, is that we still do not know what the stock will price at. It's already come down once, and as more information comes out it can continue to come down until it's finally priced the day before the first trading day.
>Forcing it into our retirement funds, 401ks and IRAs.
Do you think people buying the SP 500 are forced to buy Apple? Dell? Workday?
I see headlines like "401k holders forced to by SpaceX" and think "WTF, that is crazy." Then I look at the article and it just says its being added to the SP500.
You may not like that it's being added to the SP500 but no one is saying you are forced to buy any other companies being added to it. I can't believe people are just running with this narrative as-if its logically consistent with what they believe. It's manipulation.
> Musk advisers have reached out to major index providers seeking ways to secure earlier inclusion in market benchmarks to lift shares
> Advisers for the company, which recently merged with xAI, have reached out to major index providers, including Nasdaq, to discuss how SpaceX and this year’s other hot startups might join key indexes sooner than normal, according to people familiar with the matter.
> SpaceX hopes to skirt traditional rules in an effort to bring liquidity to its shareholders sooner as part of its planned IPO. SpaceX advisers have sought index policy changes that would fast-track its entry into major indexes for the company and benefit other highly-valued private companies, the people said.
This is simply not _companies being added to SP500, etc._ as you say. This is forceful change of the rules so these companies can reap benefits and it optics is that funds are being _forced_ to buy in.
Right. You can not like the way it was added to SP500. But adding a stock to the SP500 is either forcing them to buy it in their 401k or not. Was Dell being added in 2024 forcing people to buy it?
This is an honest headline:
"SP500 Bends Rules to Include SPACEX in fund At Launch"
With the change to only five days of being publicly traded requirements, incentivising market makers to keep a high valuation becomes very cheap.
After five days the index funds have to buy at the last price making it final.
In other words even if the vast majority of the market believes it's worth much less, they can force a high price and force basically everyone to hold it via retirement funds.
You've been missing important parts of the articles, or perhaps the ones you've seen aren't very informative. The concern is that SpaceX reached out to the indexes to get the rules changed (https://www.reuters.com/business/nasdaq-proposes-fast-entry-...); under the old rules, they would have had to wait much longer before being added. This doesn't prove anything wrong, but it's pretty suspicious, because why should SpaceX care if they are or are not in some particular list of stocks?
And why did SpaceX want the rules changed? Because anyone holding those passive indexes (a huge percent of holdings) would be forced to either liquidate them or invest in SpaceX
Is there a relevant distinction you are trying to make, beyond "well, actually"? Call it something else then, like "enshittification of index funds" but it's still the same overall picture of getting money from people who otherwise wouldn't have invested in it
> For broad indexes like the S&P 500, it would be impractical or expensive for an investor to construct the right proportions in a portfolio. Index funds do the work by holding a representative sample of the securities. S&P 500 index funds, the most popular and oldest such funds in the U.S., mimic the moves of the stocks in the S&P 500, which covers about 80% of all U.S. equities by market cap.3
So while yes, people are parroting things they don't understand, so are you.
Not just forcing it into. Forcing the funds to fight for it betting the stock rice higher and higher in a runaway style - the effect created by limited float and high valuation as the funds tracking indexes would try to get the amount reflecting the proportion of the valuation of the company vs. the whole tracked index valuation, and with such huge valuation the limited float leads to the price rise (similar to the short squeeze) and the higher the price on the float the higher the valuation, rinse and repeat...