Matt Levine's take was essentially that if you're in the index fund game, you want the market. You don't pick and choose what parts of the market you want--that's active management. SPCX mostly isn't an issue because most indices include the float in the weight, so it isn't really even a $1T company.
Everybody is upset about the rule change, but to be honest, they would’ve just ended up in the same position a few months later. Elon has kept Tesla’s market cap at 5-10x what any reasonable investor would think it should be for the better part of a decade. It’s not like SpaceX is going to tank in the next 3 months and they’ll be left holding the bag. It’s not like it wasn’t going to end up in every index in a year.
And to be clear, I’m not saying it’s a good thing. I just don’t think it matters so much.
Moving to have 401ks investing in it when 5% of the stock is publicly available versus 30-40%+ that would have been available on the previous timelines seems like it could have pretty dramatic effects on its price.
The relevant indices (S&P500, Vanguard) buy in proportion to available float -- i.e., its market cap is weighted by 5%. Only Nasdaq 100 ignores float, stupidly, but almost no money, especially 401(k) money, is in that.
This may be true (I'm sure it is, but I haven't verified) but the large majority of people do not know this, which is why hearing "my retirement account is going to be forced to by a bunch of spacex at a $2.5T valuation" makes them.... uneasy.
“In 2025, SpaceX generated $18.7 billion in revenue, with its Starlink satellite internet service accounting for $11.39 billion, or 61% of total sales.”
Tesla had higher revenue number in at the start of 2019, when it had a market cap of ~0.06 trillion. Further Tesla was highly volatile in 2021 despite huge earnings growth with some people bank when it fell from 1.2T to 0.34T before recovering.
> It’s not like SpaceX is going to tank in the next 3 months and they’ll be left holding the bag.
A stock's value can disappear in a matter of days to a degree it leads to a complete collapse. It has happened before, see Enron or Wirecard.
> It’s not like it wasn’t going to end up in every index in a year.
Sure, but it's still not wise to let unripe stocks into most American and RoW retirement funds. There's a reason why many complex software projects keep some sort of "staging" tree, and the stock markets should do so as well.
An interesting variant of "privatise the profits, socialise the losses" played wholly in the private sector capital investment space. "When you're rich they let you" is big in this because a functional board of a company about to be vested with a massive debt overhang from a serial offender (X and xAI) would surely have said "could we NOT" about this and the whole model including A and B class voting shares suggests this is a control issue: given proper control models none of this could happen.
Q: What is the purpose of modifying the liquidity and seasoning requirements? Could this change result in the inclusion
of illiquid securities in the index?
A: Most indexes require a liquidity threshold for new constituents, often as a minimum share count or average daily trading value.
For the Nasdaq-100®, securities must have a three-month average daily traded value of at least $5 million. Since only very large
companies – typically with full market capitalizations over $100 billion as of March 2026 – would have qualified for fast entry, they
are expected to easily and quickly meet this requirement. However, an average daily traded value of at least $5 million from the
time of listing will still be required for fast entry candidates.
Many indexes have included seasoning requirements to ensure that traditional IPOs undergo price discovery and stabilization
before being included. These requirements were originally intended to prevent small or little-known companies from entering too
soon. However, there is now a trend toward IPOs being larger and more mature than in the past. Companies expected to meet the
fast entry threshold are likely to be among the world’s most significant and well-known firms. High investor interest and trading
volumes should accelerate price discovery, further supporting a shorter seasoning period. Note that the seasoning period for
companies outside of the Top 40 remains at three months.
Several indexes have changed not just Nasdaq, but it’s one more people have heard about.
Sure but it’s not the only one. Add in SPY, QQQ, and IWM Force Index Funds and the percentage of Americans buying SpaceX early due to rule changes looks bad.
For others like qqq it has no bearing to be frank. It follows the nasdaq 100. Maybe an argument that the extra few months would have allowed more price discovery but I am not so sure.
What exactly can an individual do? For many their accounts have limited fund choices and if you don't want to pay high ER for fund manager's pedicures then you end up on an index, which (S&P500 excluded) have now bent the knee. Mine are on russel indexes so I have no choice.
Short spacex is the only answer I've heard but I'm wise enough to know I don't have the mentality for derivatives.
The vast majority of American employees are not maxing out every tax advantaged retirement account instrument, and putting everything in a 401(k) past the employer match level is not advisable exactly because of the limited investment choices.
except if you self-employed. I have maxed the shit out of my 401k (i401k, self-managed) and after 3 decade career have more saved than I can spend in 8 lifetimes
Shorting SpaceX when you own the same amount of SpaceX in an ETF doesn't require any derivatives and is a fairly safe play. The amount of interest you have to pay will vary a little bit, but it should cost a very small amount net.
The biggest issues are the effort and tax implications of balancing the SpaceX short.
The recent AI craze is really just LLMs. I feel like finance was likely already the most AI-adopted industry without LLMs and their impact the last few years may have taken them from “80 to 100” where most industries are going “10 to 50.” Go back to 2022 for a moment and I think this article is identical.
Unfortunately most people won't do that, either from ignorance or fear of missing out. Sometime in the next few years the chickens are going to come home to roost on the infinibubble, and I'm not really sure if the US financial system will weather it.
This isn't investment advice etc etc but there are many options that can capture large sections of the stock market without being exposed to the tech bubble (assuming there is one).
Many people say you should stay invested in the SP500 anyway and I won't argue against that. But funds like VTV, DGRO, VIG, SCHD etc don't have the same level of exposure to tech, as well as international funds like VEA. Many 401ks allow you to invest in them through brokerage "link" options. Of course, do your research or talk to a pro before considering these.