According to Evercore ISI, SpaceX’s IPO is about to start the next phase of the bull market. Equity strategist Julien Emanuel predicts that the rocket maker’s debut on Friday could push the S&P 500 index to $9,000 in his bullish case, or more than 20% above last week’s closing price of $7,431.46. His base case of 7,750 would imply an increase of just 4% from current levels. Emanuel compared SpaceX’s early excitement to the Netscape IPO in 1995, which ushered in an era of optimism in the internet world before the bubble finally burst in 2000. He expects SpaceX, along with upcoming big debuts from Anthropic and OpenAI, to be a similar psychological tipping point for the market. “Today’s SPCX IPO could trigger the next phase of ‘big FOMO’ and the bull market, just like Netscape did 30 years ago,” Emanuel said. “Early enthusiasm is positive for a breakthrough IPO.” SPCX 1D Mountain SpaceX, 1st Of course, there are also concerns that the IPO could signal an impending market high. And Emanuel said the S&P 500’s returns tend to be below average as the cycle matures. However, the lack of meaningful recession signals and the fact that the rise in yields remains subdued suggests that the peak may be some time away. The amount of liquidity remaining on the sidelines is another reason the strategist is optimistic. With a record $7.9 trillion in money market funds, there’s plenty of runway for SpaceX and the broader market to rise further if investors who had been taking a wait-and-see approach to IPOs suddenly decide to jump in, strategists said. And Emanuel said IPO activity has been relatively subdued. While the valuations and capital raises of SpaceX, Anthropic, and OpenAI have raised eyebrows, their annual IPO values are actually tame compared to history. The issue price is currently expected to be 0.5% of the S&P 500’s market capitalization. Meanwhile, annual IPO trading volume before the market’s major peaks over the past 30 years peaked at 0.75% in 1999, 0.91% in 2007, and 0.88% in 2021. “On the other hand, it’s not surprising that blockbuster technology IPOs in 2026 will be compared to 1999 and 2021,” Emanuel wrote. “Meanwhile, the lack of relative volume or deal count metrics associated with past IPO frenzy, and the record $7.9 trillion in money market cash, suggest the cycle peak may be further down the road.”
