SpaceX held its ground better than any rival this week, with SPCX falling just 0.4% while the broader space sector sold off sharply.
RKLB declined 5%, FLY lost 6%, PL dropped 7%, ASTS shed 8%, and RDW slid 9% over the same period.
Starship Flight 14 reached orbit on Monday, successfully deploying 26 Starlink V3 satellites that Elon Musk confirmed were “deployed and operating nominally.”
An upper-stage engine shutdown cut the planned 10-hour mission to roughly three hours, keeping reusability milestones firmly on investors’ radar screens.
SpaceX also put itself on track for three orbital launches in approximately 13 hours, including NASA’s Crew-13 Dragon Grace mission, Transporter-18, and Falcon Heavy’s NROL-97.
Musk said he was “cautiously optimistic” SpaceX could run its version of Nvidia’s VR72 system near 250 kilowatts of average power, with peaks roughly 10% higher.
“This is a big deal if it pans out and would apply to our ground-based systems too,” Musk said, crediting close collaboration with Nvidia on the project.
Mach33 founder Aaron Burnett estimated the target was 10% to 25% above typical third-party reported averages, adding, “If anyone can pull it off it’s the joint Nvidia and SpaceX teams.”
Rocket Lab (RKLB) landed its largest-ever commercial Electron agreement, adding 20 Synspective launches scheduled from 2028 through 2031, lifting total bookings to 47 and pushing the launch backlog above 100 missions.
ARK purchased 233,482 RKLB shares on Thursday worth approximately $16.5 million, while Citi initiated coverage with a Buy rating and a $105 price target, calling the company a “core holding for space bulls.”
AST SpaceMobile (ASTS) shipped BlueBirds 14, 15, and 16 to Cape Canaveral, and CEO Abel Avellan met FCC Chairman Brendan Carr to seek additional spectrum for direct-to-device service.
AT&T, T-Mobile, and Verizon formalized a technology-neutral satellite joint venture, with AT&T CEO John Stankey previously saying the carrier would “continue on that path” with AST.
Fresh filings identified Wayne Thorsen as executive vice president and chief commercial officer, disclosing a 200,000-RSU grant vesting over three years worth approximately $11.4 million at Thursday’s close.
Planet Labs (PL) launched its Google Project Suncatcher prototype aboard Transporter-18 alongside Tanager-2 and 18 SuperDoves, with Suncatcher designed to test how Google’s TPUs withstand orbital radiation and heat.
Redwire (RDW) signed an MOU with Sophia Space to explore orbital computing, combining Sophia’s TILE architecture with Redwire’s power, cooling, and spacecraft capabilities.
Firefly (FLY) signed a commercial agreement to carry Starcloud’s computing payload aboard Elytra on a lunar mission targeted no earlier than 2028, with executive Ray Allensworth describing “how data can be captured, processed, and delivered from lunar orbit.”
Retail enthusiasm on Stocktwits cooled sharply for RDW and FLY, with RDW sentiment swinging from “extremely bullish” to “bearish” and FLY slipping from “extremely bullish” to “neutral.”
SPCX sentiment shifted to “bullish” from “bearish” a week earlier, while ASTS turned “bullish” from “bearish,” offering some optimism even as prices fell across the space sector.
