Investor's Corner
Auto experts share insights on Tesla Model Y wiring and how Maxwell’s supercapacitors can improve batteries
There is no doubt that the adoption of electric vehicles is already underway. Key auto markets such as China and Europe have adopted aggressive goals for a zero-emissions future, and electric cars continue to improve with every iteration. Yet, inasmuch as the EV segment has grown since the early days of the original Tesla Roadster, the evolution of electric cars is only just beginning. Over the years, there will be more breakthroughs for all-electric propulsion, and automakers that refuse to acknowledge this will probably find themselves in dire straits.
These, as well as the upcoming EV technologies that are set to make a debut within the next few years, was the focus of an extensive interview with Sandy Munro and Mark Ellis from Munro and Associates. Conducted by Tesla owner-enthusiast Sean Mitchell of All Things EV, the interview touched on several topics, including the breakthroughs that will likely be seen in the Model Y crossover, the potential of Maxwell’s supercapacitors for electric vehicles, and what traditional automakers can do to be more competitive in the emerging EV market.
Munro, who has extensive experience with the early-build Model 3 and several other vehicles like the BMW i3 and the Jaguar I-PACE, noted that the EV he is most excited about is the Model Y. Munro noted that the Y will be an interesting EV because it would likely show just how much Tesla learned from the Model 3 and its challenging ramp. The teardown expert also stated that he is immensely interested to see just what Tesla did to reduce the wiring of the Model Y to 100 meters from 1.5 km in the Model 3.
One thing that Munro and Ellis emphasized in the interview was that when it comes to electric cars, battery technology is key. Munro noted that at this point, any company that aims to push EV batteries further would best be advised to take on emerging technologies such as supercapacitors, which could have great implications for electric car technology. This is where Tesla’s acquisition of Maxwell Technologies could come into play. Maxwell, after all, is primarily noted for two of its innovations: dry electrode batteries and supercapacitors.
Both of these have the potential to improve Tesla’s electric cars significantly. “The dry battery technology is game-changing if it comes to pass and they can put it in a car,” Ellis said while discussing Maxwell’s potential for Tesla. The veteran also provided a scenario where Maxwell’s supercapacitors could play a part in the operation of an EV.
“One of the issues with the battery is, when I step on the throttle hard, I’m pulling a lot of energy from the battery. And then, when I brake hard, I’m pulling a lot of energy out of the regen, but the batteries can’t take it fast enough. The batteries get really stressed when you try to pull it up too much, so if I had supercapacitors that I could use as a cushion; so when I need energy quickly, (I can) pull it from the supercapacitors and then fill the supercapacitors back up with the battery slowly; and then when I brake, I can capture more of that regen energy and do the supercapacitors faster. I think that just makes logical sense, because now all of a sudden I’ve got a sponge in front of my main energy source and I’m not stressing (the battery) so much,” Ellis said.
As for the underwhelming range from competing EVs such as the Audi e-tron and the Jaguar I-PACE, Munro noted that this is simply because of their lack of vertical integration. “(It’s) because they’re buying them from somebody else,” the teardown expert mused. When asked if a good way for traditional automakers to be more competitive in the EV market is to start developing their own battery tech, Ellis warns that adopting such a strategy will likely take a long time.
“That would be a 10-year project. There are going to be leaders in the battery industry, and a lot of the electric chemistries are under patent. They’re gonna have to be licensed. Whoever comes out on top is probably going to win. But just due to the sheer volume of batteries that are going to be needed in the next five years, you basically have three or four battery (cell) companies that are out there. You got Panasonic, you got Samsung, you got LG, and you’ve CATL from China. Those are the big four. Everybody else is going to find a niche in there,” Elli said.
With companies such as Tesla already making headway into the mass market with vehicles like the Model 3 and the upcoming Model Y, it would be easy to perceive the EV segment as having sufficiently matured. It should be noted that this is not the case, as EVs, including Tesla’s electric vehicles like the 370-mile Model S Long Range or the bang-for-the-buck Model 3 Standard Range Plus, still have far more to improve in the years to come. And it is exactly these improvements that make the electric car market just so compelling.
Watch Sean Mitchell’s extensive sit-down interview with Sandy Munro and Mark Ellis in the video below.
SpaceX announced today that it commenced its first-ever public bond offering, marking a significant step in the newly public company’s capital markets strategy.
The company announced an offering of senior unsecured notes expected to raise at least $20 billion.
The move comes just a short time after SpaceX completed one of the largest initial public offerings in history. In mid-June, the company priced shares at $135 and raised more than $85 billion, propelling founder Elon Musk’s net worth past the trillion-dollar mark and giving the firm substantial liquidity.
🚨 SpaceX has announced its inaugural offering of senior unsecured notes.
The net proceeds will be used to repay outstanding loans under its bridge loan facility in full.
This inaugural debt offering represents a financing milestone for SpaceX, which previously depended… pic.twitter.com/pcOZuVbTRv
— TESLARATI (@Teslarati) June 22, 2026
According to the company’s SEC filing, the net proceeds from the notes will be used primarily to repay in full the outstanding borrowings under its existing bridge loan facility, cover related fees and expenses, and fund general corporate purposes. The offering is being conducted under Rule 144A, as well as Regulation S, targeting qualified institutional buyers and non-U.S. investors. Notes will be unsecured obligations ranking equally with other unsubordinated debt.
The $20 billion bridge loan was used to refinance approximately $17.5 billion in higher-cost “junk” debt tied to X and xAI. SpaceX had merged with xAI in February 2026 in an all-stock deal. The bridge facility, which matures in September 2027, had represented the bulk of SpaceX’s long-term debt.
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In connection with the bond launch, SpaceX disclosed it held approximately $100.8 billion in cash and cash equivalents as of June 19. Investor calls began on the announcement date, with pricing and launch expected shortly thereafter. Rating agencies have assigned investment-grade ratings to the proposed bonds, reflecting confidence in SpaceX’s dominant position in commercial launches and the growth trajectory of its Starlink internet offering.
The debt raise also allows SpaceX to optimize its balance sheet by replacing short-term, higher-cost bridge financing with longer-date, lower-cost fixed-income securities. This provides greater financial flexibility to support capital-intensive initiatives, including the development of Starship, the expansion of the Starlink constellation, and the integration of AI capabilities following the xAI combination.
SpaceX shares (NASDAQ: SPCX) fell sharply on the news, dropping over 16 percent overall on the market on Monday. The stock had surged initially after debuting but pulled back amid profit-taking and broader market dynamics.
Overall, the bond offering underscores SpaceX’s transition to a mature public company with access to diverse funding sources. It positions the firm to pursue its long-term vision of multiplanetary expansion and AI infrastructure, while maintaining a disciplined approach to its capital structure in a high-growth but capital-heavy industry.
Investor's Corner
SpaceX is launching a secret spacecraft that could change how things are made in space
SpaceX’s secret disk-shaped Starfall capsule is targeting a market no reentry vehicle has cracked.
SpaceX is targeting Tuesday, June 23 for the first flight of Starfall, a reentry capsule the company has developed almost entirely in private. The Falcon 9 launch window opens at 6:43 a.m. ET from Space Launch Complex 40 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station, with a backup window available the same time on June 24. SpaceX has made no public announcement about the vehicle, only providing launch details. Everything known about it has come through FAA and FCC regulatory filings.
What makes Starfall different starts with its shape. Rather than the traditional cone used by Dragon and every other cargo return capsule in operation, Starfall is a flat disk that measures roughly  10.2 feet (3.1 meters) wide and just 2.5 feet (0.75 meters) tall, and weighing 4,630 pounds (2,100 kg) and capable of returning up to 2,200 pounds (1,000 kilograms) of payload from orbit. The disk geometry maximizes structural efficiency and payload volume relative to mass, and the heat shield mechanically jettisons just before splashdown, allowing recovery teams to retrieve both the capsule and the shield separately from the Pacific Ocean.
The difference with Starfall from existing competitors, such as Varda Space Industries, which has largely built the orbital manufacturing market and returns heavy payloads per flight is that Starfall’s specification is roughly 30 times more per mission, and is designed to be mass-produced and launched on either Falcon 9 or Starship. That combination of volume and launch access is something no standalone startup can replicate, and it puts SpaceX in direct competition with the companies that currently pay it to reach orbit.
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The intended market is orbital manufacturing: pharmaceuticals, protein crystals, semiconductors, and advanced optical fiber that physically cannot be produced in the presence of gravity. FAA documents describe Starfall’s long-term purpose as building a “self-sustaining commercial in-space manufacturing market” and as a potential successor to the industrial capabilities of the International Space Station, which is set to retire in the late 2020s. Military rapid global cargo delivery is a parallel application under active discussion with the Pentagon.
The reason some industries seek manufacturing in space comes down to gravity. On Earth, gravity causes materials to settle, separate, and deform during production. In microgravity, those constraints disappear.
SpaceX’s already controls launch access, which means it currently functions as the landlord for every competitor in the orbital manufacturing return space. Starfall converts that landlord position into vertical ownership, and it would no longer just carry other companies’ capsules to orbit, but rather operate the capsule, own the return logistics, and capture the service revenue directly. Viewed alongside Starlink, Colossus, and the xAI merger, Starfall fits a consistent pattern: SpaceX identifying infrastructure layers that others depend on and moving to own them outright. Orbital manufacturing return is the next layer on that list.
If Tuesday’s reentry, parachute sequence, and recovery demonstration goes as planned, the second FAA-approved test flight follows. A successful pair of demos would position SpaceX to begin offering Starfall as a commercial service, likely first to pharmaceutical and materials science customers before scaling toward the military and broader manufacturing segments.
Elon Musk
Elon Musk just upped his Tesla stake further fueling SpaceX merger conversation
Elon Musk just collected a $116 billion Tesla payday and the timing is eye-opening
Elon Musk quietly collected one of the largest single-transaction paydays in corporate history on Monday. A Form 4 filed with the SEC on June 17, 2026 disclosed that Musk exercised 303,960,630 Tesla stock options from his 2018 compensation package, with the transaction dated June 16. No shares were sold on the open market.
The numbers are straightforward but striking. Musk exercised the options at a split-adjusted strike price of $23.34, with Tesla closing at $404.66 that day, putting the spread at $381.32 per share and generating roughly $115.9 billion in paper gains in a single transaction. To cover the exercise cost, Tesla withheld 17,531,857 shares through a net share settlement, meaning Musk paid nothing out of pocket.
For perspective, in 2018, Elon Musk’s award was originally approved by Tesla shareholders on March 21, 2018, and structured entirely around performance milestones that many analysts at the time called unreachable. Every tranche eventually vested. The original grant covered 20,264,042 shares at $350.02, which after Tesla’s 5-for-1 split in 2020 and 3-for-1 split in 2022 adjusted to 303,960,630 shares at $23.34. A Delaware court rescinded the award in January 2024, ruling the board was conflicted. As Teslarati reported, Tesla shareholders voted to ratify the package anyway in June 2024 by a wide margin. The Delaware Supreme Court reversed the decision in December 2025, finding full cancellation too extreme, and Tesla’s board signed an Implementation Agreement on April 21, 2026 to formally deliver the shares.
The Tesla and SpaceX merger everyone is talking about is quietly building
The timing and structure of the Form 4 filing carries more weight than a routine stock option exercise typically would. Musk exercised his 2018 Tesla award on June 16, a week into SpaceX completing its IPO and trading publicly, and giving SpaceX a public market valuation and share currency for the first time in the company’s history. A stock-for-stock merger between two companies requires the acquiring entity to have tradeable shares it can offer to the target’s shareholders, and SpaceX now has exactly that. At the same time, Musk just increased his direct Tesla voting power to approximately 20%, giving him greater influence over any shareholder vote that a merger would require. The restricted shares he received cannot be sold until 2033, which removes any near-term incentive to cash out and instead positions this stake as long-term structural collateral in a deal. Additionally, Musk’s two companies are already deeply intertwined through shared semiconductor fabrication at their joint TERAFAB facility in Austin, cross-company supply chain transactions, and Tesla’s $2 billion investment in xAI prior to the SpaceX-xAI merger.
Wedbush analyst Dan Ives has publicly placed the odds of a Tesla and SpaceX combination at 80% to 90% by early 2027. The Implementation Agreement that made Monday’s exercise possible was signed on April 21, 2026, roughly two months before the SpaceX IPO closed. That sequencing, building Musk’s Tesla ownership to its highest point ever immediately before SpaceX gains the public currency needed to acquire it, is either an extraordinary coincidence or a carefully staged foundation for the largest corporate merger in history.
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