SpaceX
Yes, we deserve to colonize Mars and keep our “light of consciousness”
Elon Musk has spoken previously about having a duty to maintain the “light of consciousness” of humanity as the main rationale for multi-planetary habitation, or why we should colonize Mars specifically. It’s a pretty simple concept, really. Eventually the Earth will no longer be able to host human life as we know it, suffering from some sort of malady which will wipe out our species. Pick your poison: Asteroid attack, the Sun’s Earth-engulfing expansion, or even climate change. Something will bring us down, someday, unless we are proactive in our approach to survival.
Unfortunately, facts are fun things that don’t always help with solving problems (and annoyingly so), but it seems there’s also a crowd that doesn’t disagree with the facts and instead questions whether we even “deserve” to respond to them altogether.
In her recent TechCrunch article titled “The Ethics of Colonizing Mars”, Shivika Sinha cited Elon Musk, NASA, and the progress being made towards Mars and then asked the question, “Do humans deserve to be multi-planetary?”
Her argument framed capitalism and consumerism as co-conspirators of our modern societal woes, and her conclusion was that we need to change our “parasitic” ways before exporting them to other planets in the universe. The whole argument was really just the human-shaming version of “fix Earth first”, a common objection to deep space colonization.
Interplanetary Transport System by SpaceX
As a perfect, imperfect example of one of billions of humans on this planet, I will quite willingly admit that we are not a perfect species; however, I don’t understand why there’s so much guilt felt for merely existing in certain sects of society. It’s your choice whether to like who you are, but remember that you cannot live without living. You cannot stop pursuing the long-term survival of the species simply because you do not approve of its current state. Why aspire to be more if we are telling ourselves we are not even good enough to be such?
Behavior takes time to adjust. We do not live in a controlled, variable-limited scientific model society wherein our survival mechanisms are neatly categorized into “good” vs. “bad” choices. And more still, since when did survival become a question of worth? Many of humanity’s greatest accomplishments in societal evolution have been those which expand the ability to survive. Indeed, a huge part of compassion in our value system is the belief that everyone has the right to a life that is so much more than simply surviving. Given the consequences of not eventually going to colonize another planet, how does the logic compute that our species is suddenly not worthy of existence whatsoever?
Sinha points to the flaws in our system which are in contradiction with the natural world, destroying it specifically, yet she doesn’t credit the source of the flaws to begin with: That same natural world. We were born in it, raised in it, and learned to survive based on those experiences. Somewhere along the line, we developed consciousness as a result of that process of surviving. We didn’t suddenly arrive on a beautifully balanced Earth ecosystem and begin sucking resources to feed our ravenous appetites. We fought hard to get here, and as an evolved species of this planet, we have the right to fight to continue to survive – just as every other living creature on Earth has done.
But that’s not the line of discussion I wanted to flesh out here.
Instead, I’d like to suggest that multi-planetary habitation is actually quite compatible with Sinha’s (and others like her) perspective because colonization is more than just a survival plan: It’s a tool for evolving our consciousness towards a value system which includes “conscious consumerism” by default.
We evolved with the resources available in our Earth environment, and we’ve often taken them for granted because they were always there and available to us. When we take our species to colonize Mars, we will be doing just the opposite by transforming its environment to provide resources we need to survive. The very act of creating an environment fit for our survival will transform us into hyper-aware custodians. Every resource will be valued right down to the tiniest amounts measurable because even the most minute amounts will be important. Every action we take will have reactions that we must carefully calculate if we hope to survive.
Taking the human race into deep space is so much more than “exporting” our consumerism once we’ve outgrown its birth place. It’s evolving who we are, increasing our awareness, and forcing us to understand the environments we will depend on and cannot risk taking for granted. We will be conscious of every choice we make as a matter of survival, and those lessons we learn in the early days of exploration will set the stage for the next phase of human colonization.
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In the end, I think we’re all on the same page as far as long-term “colonize Mars” goals. The difference is simply in perspective. Taking our species to places like Mars isn’t an act based on some sort of contrived selfishness. It’s answering something we’ve had calling to us since the beginning of time: The stars. We came from them, and it’s to be expected that eventually we will want to return. Mars is the next step.
Onwards.
SpaceX’s massive investment in AI will make it a big winner, Argus Research said after the company’s successful earnings call last week.
The firm also upgraded shares to a Buy from Hold and set a $160 price target.
SpaceX (NASDAQ: SPCX) is currently recovering from its heavy AI infrastructure investments, as it spent nearly $16 billion in Q2 alone. The company did this primarily by monetizing high-demand GPU compute capacity at a much faster pace than traditional data center economics would suggest.
Company CFO Bret Johnsen said that SpaceX would be able to pay back anything on new deployments within a year.
There are plenty of ways the company can do this:
Leasing excess compute capacity through contracts
SpaceX has already built Colossus and Colossus II, largely for its own model training. However, much of that capacity is already rented out to third parties. It already has major deals with Anthropic, Google, and Reflection AI. These partnerships are adding billions per month to SpaceX’s spreadsheet.
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High utilization driven by industry-wide scarcity
The demand for advanced AI training and inference capacity continues to exceed what is available for use. SpaceX can fill new racks quickly after they come online, so the capital deployed converts into revenue with minimal idle time.
Additionally, management and outside observers have described the new compute capital as behaving more like a cost-of-goods-sold than traditional multi-year capex, especially because of this rapid monetization pattern.
Capacity has already scaled from ~0.4 GW a year to 1.4 GW annually by the end of Q2. There are targets of more than 2 GW by year-end.
High incremental margins on the rental business once capacity is online
GPU cloud providers often operate at strong gross margins. SpaceX can monetize capacity that was already partially built or can be added efficiently. This means that incremental EBITDA margins on the rental revenue are usually high. This accelerates cash recovery relative to the gross capital outlay.
Parallel monetization of its own AI software and applications
Beyond pure infrastructure rental, SpaceX also generates revenue from Grok through subscriptions and usage, from X through ads, data, and other related services, enterprise APIs, and the planned integration of the Cursor coding tools acquisition.
These application layers ride on the same compute infrastructure and provide additional high-margin streams that could offset build-out costs. AI-segment revenue overall rose sharply to about $2.6 billion in Q2, according to Motley Fool. This was driven primarily by the infrastructure contracts, but the software side is also partially responsible.
Efficient, large-scale deployment and vertical integration advantages
SpaceX has emphasized the rapid construction of power and cooling infrastructure and favorable cost-per-megawatt economics relative to industry benchmarks in some disclosures.
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Combined with its ability to scale capacity aggressively and the fact that many contracts start generating revenue within months of capacity coming online, the effective payback compresses dramatically compared with more conventional multi-year data-center projects.
SpaceX’s dominant near-term recovery path will turn the AI clusters into a hyperscale-style compute rental business for other leading AI companies while still using a portion for internal models.
Elon Musk
Another Tesla SpaceX merger prediction by ARK Invest has Elon Musk talking
Elon Musk again denies a Tesla China split as new SpaceX merger speculation resurfaces quickly.
Elon Musk restated that Tesla has no plans to separate its China business from the rest of the company, responding to a new round of merger speculation from ARK Invest.
On the firm’s “Brainstorm” podcast, Cathie Wood’s team, including chief futurist Brett Winton and research director Nick Grous, argued a Tesla and SpaceX combination remains likely, with an announcement possible before the end of the year even if the deal itself would not close that quickly. Winton called Tesla’s Shanghai operations a “small ish wrinkle” for a merger rather than a real obstacle, since SpaceX’s national security work with the U.S. government sits uneasily next to Tesla’s manufacturing base in China.
Musk pushed back on the framing directly. “China is awesome. I strongly encourage people to visit,” he wrote on X. He also repeated language he first used in late July, when the Wall Street Journal reported that Tesla executives had been told to prepare for a possible spinoff, sale, or closure of the China business ahead of a SpaceX tie up. Musk called that report “absurdly fake news” at the time, adding that a separation had “never even come up in a discussion ever,” a line he echoed again this week.
The repeated denial has not settled the underlying question, because Shanghai’s role in Tesla’s business is exactly what makes a merger complicated. Gigafactory Shanghai still ships more than half of Tesla’s global deliveries and functions as the company’s main export hub for Europe and Asia. Teslarati previously reported on Musk’s initial denial, and the merger conversation itself has been building since SpaceX’s IPO gave it public shares to use as acquisition currency.
Wedbush’s Dan Ives has pegged the odds of a Tesla SpaceX merger at 80 to 90 percent by early 2027, and ARK’s prediction of a year end announcement adds another data point to that timeline, even as Musk keeps rejecting the specific mechanics reporters have described. Neither position rules out the other. Musk can deny a China spinoff was ever discussed while analysts still expect some form of combination to move forward, since ARK and Ives are both describing convergence at the corporate level, not necessarily the internal restructuring the Journal described in July.
For now, Tesla’s China business remains intact, and Musk’s comments this week make clear he has no interest in publicly walking that position back, no matter how often the merger question resurfaces.
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SpaceX stock did the opposite of what most of Wall Street expected this week, when the day designed to be its most dangerous turned into a rally, and the rally kept going.
Thursday marked the first major lockup expiration since SpaceX’s June IPO, making roughly 911.5 million insider held shares eligible to trade for the first time, more than doubling the company’s public float. Analysts and short sellers had spent weeks bracing for a flood of selling, especially after the stock fell 13 percent following its first earnings report as a public company on Tuesday. Instead, shares rose 6.1 percent Thursday to close at $114.92, and by Friday they were trading near $129, up more than another 12 percent on the day.
SpaceX shorts get warned by Musk ally, echoing Tesla’s early struggles
The setup made the outcome notable. Short interest had climbed to roughly 34 percent of the float heading into earnings, among the highest of any large cap stock, with about 95 percent of available shares to borrow already on loan. CEO Elon Musk warned short sellers twice in the weeks before the lockup, writing on X that “the survival probability of firms who maintain a significant short position in SpaceX over time is very low,” then following up on the morning of earnings with “I try to warn them, but they just double down.”
When the newly unlocked shares hit the market and the selloff never showed up, some of that short position appears to have started unwinding. TipRanks reported that options activity shifted toward bullish strategies like put selling and risk reversals following the rally, with roughly $600 million in options premium trading Thursday alone. Retail buyers also stepped in during the earnings dip, according to Vanda Research.
The fundamentals behind the stock have not changed much in a week. SpaceX’s revenue nearly doubled year over year to $7.8 billion, with Starlink subscribers doubling to 12 million and the company’s AI segment growing 247 percent. What spooked investors on Tuesday was the spending side. Capital expenditures jumped to more than $18 billion for the quarter, up from $2.8 billion a year earlier, with AI investment alone rising from $749 million to $15.8 billion. Wall Street remains split on whether that spending is building infrastructure SpaceX needs or outrunning what the business can currently support, a debate Teslarati has tracked since shares first came under pressure.
None of that resolves the bigger question hanging over the stock. Thursday’s release was only the first of nine staggered lockup tranches, with roughly $800 billion worth of additional shares scheduled to become eligible through October, and Musk’s own stake stays locked until next June. If this week is any indication, the market is treating that supply as something it can absorb rather than something to fear, at least for now.
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