Caroline Hepker

At that price, SpaceX is worth about $1.77 trillion.

trillion, making it one of the world's most valuable public companies.

Including employee stock awards and options, the valuation rises to roughly $1.8 trillion.

Dan Ives is Global Head of Technology Research at Wedbush Securities.

So that was Dan Ives there, AI big tech bull that he is.

As Elon Musk's fan base played a crucial component in this deal, sources tell us that retail investors alone have placed more than $100 billion worth of orders, far exceeding the 20% of shares reserved for them.

Well, SpaceX will begin trading on NASDAQ later today under the ticket SPCX.

However, the company will not be eligible for inclusion in the S&P 500 for at least a year.

It would also need to meet the index's requirements for profitability and 10% public share ownership.

Currently, less than 5% of SpaceX's shares are available for public trading, and the company posted a loss of nearly $4.2 billion in the first quarter.

Peter Singlehurst heads the private company's team at Bailey Gifford.

Peter Singlehurst speaking there with a small number of firms set to net tens of billion dollars in returns from the listing in one of the most significant windfalls in venture capital history.

SpaceX is the first of three major IPOs expected to capitalise on investors' appetite for artificial intelligence.

Anthropic and OpenAI are also expected to go public this year and they could each seek valuations of more than a trillion dollars.

As well as raising tens of billions of dollars for the company, the listing of SpaceX makes Elon Musk a near trillionaire.

It's a status that he could hit once the stock starts trading later today, as Bloomberg's Tom McKenzie reports now.

Wow, isn't that an extraordinary story around SpaceX?

And actually, if you look at the early indications, SpaceX shares indicated higher by more than 35% when that debut begins on the NASDAQ today.

Okay, let's turn our attention now to the UK, where Defence Secretary John Healey has resigned from Keir Starmer's government, dramatically weakening the Prime Minister's authority.

Healy was joined by junior defence minister Al Cairns and two ministerial aides in stepping down in a row over how to fund increased defence spending for Britain.