It’s like Christmas for two of Wall Street’s biggest banks.
The headquarters of Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley decked their halls with SpaceX gear on Wednesday ahead of the rocket maker’s blockbuster IPO — a show of banker enthusiasm for what could be the largest market debut in history.
Morgan Stanley draped its lobby entrance gates with SpaceX logos and its lobby wall with a giant mural of Mars, a nod to SpaceX’s lofty ambitions. Goldman Sachs plastered its lobby walls with renderings of Starship, SpaceX’s reusable rocket. It also touted its role as “lead left” bookrunner for the IPO.
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SpaceX is seeking to raise $75 billion in the offering, according to its SEC filing, a haul that would dwarf Aramco’s 2019 record-setting IPO. The deal would value Elon Musk’s space company at over $1.75 trillion, instantly making it one of the most valuable public companies in the world.
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Scoring SpaceX’s business for its IPO is a mark of prestige for Goldman and Morgan Stanley, as well as a likely windfall. The banks are the lead underwriters on the offering, with Goldman scoring the lead-left spot in the S-1 IPO filing. Both banks have a front-row seat to one of the most coveted mandates on Wall Street — and the opportunity to collect major fees and deepen ties with Musk’s business empire.
The lobby displays show just how big a moment this is for the banks. The SpaceX IPO is a major market event, a Musk spectacle, and a test of investor appetite for one of Silicon Valley’s most ambitious private companies.
Plus, for the banks leading the IPO charge, it’s a good time to bask in the glow of bragging rights.
