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Google's $900 Million SpaceX Bet Is Now Worth $69 Billion. It Added Millions More Shares

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Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOGL) increased its stake in Elon Musk‘s SpaceX (NASDAQ:SPCX) by nearly 4 million shares last quarter, adding to a holding now worth approximately $69 billion that began with a $900 million investment in 2015.

Google’s parent company held approximately 555 million SpaceX shares at the end of September, up from 551.2 million three months earlier, Reuters reported Friday.

At Thursday’s closing price of $123.62, the stake was worth $68.6 billion.

Google invested $900 million in January 2015 as part of a $1 billion funding round alongside Fidelity, backing SpaceX’s ambitions in reusable rockets and satellite communications.

Days earlier, Musk had described his vision for a global satellite network as “like rebuilding the Internet, in space.”

Google Adds Shares as SpaceX Tumbles

SpaceX shares have plunged from $170.86 at the end of June to $123.62 at Thursday’s close, wiping approximately $25.6 billion off the market value of Google’s holding.

About $10.5 billion of that decline came during the third quarter, when Alphabet increased its share count by 3.8 million. The filing does not reveal precisely when or how it acquired those shares.

The losses have already hit Alphabet’s earnings.

Chief Financial Officer Anat Ashkenazi said last month that unrealized SpaceX losses were primarily responsible for $8.2 billion in negative other income during the third quarter.

The remaining $15.1 billion decline has come since September 30, potentially setting up another substantial unrealized loss in the fourth quarter if SpaceX finishes the year near Thursday’s level.

Every $10 move in SpaceX shares changes the estimated value of Google’s holding by approximately $5.5 billion.

Google Is Now Paying SpaceX Billions

In June, Google agreed to pay SpaceX $920 million a month for access to approximately 110,000 Nvidia GPUs, which it called temporary capacity to meet demand for its Gemini Enterprise AI platform.

Demand had been “even higher than we expected,” a Google spokesperson said. Either company can terminate the agreement with 90 days’ notice after Dec. 31.

And Google isn’t the only company looking for computing power.

Musk said on SpaceX’s third-quarter earnings call that it was “hounded relentlessly by every hyperscaler” seeking capacity. He claimed the company could rent out several times more than it currently supplies.

Google’s entire 2015 investment in SpaceX would no longer cover a single month of its computing bill.

Image: Shutterstock

Read Also: Elon Musk Says Starship Needs Just 6–8 Refueling Launches to Reach Moon, NASA Safety Adviser Cites 22

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