What $1,088 Invested in SpaceX Could Be Worth by 2030

Eight dollars.

That's how much richer you'd be today if you'd bought eight shares of Elon Musk's Space Exploration Technologies (NASDAQ: SPCX), or SpaceX, at its IPO price of $135 per share. Because even after soaring to over $225 a share and tumbling to under $105 per share, the stock is now trading at $136, just $1 more than its IPO price. If you'd bought eight shares, you'd have made $8 in just over three months.

But if you missed the IPO, you might be wondering whether now's a good time to buy those eight shares. Right now, they'd cost a total of about $1,088.

Here's what $1,088 of SpaceX stock could be worth by 2030.

Nobody can agree on what SpaceX is worth right now

On Thursday, analyst Markus Leistner of Germany's DZ Bank initiated coverage of SpaceX, and he didn't like what he saw.

While Leistner thinks SpaceX has a compelling market opportunity ahead, he cheekily flagged the rocket and satellite company's "crash risk in the valuation orbit." Specifically, he's skeptical of the company's estimate that its market opportunity is worth more than $28 trillion, which he believes is far too optimistic.

Instead, Leistner assigned SpaceX a $100-per-share valuation, suggesting that eight shares should be worth $800 instead of $1,088. That number prices in the substantial risk that SpaceX's long-term market opportunities won't justify the company's massive upfront capital expenditures.

But what if SpaceX manages to succeed beyond anyone's wildest expectations? What could the eight shares be worth then?

The mega-bull and mega-bear cases for SpaceX

According to Barron's, the bull case for SpaceX is that the company roughly doubles its sales every year, from $44 billion this year to more than $760 billion in 2030. But that type of astronomical growth would require SpaceX to deploy about $800 billion in capital spending between now and 2030. That would probably require SpaceX to take on hundreds of billions of dollars in debt and issue more stock, diluting current shareholder value.

Still, analysts at Oppenheimer have assigned a $250-per-share valuation to SpaceX stock, citing its vertically integrated AI stack and its potential to make additional acquisitions. A $250 share price would make eight SpaceX shares worth a nice, round $2,000.

Of course, if SpaceX starts posting triple-digit revenue growth and snapping up valuable AI companies, it's likely investors will bid up shares well beyond what Oppenheimer analysts consider a fair value, meaning those eight shares could be worth $2,500 or more.

Of course, both of these scenarios could be wrong. My own analysis suggests SpaceX should be valued more like communications company T-Mobile US, at about $200 billion or $250 billion, which would roughly equate to $38 per share, or $300 for eight shares. However, even under this extremely bearish scenario, the stock is likely to remain overvalued, so a $70 share price ($560 for eight shares) is the absolute minimum I'd expect to see.

Your $1,088 investment in SpaceX today will likely be worth somewhere between $560 and $2,500 by 2030. That wide variation in price points to volatility for the next few years.

John Bromels has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool recommends T-Mobile US. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.