SpaceX's Biggest Unlock Is Days Away. Do You Have a Plan?
Picture earnings night. SpaceX has just reported its third-quarter results, the stock is jumping around after hours, your phone won't stop buzzing, and in two trading days you'll be allowed to sell a big chunk of the shares you've been staring at since June.
What do you do?
If your gut says "sell everything" or "sell nothing," keep reading. Those are the two answers most likely to hurt you.
Same engineers, different decisions
Imagine two engineers who joined SpaceX the same year. After the IPO, each has about $1 million in stock.
Jake is all in. He's watched the company do things nobody thought possible, and he isn't selling a share. The stock peaked in June, and he figures it'll get back there.
Ryan is spooked. Every headline about lockups and share supply makes him want to cash out entirely and be done with it.
Both think they're being smart. Both are about to make the same mistake: treating a decision with a hundred possible answers like it only has two.
How it goes wrong
Run it forward.
Say the stock drops 35% by spring. Jake's $1 million is now $650,000. But his RSUs were taxed as wages when they settled, and his company withheld only 22% for federal tax. He's in the 35% bracket, so he owes roughly $130,000 more in April. He sells near the bottom to pay it. That's the worst way to sell stock: not because you chose to, but because you had to.
Now say the stock doubles. Ryan sold everything at the unlock. His coworkers are buying houses with cash, and he's refreshing a ticker he no longer owns, doing math he can't stop doing.
Different outcomes, same root problem. Each of them bet everything on being right.
Sell some, keep some
There's a third option, and it isn't a compromise. It's a plan. Give your shares jobs:
Pay the bill you know is coming: sell enough to cover April's taxes, plus a cushion.
Buy the thing that changes your life: a down payment, a paid-off mortgage, two years of freedom. Sell for that.
Keep the bet: hold the rest, because you believe in the company and want to be there if it runs.
With $1 million, that might mean selling $150,000 for taxes and $200,000 for a goal, and keeping $650,000.
Stock doubles? You still have $1.3 million in SpaceX, plus the house. Stock falls 40%? Your taxes are paid, your goal is funded, and you still own a meaningful stake. Neither outcome wrecks you. That's the whole point.
This isn't a one-night decision
A few details change the math. Shares held less than a year since settlement get short-term rates. Exercising non-qualified options creates ordinary income with the same withholding gap. And your trading window may not open the moment the lockup does.
SpaceX reports on October 20, but the unlocks don't stop there. Roughly 800 million more shares free up around December 8, and Elon Musk's own shares stay locked until around June 2027. Set your split while you're calm, then revisit it at each unlock as the price and your life change.
Whether you're reading this before earnings or after the first wave has passed, there's still time to build a plan. If you'd like a second set of eyes on your numbers, book a call here or find a time that works for you below:
About the author:
I'm Michael Walstedt, a fee-only wealth advisor at Reliant Wealth Advisory in Hoboken, NJ. I work with tech employees on equity compensation, IPOs, and concentrated stock decisions.
This article is for educational purposes only and is not tax, legal, or investment advice. Lockup dates and share counts are based on public reports of SpaceX's IPO prospectus and may change. Talk to a qualified tax professional about your situation.
