Burton Malkiel, best known for his 1973 book, A Random Walk Down Wall Street, has some interesting remarks in the NYTimes for those who are wary of being stuck with a stake on SpaceX (and perhaps OpenAI and Anthropic as well) as a consequence of having index funds in their 401(k).
Given that so many millions of Americans are suddenly having SpaceX shares foisted upon them, I understand why some financial experts are criticizing the practice of index investing itself. Right now, just a handful of A.I.-related stocks represent almost half the value of the total stock market index. If A.I. stocks collapse, so will the worth of your index fund.
This is the paragraph I find particularly interesting:
Unlike prior initial public offerings, SpaceX shares are already so expensive there isn’t a lot of upside potential left. When Facebook, now Meta, went public in 2012 with a valuation of $100 billion, shareholders were able to benefit financially from its growth to a $1.5 trillion giant. Amazon went public with a generous (for 1997) valuation of $440 million, and shareholders profited as it grew into a $2.5 trillion behemoth. Not so SpaceX. Because it was owned by private investors for so long, much of the gain will immediately be handed off to its venture and private equity backers rather than preserved for new investors.
He goes on to point this as well:
Moreover, unlike other public companies, SpaceX is employing a dual class share structure that gives Elon Musk essentially complete control with no independent oversight. Public shareholders will, comparatively, have no voice in corporate decisions. Mr. Musk controls multiple related corporate enterprises, raising the possibility of conflicted transactions within the Musk ecosystem. Many investors will be uncomfortable giving him so much power and holding an index fund in which he has so large a share.
He then says:
These are all legitimate reasons to worry. But in my view, it would be a mistake to abandon an indexing strategy. Timing the market is impossible. Yes, the stock market is unusually concentrated today, and it is likely to get even more so over the next period with Anthropic and OpenAI looking to go public soon.
You can read the rest of the article, if you wish. But it's that paragraph about upside potential that caught my attention.
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