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On 5 June, according to Wall Street Journal, many current and former members of the group SpaceX Employees hold shares in companies valued at millions of United States dollars. After SpaceX is listed, they will be able to cash these shares more easily.

J. André Lavoie, a former SpaceX engineer, moved to northern Italy five years ago and bought a hotel in Puntebba, where he has been renovating it.

For Rawoi, project funding is not a problem. He had acquired SpaceX shares many years ago, and he was expected to make a fortune when the company was on the market next week. According to the IPO distribution price in the SpaceX plan, the value of his shares would exceed $28 million.

In addition to investing in hotels, he was already working on other ways to spend the wealth, including ideas such as helping his town to move from fuelwood to cleaner heating.

"I don't want to leave a lot of money in the bank when I die." He said.

Once SpaceX has completed its first show on the market, Lavoy will be able to more easily cash the holdings of this rocket with the shares of the satellite manufacturer, together with thousands of current and former employees. As SpaceX moved to its largest IPO in history, these current and former employees witnessed its valuation boom.

The beneficiaries include not only engineers and other white collars, but also a large number of technicians who build company rockets, as well as coffeemakers and other salaried employees working in SpaceX, Texas and Florida parks. Some employees held shares valued at less than $2 per share at the time of the award, when the company had not even successfully landed a rocket. As the company ' s value grew at a rapid pace, multiple stock-splittings over the years also led to an increase in the number of employees holding shares.

Today, SpaceX plans to set its IPO distribution price at $135 per share, valued at approximately $1,77 trillion, with ambition to colonize Mars.

Employees and other in-house persons are usually unable to sell their pre-market shares for months after IPO, which is a “lock-and-lock” arrangement designed to prevent large-scale market-sharp stock prices at an early stage. However, SpaceX provides that some employees will be able to sell their shares in small quantities as early as July.

27-year-old Marilyn Musselman is not sure if she will sell her stock immediately. "I think it's gonna be a last-minute decision." She said.

Musselman joined SpaceX in 2022 as an engineering officer on a ship that was responsible for the recovery of rocket parts that fell off the coast of Florida. In addition to the equity acquired as part of the remuneration, she spent 10 per cent of her salary on the purchase of the company's equity in two years.

She is well aware of the risks, but also believes that this may lead to substantial returns and help her to start her own business one day.

“Seamen do not normally hold shares in their own company and do not always benefit from welfare.” She said.

Musselman refused to disclose the value of her current shares, but she stated that her goal was to own a maintenance business in Chesapeake, Virginia. Currently, she works there as a seaman.

Many holders of SpaceX shares have sold some of their shares over the years. SpaceX allows employees and early investors to transfer shares to other in-houses and investors through secondary markets, approximately twice a year.

In Italy, Lavoj is watching his own stock increase and is constantly revising his plans.

"The stock price is so high every year that it keeps disrupting my life plan." Sixty-three-year-old Lavoy said he left SpaceX in 2015.

Other former employees interviewed by the Wall Street Journal stated that they sold shares in order to repay their spouses ' student loans, buy their parents summer vacation homes, pay for maternity treatment or start their dream career.

Juan Hernández is one of the people whose lives have changed in the early days of SpaceX. Hernández emigrated from Mexico to the United States, where he studied this technology because of the high wage of welding. In 2015, he heard about SpaceX's job.

"When my friend talked about SpaceX, I didn't even know what it was, but it paid well." 42-year-old Hernández said.

He was initially admitted as a contract worker of $28 per hour, and was later formally employed and given an incentive of $10,000 in equity, which was gradually assigned over five years. Like other employees, Hernández has the option to continue buying shares in the company from a portion of his salary, which he has been doing for years.

In 2020, with SpaceX ' s estimate of $36 billion, he began to sell part of his share in small quantities. With this money he purchased property throughout Texas and established a small real estate business with his wife.

His remaining shares were valued at approximately $8.8 million at SpaceX IPO prices.

"It makes my life comfortable." Hernández said he left SpaceX last year. He is now a welder at the Blue Origin rocket launch site.

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