Musk's "darkest week": Tesla plunged 18%, marking its biggest weekly drop since 2022; SpaceX fell another 7% ahead of Starship test flight.

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This week has been a tough one for Elon Musk.

Tesla’s stock price plunged 18% this week, closing at $313.03 on Friday, marking its worst single-week drop since 2022.

Meanwhile, SpaceX’s stock continued its downward trend, dropping a total of 7.2% over the past five trading days, and closed at $115.07 on Friday—the lowest level since the company's record-setting IPO last month.

The drop in share prices of the two companies has wiped out about $130 billion of Musk’s personal wealth. Just a few weeks ago, he had become the world's first “trillionaire.”

On Friday, Musk joked on X platform: "(Former) trillionaire."

Tesla: Negative Cash Flow, Pressured Earnings Outlook

Tesla’s stock price decline was mainly due to the company’s second-quarter earnings report missing expectations.

Due to a sharp increase in investments for future projects—including robotaxis, humanoid robots, and a large chip factory—Tesla’s cash flow turned negative.

In a report on Friday, Argus Research analysts stated:

“We expect this will put pressure on free cash flow and delay earnings growth, while not delivering near-term returns to shareholders. It’s almost impossible for Tesla to achieve stable profit growth in the short term.”

So far this year, Tesla’s stock price has dropped 30%, making it the worst performer among the Mag 7 companies.

SpaceX Down Three Weeks in a Row, Starship Test Launches Canceled Twice

Over the past month, SpaceX’s stock price has also continued to decline. The company’s shares surged early after listing, but have since pulled back. In the last five weeks, SpaceX’s stock price has dropped in four of them, and is now down about 43% from its June 16 closing high.

Investors overall are reducing their exposure to tech stocks. Ken Mahoney, CEO of Mahoney Asset Management, described the situation as a “perfect storm”—with oil prices, interest rate hike expectations, and doubts about AI returns all piling on the pressure.

Morgan Stanley analyst Jonas said that many investors expect SpaceX’s stock price may fall to $100 after the first batch of restricted shares are unlocked next month. He believes the current pessimistic investor sentiment is a clear divergence from the company’s fundamentals, creating a buying opportunity for SpaceX.

On Friday night, SpaceX will once again attempt the 13th Starship test flight. This is currently the world’s largest and most powerful rocket system.

The company plans to launch the upgraded Starship V3 rocket from its “Starbase” facility in Boca Chica, Texas. This rocket is designed to be fully reusable and is considered critical to SpaceX’s near-term goal of massively expanding its Starlink satellite network.

SpaceX announced on its X platform that due to “weather reasons,” the test flight originally scheduled for Thursday was postponed. Previously, SpaceX also canceled a test launch last week when a rocket booster triggered a pause protocol.

If this Starship V3 launch succeeds, it will be the first successful Starship launch since SpaceX went public. SpaceX plans to use Starship to return NASA astronauts to the surface of the Moon, and Musk’s long-term goal is to use this rocket for crewed Mars missions.

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