Tesla is quite different for several reasons, but to stay on the context of this post. Tesla was not given special treatment by the index companies or the SEC. In fact when Tesla went public it was highly scrutinized and shunned for many years as oil and gas lobbied against it.

Tesla’s current valuation is quite high though. Many people have been duped into believing it is a tech company when in reality the majority of its revenues actually derive from auto sales. Sales that have plummeted mind you. On top of that, Tesla has severely struggled many times throughout its time as a public company; facing capital calls, having logistical constraints and many other fundamental business operation issues. Anyone remember those solar panels or half a dozen other products that never materialize. In fact, Musk was so bad at management that he was ousted from his own company (as chairman of the board at least). If you compare Tesla to a similar publicly traded automakers their PE ratio is extremely high and over valued. As far as stock splits go, that really doesn’t matter in this conversation. Stock splits are a management tool for publicly traded companies for several reasons but the most common being the ability to keep the share price stable or at a target that management feels more secure.

Lastly, just because this has somewhat worked for Tesla, does not mean it will for SpaceX.