Key Takeaways
- SpaceX has reportedly stopped booking Falcon 9 rideshare missions beyond late 2028, and an investor on Reddit calls that a gift to Rocket Lab.
- Rocket Lab is already cashing in: it signed eight Neutron missions for roughly $515 million in the third quarter, several at a higher $70 million base price.
- Neutron won’t fly until 2027 at the earliest, and Rocket Lab burned $322 million of free cash flow in 2025.
- The gift lasts until Starship flies reliably several times a week, so Neutron’s first flight and Starship’s pace are the things to watch.
SpaceX (SPCX) has started closing the door on Falcon 9, the rocket that flew more than half of the world’s orbital launches in 2025. Rocket Lab (RKLB) investors think they know who walks through it.
SatNews reported in July that SpaceX had stopped taking new bookings beyond late 2028 for its Transporter and Bandwagon rideshare missions. Elon Musk has since written on X that “once Starship is flying reliably several times per week,” it makes sense to shift SpaceX’s scarce engineering resources to Starship. The money is already moving: the AI and data center segment took $40.0 billion of SpaceX’s $48.1 billion of capex in the first nine months of 2026.
In a post on r/investing on Nov. 10, one investor asked why SpaceX would walk away from the “crazy demand for that vehicle,” and concluded: “Ending Falcon 9 is a gift to Rocket Lab, Blue Origin, ULA and others.”
Rocket Lab Is Already Getting Paid
On Rocket Lab’s Nov. 9 call, CFO Adam Spice said the “future lack of transporter and bandwagon like everyone’s concerned about, is going to have to go somewhere, right?” He named Electron, the small rocket Rocket Lab already flies, as the next best alternative, while cautioning that Rocket Lab may only be seeing the earliest signs of it.
The bigger prize is Neutron. Rocket Lab signed eight Neutron missions for roughly $515 million in the third quarter, several at a $70 million base price. Its first 16 launches are booked, with the next open slots in the 2030s. And Spice isn’t done raising prices: “I personally don’t think that we’re yet at the end of the pricing curve for Neutron.”
Not bad for a rocket that hasn’t flown yet.
Analysts see Rocket Lab’s revenue more than doubling from $602 million in 2025 to $1.33 billion in 2027, then reaching $1.74 billion in 2028, on estimates set before the third-quarter report.
TIKR Tracks 23 Analysts on Rocket Lab. How Many Say “Buy”?
See the full breakdown of Buy, Hold, and Sell ratings on Rocket Lab, along with Wall Street’s revenue and earnings estimates, all in one place. More than 500,000 investors use TIKR to research stocks like this one. See Rocket Lab’s Analyst Ratings
Rocket Lab’s Margins Need More Flights
Gross margin has widened every year, from -3.0% in 2021 to 34.4% in 2025.
Spice tied launch margins to “absorbing those fixed costs over a greater number of launches.” On Nov. 9, the Pentagon’s Office of Strategic Capital announced a $150 million conditional loan commitment to help raise Neutron’s flight rate. It’s small next to the $4.45 billion of cash Rocket Lab held on Sept. 30, but if it closes, it would fund more flights without new shares.
Neutron Still Has to Fly
None of this pays until Neutron launches, and Rocket Lab pushed the debut to 2027 after finding voids in a propellant tank’s forward dome. Free cash flow has been negative in each of the last five years, and 2025’s -$322 million was the deepest.
The bigger risk is Starship itself. A fully reusable rocket should cost less per launch than Falcon 9, which throws away its upper stage, and small satellites can share the ride. SpaceX is targeting weekly Starship flights in the first half of 2027.
Rocket Lab’s Gift Comes With a Starship Clock
Neutron’s order book backs the Reddit poster’s case, though Beck credited the orders to both tighter launch supply and customers’ confidence in Neutron, not to SpaceX alone. But the gift lasts only while small-satellite customers have nowhere cheaper to go. Once Starship flies several times a week, I’d expect SpaceX to come back for that business at prices Neutron can’t match. Starship’s Flight 15 on Nov. 13 is SpaceX’s next test. Rocket Lab’s is a firm Neutron launch date.
So What Is Rocket Lab Stock Actually Worth?
TIKR lets you forecast the future price of any stock in less than a minute. Just enter a few assumptions into TIKR’s valuation model and see what Rocket Lab could be worth. Start from Wall Street consensus estimates, or adjust the inputs to reflect your own view of the business. It’s free to use.
Disclaimer:
Please note that the articles on TIKR are not intended to serve as investment or financial advice from TIKR or our content team, nor are they recommendations to buy or sell any stocks. We create our content based on TIKR Terminal’s investment data and analysts’ estimates. Our analysis might not include recent company news or important updates. TIKR has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. Thank you for reading, and happy investing!
