Mars colony and Grok warnings: five strange details in SpaceX’s pitch to investors

SpaceX publicly released an investor prospectus on Wednesday as part of its plan for a $1.75tn debut on the US stock market next month, revealing unseen details about the finances and future plans of Elon Musk’s flagship company. In addition to new information on operating costs and revenue, the filing also included trademark Muskian sweeping proclamations about the universe and insights into some of the quirks of his tech empire. Scattered throughout the 300-plus-page prospectus are several disclosures and risk warnings that show the eccentricities of Musk’s company and its cosmic ambitions. Other financial details in the document highlight how interdependent Musk’s various businesses have become and the risks that they carry. As SpaceX barrels towards the largest initial public offering (IPO) in the history of the US stock market, here is a look at some of the strange details buried within its filing. SpaceX spent about $131m on Cybertrucks last year View image in fullscreen Tesla Cybertrucks are parked outside a SpaceX facility in Starbase, Texas, on 21 May. Photograph: Ronaldo Schemidt/AFP/Getty Images SpaceX appears to have done extensive business with Tesla, spending hundreds of millions of dollars with Musk’s electric car company in recent years. Although much of that money – $506m to Tesla in 2025 and $191m in 2024 – went to purchasing Tesla’s Megapack battery product, SpaceX also spent lavishly on Cybertrucks. The prospectus discloses that in 2025 SpaceX obtained $131m worth of Cybertrucks at the manufacturer’s suggested retail price, which ranges between about $69,900 and $99,900, depending on the options. At that price, SpaceX would have acquired at least 1,300 vehicles. Tesla only sold a total of 20,237 Cybertrucks last year, according to auto industry sales reports, meaning that SpaceX’s purchases made up a significant portion of its overall sales. Extend ‘the light of consciousness’ to the stars Throughout the investor prospectus, SpaceX reiterates that its ultimate goal is to establish colonies on the moon and Mars that will usher in human civilization’s next evolution and expand humanity’s presence in the universe. “By moving beyond the only home we have ever known, we ensure species-level redundancy and that the light of consciousness will not be tied to a single planet subject to the inevitable hazards of a harsh and vast universe,” the prospectus says. “We do not want humans to have the same fate as dinosaurs.” At one point, the prospectus includes what appears to be an AI-generated rendering of life on Mars. The image shows a family on Mars looking out at a rocket launch amid a field of geodesic domes and rows of solar panels. The sci-fi rhetoric is not theoretical; it bears financial stakes. Musk will receive an award of 1bn shares in the company if SpaceX achieves “the establishment of a permanent human colony on Mars with at least 1 million inhabitants”. The interplanetary ambitions of SpaceX’s central mission also result in some warnings to investors. Reaching such unusual business goals as understanding the “true nature of the universe” may prove difficult, the company advises. “We face a number of challenges relating to our business and growth strategy and, ultimately, the achievement of our mission to make life multiplanetary, understand the true nature of the universe, and extend the light of consciousness to the stars,” the prospectus reads. Warnings about Grok The section of SpaceX’s filing that outlines risks to investors contains an array of legal and regulatory issues that reference various investigations, lawsuits and scandals involving Musk. Several of these relate to xAI, Musk’s artificial intelligence company that SpaceX acquired in February. One passage in the prospectus discloses that xAI’s Grok chatbot, especially its “spicy” and “unhinged” modes, present a heightened risk of creating numerous harms including “the generation of potentially explicit content and misinformation or deceptive outputs, potential nonconsensual or exploitative imagery, intellectual property infringement, or content that could be viewed as exploitative, harmful, harassing, abusive, or discriminatory”. The prospectus also states that the company is the subject of numerous domestic and international law enforcement investigations and inquiries related to allegations of Grok creating nonconsensual images. Grok generated more than 3m sexualized images in the span of just 11 days earlier this year before the company increased some restrictions on its output, according to an estimate from the Center for Countering Digital Hate. The bot itself disclosed that it had generated images of “minors in minimal clothing”. Several people, including minors, have filed lawsuits since alleging the company profited off of sexual predation and child sexual abuse material. SpaceX spent $4m last year on Musk’s personal security Musk has long expressed public concern about his personal safety and threats to his secur