SpaceX (SPCX) Q3 2026 earnings report: Live updates
Starshield issues in Ukraine
BRUSSELS, BELGIUM – OCTOBER 16: Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy holds a press conference during the second day of the European Union leaders’ summit in Brussels, Belgium, on October 16, 2026. (Photo by Dursun Aydemir/Anadolu via Getty Images)
Anadolu | Anadolu | Getty Images
A military tier of Starlink, marketed as Starshield, has drawn scrutiny of late as restrictions on the system in Ukraine hindered the country’s ability to defend itself against intensifying attacks by Russia.
Ukrainian officials said SpaceX and the Trump administration restricted Starshield without warning last week, causing Ukraine’s military forces to lose control of drones moving over 100 miles per hour, as the craft were relying on Starshield for connectivity at those speeds.
Musk said in a post on X that any changes to Starshield should be attributed to the U.S. government and President Donald Trump, though Trump later denied he ordered any such restrictions.
Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy told NBC’s “Meet the Press” on Sunday that the restraints remained in place over the weekend.
Investors, meanwhile, have poured capital into potential Starlink competitors, including Eutelsat.
—Lora Kolodny
An update on cloud computing revenue
After acquiring xAI in February with its data centers in and around Memphis, Tennessee, SpaceX struck lucrative cloud computing agreements, establishing a new revenue stream.
Deals with Google, Anthropic and Reflection AI, as well as an unnamed customer revealed by SpaceX CFO Bret Johnsen at an event last month, amount to potentially tens of billions of dollars in annual revenue for the company.
SpaceX is reportedly in talks to raise up to $40 billion to buy more Nvidia chips to support its AI ambitions.
Investors are looking for updates around this business for SpaceX as it seeks to monetize its AI capacity.
—Lora Kolodny
Speculation builds around a possible Tesla-SpaceX merger
Ahead of earnings, investors are invited to submit questions for the call. One entry that got a lot of upvotes was about timing for a potential merger between SpaceX and Tesla, Musk’s automaker.
Musk’s companies have had business and financial relations for years, even sharing personnel and some board members.
Tesla invested $2 billion into xAI, which later converted into shares of SpaceX. The AI unit of SpaceX also spent about $430 million last year on Tesla’s Megapacks, which are battery energy storage systems, and $143 million on Cybertrucks.
With SpaceX hitting the public market in June, speculation about a more permanet tie-up has been swirling. SpaceX COO Gwynne Shotwell told CNBC ahead of the IPO that a merger “might make Elon’s life a little easier.”
A demo of Tesla’s next-generation Roadster last week stirred up further merger excitement among Musk fans. The new Roadster was developed with SpaceX and incorporates its technology, including cold gas thrusters, to enable the car to launch, hover and flip in mid-air.
—Lora Kolodny
