SpaceX CEO Elon Musk said Monday that he will give one of his shares in the company to every child in the U.S. next year. The gift would amount to about $10.5 billion in shares, based on SpaceX's closing stock price of $146.03 on Friday and roughly 72 million U.S. children under 18 as of July 1, 2025, according to official census data. Musk did not provide further details on how the giveaway would happen. "This will be the first of many," he said in a post on X. CNBC has reached out to SpaceX and Musk's family office for more information.
Musk currently owns about 4.8 billion SpaceX shares, according to an August SEC filing. Including unvested awards and stock options, that figure rises to 6.4 billion, representing a 48.4% beneficial stake in the company. Brad Gerstner, founder of Invest America and Trump Accounts, praised the move and suggested the shares could be distributed through Trump accounts, calling it potentially the largest philanthropic gift in history.
Musk's giving has drawn attention recently for political contributions. He has spent more than $276 million on donations to Republican groups since July, making him the biggest known donor of the 2026 midterm election. His philanthropic record is mixed. He contributed about $38 million to OpenAI between 2016 and 2020, far short of a promised $1 billion, and he did not donate the $6 billion he pledged to the United Nations World Food Program in 2021. His foundation has also repeatedly fallen short of its legally required minimum donations.
The announcement came shortly after Anthropic said it would commit 5% of its shares to a new public benefit fund. Responding to that post, Musk said he recommends giving shares directly to the public and added that this is what he would be doing.
Source: Wall Street Journal Markets · Summarized by HeadlinesBriefing