When the world’s most anticipated tech IPO tells an entire country’s investors they can’t participate, those investors tend to get creative. That’s exactly what’s happening as Chinese and Hong Kong-based investors, barred from SpaceX’s upcoming public offering, are turning to perpetual futures and synthetic derivatives on crypto exchanges to get a piece of the action.
SpaceX’s IPO, targeting a valuation of roughly $1.78 trillion and set for May 2026, explicitly excludes investors from mainland China and Hong Kong. The reason: US export control regulations. Underwriters have been instructed to reject orders from those regions entirely.
The crypto workaround
In mid-May 2026, decentralized exchange Hyperliquid launched pre-IPO perpetual futures contracts for SpaceX under the ticker SPCX. These contracts reference an implied valuation north of $1.78 trillion and trade around the clock, seven days a week. No underwriter approval required.
OKX followed suit on May 6, 2026, announcing perpetual futures for implied valuations of OpenAI, SpaceX, and Anthropic. Bitget has also joined the party.
