SpaceX stock is flying high, and so are the older aerospace incumbents. The newer space trade is not.

Since Space Exploration Technologies (SPCX) began trading, shares are up more than 30%, keeping the company at the center of one of the biggest market stories of the year.

But the move has split the space trade in two.

Old-line aerospace and defense names have broadly caught a bid since the IPO.

GE Aerospace (GE), Howmet Aerospace (HWM), Honeywell (HON), Parker-Hannifin (PH), Eaton (ETN), and TransDigm (TDG) are all up roughly 5% to 9% over the same stretch. Boeing (BA), RTX (RTX), Airbus (AIR.PA), Wabtec (WAB), and Curtiss-Wright (CW) are also higher.

The smaller public space stocks look very different.

Rocket Lab (RKLB) is down about 5%. AST SpaceMobile (ASTS), EchoStar (SATS), Viasat (VSAT), Redwire (RDW), Planet Labs (PL), and Satellogic (SATL) are down roughly 10% to 16%. Virgin Galactic (SPCE), Sidus Space (SIDU), and Intuitive Machines (LUNR) have fallen more than 20%.

SpaceX has not sparked a blanket “buy space” trade. It has turned into a sorting machine.

Before SPCX’s debut, smaller public space names were one of the few ways investors could trade the theme while SpaceX remained private. Investors were already chasing pre-IPO SpaceX exposure through ETFs and wrappers, and the IPO finally gave them the main event.

Now the question is whether those old proxies still deserve the same oxygen.

For now, the market’s answer is blunt. SpaceX changed the scoreboard, and the newer space names have to prove they can win attention on their own.

Jared Blikre is the global markets and data editor for Yahoo Finance. Follow him on X at @SPYJared or email him at jaredblikre@yahooinc.com.

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