The News
SpaceX CEO Elon Musk said Monday that he would distribute to every American child a share in the AI-and-space-exploration company, a gift that, if realized, would dwarf a similar $6.25 billion gift from Michael Dell.
The gift could be worth roughly $10.8 billion, based on SpaceX’s current share price and the U.S. Census’ estimate of under-18s living in the US. It would work out to roughly 1% of Musk’s current SpaceX holdings. Musk and the Trump administration originally discussed the share donations this summer when Trump accounts were first launched, Semafor scooped.
Musk made the announcement Monday in response to a social media post from Anthropic, which said it would commit 5% of its listed equities to a “public benefit fund.” President Donald Trump later tweeted a thank you to Musk: “This is exactly what was envisioned when we created Trump Accounts.”
The pledge raises some questions about what kind of voting rights the shares would have; SpaceX is a dual-class stock and Musk enjoys supermajority control of the company. Recent regulatory changes allow individual equities to be held in Trump Accounts, the childhood savings program that has been a flagship initiative of this administration.
Musk and a Treasury spokesperson did not return a request for comment.
Rohan’s view
Musk has not been a big philanthropist, relative to his wealth, and has argued before that the best way he can do good for humanity is by building great companies. Look at this through a strategic, rather than a philanthropic lens, however, and it makes a lot more sense.
Musk’s planned donation could generate goodwill from a skeptical public around him, his companies and his goals — space exploration, self-driving cars and AI, among others. If other businesses chose to do something similar, they could also benefit from a public-relations boost, or possibly amass a friendly shareholder block that helps protect against others that might disagree with their strategic direction.