Warren Buffett has spent decades telling anyone who would listen that he doesn’t do IPOs. Turns out, he doesn’t have to. Berkshire Hathaway now holds an indirect economic interest in SpaceX worth approximately $700 million, acquired entirely through its position in Alphabet, Google’s parent company.
The math is straightforward. Berkshire owns about 0.9% of Alphabet, a position valued at roughly $38B as of June 30, 2026. Alphabet, in turn, holds approximately 4% of SpaceX, a stake valued at around $94B. Multiply those two percentages together and you get Berkshire’s “look-through” exposure to SpaceX: about 0.04%, initially worth roughly $815 million before recent share price movements trimmed it to around $700 million.
The Oracle’s accidental rocket bet
Nobody at Berkshire headquarters in Omaha sat down and decided to invest in rocket launches. The SpaceX exposure is a mathematical consequence of two separate decisions: Alphabet’s 2015 investment of approximately $900 million in SpaceX alongside Fidelity, and Berkshire’s subsequent decision to build a major position in Alphabet.
Berkshire expanded its Alphabet stake by 83%, accumulating nearly 106 million shares by mid-2026. That made Alphabet Berkshire’s third-largest equity holding, trailing only Apple and American Express. SpaceX went public on June 12, 2026, which crystallized the value of Alphabet’s stake in a way that private market valuations never quite could.
Buffett’s philosophy meets modern portfolio math
Buffett has been consistent about avoiding IPOs for most of his career. He’s argued that the incentive structure around initial offerings tends to favor sellers over buyers, and that the hype cycle surrounding newly public companies inflates valuations beyond what a disciplined value investor should pay.
The SpaceX situation sidesteps all of those objections. Berkshire never participated in SpaceX’s IPO. It never negotiated terms with SpaceX’s bankers. It simply owns a large chunk of a company that happens to own a smaller chunk of SpaceX.
What this means for investors
For institutional investors watching Berkshire’s moves, the 83% expansion of the Alphabet position is arguably more significant than the SpaceX byproduct. That kind of aggressive accumulation in a mega-cap tech name signals strong conviction in Alphabet’s standalone value proposition.
The SpaceX angle adds a different kind of signal. Alphabet’s 4% stake, now valued at $94B, represents an enormous return on its original $900 million investment from 2015. That’s roughly a 100x gain over eleven years. Berkshire shareholders get to participate in that embedded value without ever having to underwrite the risk of a pre-revenue rocket company.
At $700 million, Berkshire’s indirect SpaceX exposure is large enough that it would rank as a standalone position in most institutional portfolios. For a company that famously avoids IPOs, that’s a quietly remarkable outcome.