SpaceX posts a big AI-driven quarter as Musk floats a Tesla merger

What happened: SpaceX earned $4.4 billion last quarter against analyst expectations of $1.6 billion. Revenue jumped 161% to $14.6 billion, with $7.6 billion from AI, mostly renting out data center compute. Its stock jumped in early trading. On the earnings call Musk revealed that Tesla and SpaceX have both formed committees to discuss a merger.
The claim: Musk says a merger is not a sure thing and called the talks a "kabuki dance."
Austin's take: Austin frames AI as three layers (infrastructure, models, applications) and says SpaceX now spans all three, with Tesla adding AI in physical hardware like self-driving cars and the Optimus robot. He thinks a merger would create a mega company at the frontier in several areas. He says he uses SpaceX's Grok bot personal agent daily.
Why it matters: A rocket company now gets more than half its revenue from renting AI compute, a sign of how much money is flowing to infrastructure.
What to do: Treat merger chatter as unsettled until there's a formal announcement, and watch AI compute rental as a growing revenue line across the industry.
Not confirmed yet: The merger is only under discussion, and Musk himself says it may not happen.

The Loop