3 Tiny Space Stocks to Buy BEFORE Elon’s Tuesday Launch

Tuesday at 6:30 p.m. Eastern, Elon Musk will launch the most powerful rocket ever built. If it works, SpaceX walks into a $2 trillion IPO next month. This is the final test for SpaceX before the initial public offering, and it creates an immediate, highly profitable window for traders looking at tiny space stocks to buy before the launch.

A lot of investors have been looking for ways to buy SpaceX stock before it goes public. The play here is targeting the fast-moving suppliers sitting directly inside SpaceX's supply chain.

Tiny Space Stocks to Buy: Why They're Moving

This is the 12th flight of Starship, but the first flight of Starship version 3 with the new Raptor engines. This is the production model. Not a prototype anymore.

If this flight succeeds, it gives investors confidence that Elon Musk can fulfill his promises of an orbital data center business and a base on the moon. The entire IPO narrative is riding on a 90-minute launch window.

Which SpaceX Supply Chain Stocks Have Already Moved?

SpaceX is the biggest IPO of all time. The company is run by the richest man who has ever lived. And anything even remotely related to SpaceX has been on fire lately.

The momentum in small-cap space stocks is already well established:

• DXYZ, an ETF holding pre-IPO shares, doubled in about a month.
• EchoStar got shares in SpaceX from a spectrum sale.
• Filtronic, a small-cap supplier of key radio components for SpaceX, soared in under a week.

All saw spectacular returns. These are not long-term investments. The play is simple: ride the momentum of the stocks in this group.

Three Tiny Space Stocks to Buy in SpaceX's Supply Chain

Here are three names from a list of fast-moving space stocks, each with direct exposure to this launch and the broader space economy.

Velo3D (VELO)

Velo3D makes industrial-grade metal 3D printers. These machines print the rocket engine parts you literally cannot build any other way. SpaceX is a publicly disclosed customer. Velo3D prints components for the Raptor engine, the same engine flying on Tuesday.

Market cap is about $570 million. Still a small cap, but the operational turnaround is already underway. When SpaceX scales Starship production from a handful of rockets a year to dozens, somebody has to print thousands of new engine parts. That somebody is Velo3D.

The stock routinely makes 100% or more moves in just days or weeks. To be clear, this is not a blue chip. The company has debt. There are plenty of risks. But the technology is very real, the customer list is the best in aerospace, and the growth is huge.

STMicroelectronics (STM)

Most people think of STM as a little European chip company, making sensors and automotive stuff, boring industrial parts.

STM has a 10-year partnership with SpaceX. They make the radio frequency antenna chips inside every single Starlink user terminal on Earth. They have already shipped 7.5 billion of them, and that volume is projected to almost double by 2027.

The combination of STM announcing bigger and bigger chip milestones, momentum buyers and trend followers getting in, and everyone finally connecting the dots between this European chip name and the most valuable private company on the planet. If Starship sticks the landing Tuesday, SpaceX can deploy bigger, better Starlink satellites. Bigger satellites mean more bandwidth. More bandwidth means more user terminals. Every single one of those terminals needs STM chips.

Intuitive Machines (LUNR)

This is a lunar play. The new Starship is not going to the moon Tuesday, but the entire point of Starship is to go to the moon, and eventually Mars. When that happens, you need landers, surface systems, communications relays, and cargo delivery.

Intuitive Machines is a prime contractor on NASA's Artemis program. They are the only publicly traded company that has actually landed on the moon and has a multi-billion dollar contract pipeline tied to the next decade of lunar exploration.

How Does a Starship Launch Actually Move Stock Prices?

Starship has flown 11 times, and some of those flights ended up in fireballs. The version 3 is the production model. This is the rocket SpaceX plans to use to deploy the next generation of Starlink satellites: bigger, more powerful, more bandwidth per orbit.

The Raptor 3 engines deliver about 250 tons of thrust at sea level. The vacuum engines push 275 tons. That is roughly an 8% bump in raw thrust per engine on a rocket carrying 39 engines on the booster alone.

More thrust means bigger payloads. Bigger payloads mean bigger Starlink satellites. Starlink's internet business already has 10 million paying customers and is now nearly 80% of SpaceX's revenue.

If version 3 works, the Starlink growth curve goes vertical. If it fails, do not be surprised if the IPO gets pushed back.

What Chart Pattern Signals a Buy in Space Stocks?

Trading high-momentum space stocks requires a specific framework. The one used here is the culmination of work from two trading legends.

First is William O'Neil, founder of Investors Business Daily. He spent 50 years studying the biggest winning stocks in market history and found a pattern called the high tight flag. His rule required a move higher of 100% or more in four to eight weeks, followed by a sideways consolidation for three to five weeks where pullbacks stayed under 25%.

The problem: market cycles are too fast today. By the time a textbook O'Neil flag forms, the move is half over.

Enter Christian Kahlmaki. A Swedish trader, a total unknown, who turned roughly $5,000 into over $100 million by updating O'Neil's pattern for modern markets. Here is his four-rule hybrid that works for retail traders today.

1. The Setup

Look for any stock breaking out to 30 to 60-day highs. It does not need to follow O'Neil's strict 100% minimum move. STM's big run qualifies. Velo3D's earnings pop qualifies.

2. The Flag

The stock has to be surfing a rising 10 or 20-day moving average. This is the modern tight consolidation.

Intuitive Machines showed a perfect example. It made an initial 96% move in three weeks, from about $16 to $31. Then it pulled back for about a week and a half, holding tight to the 10- and 20-day moving averages. That is what "surfing the moving average" looks like.

3. The Entry

On a daily chart, wait for the stock to close above the consolidation high on volume. When it does, buy the open the next day. No one-minute candles. No day trading.

4. Risk Management

Place your stop loss beneath the consolidation low or just use the average daily range. For Intuitive Machines, the average daily range is about 11%. Use whichever level is lower.

Sell a third to a half of your position after three to five days of strength. Once you lock in that gain, move your stop loss to break even immediately. For the remaining shares, trail the 20-day simple moving average. As soon as the stock closes a day beneath its 20-day moving average, you are out. Sell the next morning.

Key Risks Before You Buy

Anything could happen on Tuesday. Starship has flown 11 times, and some of those flights ended up in fireballs. If Tuesday's flight ends in another fireball, these stocks will get hit.

You want to be aggressively taking profits on the moves higher. These are volatile stocks.

• Velo3D is a microcap with debt. It can move 20% a day in either direction.
• Intuitive Machines has missed numbers before.
• None of these are dividend-paying blue chips, but dividend-paying blue chips are not making 50-80% moves in a week.

SpaceX is going to compete with some of its own suppliers eventually. Elon vertically integrates everything he touches. Hopefully, he just buys out the competition and we profit. But these are not forever holds. They are tactical plays into a once-in-a-decade event.

Other Space Stocks on the Watchlist

The full list of high average daily range space stocks includes several other names. Some are in the SpaceX supply chain, others are simply tied to the same group. Keep an eye on Planet Labs, Rocket Labs, and AST SpaceMobile. Any of these tiny space stocks to buy could form the high tight flag setup very quickly.

A 90-Minute Window for $2 Trillion

Tuesday at 6:30 p.m. Eastern is arguably the most important rocket launch since the space shuttle retired. The whole IPO narrative, $2 trillion of paper wealth, is riding on whether the V3 Starship succeeds.

If you want to capitalize on this, focus on the tiny space stocks to buy within the SpaceX supply chain. Trade the momentum, manage your risk with strict stop losses, and be ready to take profits when these stocks surge.