Preview: "SpaceX transferred $153 million in Bitcoin as political tensions rise and the Pentagon opens defense contracts to new bidders."
SpaceX has moved 1,308 Bitcoin, worth approximately $153 million, in its first onchain activity in three years. The movement was flagged by Arkham Intelligence, which tracks wallets tied to the company.
The Bitcoin
was withdrawn from 16 Pay-to-Public-Key-Hash (P2PKH) addresses and consolidated into a single SegWit-compatible Pay-to-Witness-Public-Key-Hash (P2WPKH) address, where it remained at time of publication. The movement of BTC from 16 separate addresses into one could make it easier to manage and possibly cheaper to spend the funds later.
While the reason for moving the assets is unclear, the nature of the transfer suggests a strategic adjustment rather than a reactive action.
SpaceX is a private aerospace company founded by Elon Musk in 2002. The company first disclosed its BTC holdings in July 2021, alongside Tesla. The purchase was part of Musk’s broader strategy to diversify his companies’ assets and support crypto adoption.
Neither SpaceX nor Musk has commented on the transfer.
Contract tensions grow as Pentagon eyes SpaceX alternatives
SpaceX’s decision to consolidate its Bitcoin holdings comes as the company is navigating increasing political uncertainty.
In early June, the administration of US President Donald Trump reportedly threatened to review or cancel about $22 billion in SpaceX contracts amid a feud between the Trump and Musk on X. Though most of the contracts were deemed “too critical to US interests to eliminate,” the episode signaled growing political tension and raised questions about SpaceX’s long-term standing with the US government.
Today, the Pentagon announced its decision to diversify its partners for the Golden Dome missile defense system, a $175 billion missile defense initiative to build a space-based network of satellites to detect and track incoming threats.
Reported by Reuters, concerns over “over-reliance on SpaceX” have prompted the Trump administration to open bids to other providers, ensuring the Golden Dome isn’t solely dependent on SpaceX.
Related: New Bitcoin analysis says ‘most explosive phase’ to $140K is close
From memecoins to stablecoin rails
Since the 2021 Bitcoin bull run, Elon Musk’s relationship with crypto has been anything but straightforward. His early tweets endorsing Dogecoin sent the memecoin soaring, only for it to crash by 30% following his appearance on the TV sketch comedy show “Saturday Night Live.”
That same year, Tesla announced a $1.5 billion Bitcoin purchase and briefly accepted BTC as payment. The decision was soon reversed over environmental concerns, and a portion of the company’s holdings was sold off.
After acquiring Twitter in 2022 and rebranding it as X, Musk began laying the groundwork for a broader financial ecosystem. X secured money transmitter licenses across the US, and backend code revealed early development of a native crypto wallet. While no crypto features have been launched publicly, blockchain integration remains part of the long-term vision.
In a 2024 podcast, venture capitalist Chamath Palihapitiya said SpaceX uses stablecoins to collect Starlink payments in emerging markets, bypassing traditional banking rails. “They don’t want to deal with sending wires… so they swap into stablecoins,” he said.
Today, SpaceX is estimated to hold about 6,977 BTC, worth approximately $815 million, positioning it quietly among the largest corporate Bitcoin holders.
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