If Elon Musk’s new public offering of SpaceX stock was an appealing investment, he would let investors make our own decisions about buying it. Instead, with the help of the NASDAQ stock exchange, he is sneaking it into our retirement accounts whether we want it or not.
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As he has with Tesla, Musk wants to have the access to other people’s money of a public company, raising capital by issuing stock anyone can buy, but he wants to retain the control of a private company.
All of capitalism rests on one question: Why should I trust you with my money?
Normally, in order to reassure the public that our money is safe with corporate executives and the board of directors, to show us that stock is a good investment, there are many protections in the law. It is the wide range of those protections, from extensive disclosure requirements to a fiduciary legal standard “above the morals of the marketplace” that keep the interests of shareholders paramount, crucial to making the US capital markets the most robust in the world.
But Musk will not accept that level of transparency, oversight, and accountability. Though he is not the majority stockholder at Tesla, he has been able to install a rubber-stamp board that includes his brother. Tesla was legally domiciled in Delaware, which has…