SpaceX (SPCX) shares are moving higher Monday as technology stocks bounce from last week's steep selloff, with investors largely unmoved by a report that four of Europe's largest telecoms companies are exploring a joint challenge to Starlink's dominance on the continent.
Deutsche Telekom, Orange, Telefónica and Vodafone signed a letter of intent over the weekend to explore a joint bid for radio spectrum that would allow smartphones to connect directly to satellites across Europe, the Financial Times reported.
The initiative has quiet backing from European Commission officials and reflects growing political pressure to reduce the bloc's dependence on US-controlled digital infrastructure, a tension that sharpened last week after the US ambassador to the EU warned of "devastating" retaliation if Brussels proceeds with plans to reserve the relevant 2 GHz frequency band for European operators.
The market's scepticism is understandable.
The four telecoms groups have no satellite constellation of their own and would need to partner with an existing provider, most of which are American or Chinese.
France's Eutelsat is the only substantial European alternative and is widely regarded as years behind Starlink, which has more than 11,000 satellites in orbit and more than 12 million subscribers.
Goldman Sachs analyst Andrew Lee described the move as a "reassuring reminder" to investors that European operators see satellite as a companion technology to their existing networks rather than a replacement, which is rather more modest framing than the headlines suggest.
SpaceX reports third-quarter results tomorrow, with investors focused on whether Starlink subscriber numbers have pushed past 14 million and how quickly the company's AI compute segment is converting its contracted capacity into revenue.
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