The Trillion Dollar Gap | Aswath Damodaran on SpaceX, AI and the Big Market Delusion

Professor Aswath Damodaran joins Kai Wu on The Intangible Economy to break down how to value SpaceX, AI companies, intangible assets, and the future of value investing.
We discuss why big markets do not automatically create big value, how AI CapEx is changing the character of major technology companies, and why the best investment stories still have to connect to the numbers.
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Topics covered:
• Valuing SpaceX after its IPO and why price matters even for great companies

• How Starlink, space launch, and xAI fit into SpaceX’s valuation story

• Why total addressable market can mislead investors in AI and other disruptive industries

• The problem with AI unit economics, data centers, power, water, and reinvestment needs

• Why growth can destroy value when margins and returns on capital are weak

• How intangible assets, R&D, future growth, and narratives should show up in valuation

• The Big Market Delusion and how overconfidence drives boom and bust cycles

• Why AI CapEx is different from the dot-com boom and could create broader risks

• How AI is changing the character of the Magnificent Seven and semiconductor companies

• Why value investing became rigid, ritualistic, and righteous, and how it can evolve

Timestamps:
00:00 Why great companies can still be bad investments
01:03 Introducing Aswath Damodaran and The Intangible Economy
01:49 SpaceX IPO, Starlink, xAI, and the challenge of valuing uncertainty
05:31 Why Starlink became the core of SpaceX’s current revenue
10:31 How Damodaran valued SpaceX across launch, connectivity, and AI
14:07 Why AI’s huge market may still have difficult unit economics
17:10 The tension between SpaceX competing in AI and renting data centers to competitors
20:00 Why valuation should use distributions instead of false precision
22:39 How stories and numbers work together in valuation
26:45 Why investors confuse promises, potential, and businesses
30:49 The Big Market Delusion and overconfidence in AI investing
33:02 Why the AI CapEx boom is different from the dot-com bubble
35:17 How AI infrastructure is changing the Magnificent Seven
38:36 Nvidia, Micron, semiconductors, and the risk of peak cycle earnings
41:00 Why the biggest AI market stories could be scary for society
43:37 AI disruption, labor markets, and the speed of technological change
46:30 Measuring which jobs and companies are most exposed to AI automation
49:00 Why AI cost structure may look more like Spotify than software
51:13 The unresolved business model questions for LLMs and AI agents
52:29 Why traditional value investing lost its edge
56:03 Passive investing, book value, and the blame game in value investing
58:13 Why rigid value investing is vulnerable to AI disruption
01:00:58 How value investing can adapt to intangible assets and uncertainty
01:02:21 Why any company can be a good investment at the right price
01:04:57 Why investing mistakes and track records are harder to judge than they look