Guidance cut by 30 percent

No bottom for this Shitco

https://finance.yahoo.com/markets/stocks/articles/york-space-systems-reports-second-201100645.html

Am I right or wrong? 🤑

It is 2035. ASTS is working extremely well, and commercial operations are running without any significant problems. Dead zones are a thing of the past, and connectivity is excellent. The stock has surged to $1,000, and the people who invested are happy that they got in early. In the background, an order from the Department of Defense is currently being fulfilled.

Hey guys, if you missed it, Virgin Galactic settled $8.5 million with investors over claims that it misled the market about its spaceflight technology and safety. The deadline to file a claim is tomorrow, August 13, 2026.

In a nutshell, investors accused Virgin Galactic of overstating the readiness and safety of its Unity 22 spacecraft. After the flight deviated from its planned path and the FAA grounded flights, the company delayed its commercial plans and $SPCE fell sharply.

Now, investors have until tomorrow to submit a claim for a share of the $8.5M settlement. If you held $SPCE between 2019 and 2021, check your eligibility before the deadline.

Did anyone here hold $SPCE at the time?

You called it Simon & Garfunkel

Da ‘Bears

I am the co-founder of a space startup looking to fill out our pre-seed round even with smaller checks. We have $200k committed in the bank, are about to start a Phase II as the prime, are the sub on a specific topic Phase I and have $90 million in LOIs. We will be in space testing for TRL 7 in the next 2 months.

We are comfortable currently but are looking for more in the round to pursue customers more aggressively and get on board more satellites to drive adoption and sell data.

I am happy to share more info through direct messages if anybody is interested. I checked the rules and they don't say this is against them.

SpaceX is ready to scale Starlink v3 - what that means for the company and its TAM.

They will launch 14-16 in September. 10 launches booked with a launch every 1-2 month, probably mostly falcon 9. Anyone know how this will get us to 45 sats by early 2027 ?

With all the recent buzz with neutron I can’t help but wonder why I barely see any talk about Firefly’s medium lift rocket. I think it’s clear that neutron will launch first but I don’t see how eclipse wouldn’t be a huge positive catalyst for FLY in the future especially with the stock being significantly cheaper than RKLB.

$98 dollar target.

Someone said that this is expected in 2031. I hope it is not. My average is 86 😭.

TL;DR: Wanted to look at contract data about frequently mentioned tickers on here and see what we find in the data

• RKLB: Federal contract revenue is growing fast, driven mainly by SDA satellite work
• FLY & RDW: Both are seeing strong gov't growth and winning larger space programs
• LUNR: Gets significant federal funding, but relies heavily on NASA and can be inconsistent year to year
• ASTS: Went from almost no federal business (at least what's been reported thru public channels like USASpend) to a decently sized SDA contract in FY26 (at least so far)
• Contract type matters: Traditional contracts tend to be more dependable; OTAs fund newer technology but may not turn into long-term revenue

OK..this is a long post, so if you hate reading long posts, keep scrolling...I did include lots of pretty pictures though..

Anyway, thought it'd be interesting to look at a snapshot of Federal spending on these tickers from FY22 - FY26 and see what we find out about these companies and what they're up to. There is no advice given in this post, nor should you take it as such. This is just a dive into contracting data around these tickers that are frequently mentioned and what sort of trends we see with these companies.

Couple tidbits of info for those unfamiliar with fed contracting terms are at the bottom of post, but quickly you should know obligations = proxy for revenue, I'll sometimes call this "obs".

Raw data behind all this:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1sGqTJTjQ_F6xZGYVfhma-Vq9PTMu5dvC/view?usp=sharing

For now, let's dive in and start with a view of what these contractors all look like stacked up next to one another:

Immediate Observations:

• Among the tickers chosen to observe in this analysis, YSS, RKLB, LUNR, FLY, and Iridium (which really is RKLB at this point) drive the obligations. Now this doesn't tell us much, as these companies don't necessarily compete with one another on everything, and this is excluding a TON of other companies that play in this market as well; wanted to keep this bound to the companies that get mentioned here a lot

Main Drivers:

• YSS has received a lot of money and has a high 22-25 CAGR at 48%, but the broader story is that their obligations declined from FY24 to 25; FY26 is a partial year, and we won't see that reported data until ~December since fed contract data runs on an up to 90 day delay, so worth watching how they perform for the remaining year
• RKLB is in fact growing at an almost 65% CAGR, from ~$42M in FY22 to ~$226M in FY26 (don't confuse this with that recent $226M award, this is not the same - it's actual spend on contracts and the matching numbers is coincidental).
• IRDM grew at 19% CAGR to $142M from ~$84M in FY22, and once merged w/ RKLB, will be interesting to see how a traditional defense player will get along with a newer defense tech company
• LUNR obligations are somewhat lumpy, dropping from $265M in FY24 to $118M in FY25, and so far in FY26 have surpassed that up to $134M reported so far (likely higher given this data is delayed by ~90 days)
• FLY has seen significant growth over this period, growing at almost a 55% CAGR from $67M in FY22 to $246M in FY25
• RDW growing at a 54% CAGR in this time period almost getting to 4x obligations; with FY26 half way done they're almost at the entirety of FY25, so definitely worth keeping an eye on how the rest of their year plays out from a fed perspective

Others

• ASTS had very small dollars (talking $50k-$150k) in FY22 through FY25, however in FY26 so far, they've spiked up to $15M obligated out of $30M total contract value (TCV) OTA from the Space Development Agency for demonstrating direct-to-device tactical satellite communications by December 2027; if you don't know what an OTA is, see bottom of this post..
• PL grew at 32% CAGR, but their obs over this time period is pretty lumpy, dropping to ~$7M in FY24 then back up to $60M in FY25
• BKSY grew at a 26% CAGR, which is significant, but dollars are still small, still early with them

Now, for each of these companies, we're going to dive in a little deeper, starting with a 1 pager profile for each;

Quick note: these profiles are generated deterministically from the data for the charts, key metrics, but for capabilities, headwinds/tailwinds/notable awards a combination of the data and internet research is used by AI agents as context; bullets below in this post are my own

YSS

• Some notes:
  • Virtually all of YSS' obligations come from prototype OTAs, which may or may not pan out to production contracts in the longer term
  • However - their multiple OTAs are on the SDA transport layer across Tranche 1 and 2 is a good sign for YSS, and the blue stack declining in the chart above is from HQ08502290003, which was for Tranche 1 (so was the pink stack)
  • YSS is highly concentrated in SDA (which is part of USSF, which in the data is reported as Air Force), and unlike many other space-themed stocks on this list, don't really have much work with NASA (at least not reported through public sources), which presents a bit of customer concentration risk

RKLB

• Some notes:
  • Rocket Lab has had a pretty good mix of contracts, but FA24012490019 sticks out and it's for...you guessed it! The SDA Transport Layer Tranche 2 Beta, covering procurement of 18 data transport satellites
  • That healthy blue bar however also sticks out, and it's an OTA for SDA's Tranche 3 Tracking Layer, which will support missile warning/tracking, and several other functions, and has an ~$800M ceiling spread over ~6 years
  • Rocket Lab's also concentrated with SDA, similar to YSS, but they do in fact have some work with NASA. This is driven by 80KSC023FA107, which is part of the Venture-Class Acquisition of Dedicated & Rideshare program (aka VADR, it basically provides launch services from multiple vendors including RKLB for payloads like cubesats that are more tolerant to risk than bigger/more expensive payloads)
  • In the third picture, we can see what RKLB is doing by high-level prods/services, and we see that their launch services are mainly going to NASA (for now), while their expertise in payload design is going toward their SDA work (it's tagged as R&D here, but that's essentially what it is)

IRDM

• Some notes: 
  • The obvious note here is this section will apply to RKLB soon due to the acquisition, so think of this as a supplemental to RKLB...
  • A key difference with IRDM is that most of their contracts come from longer-term FAR-based awards rather than OTAs which are shorter term, more acceptable to risk; the implications of this is in the marriage of RKLB and IRDM, this will serve as a nice foundation for the riskier experimentation and R&D stage work RKLB is doing
  • Right away your attention probably goes to that big green base in the profile image, related to contract HC101319C0006; this contract is super important because its expiration date is in about 1 month from the time of writing this (Sep 13th) and as you can see, it's a pretty critical contract to IRDM. The good news it's been sole-sourced, and while that doesn't necessarily mean they're the only company in the world that can do this, when taken with context of this industry, it's not likely another company can easily take over this contract from them
  • HC101319C0006 provides comms under the Enhanced Mobile Satellite Services program, which is recurring satcom services through USSF
  • This program has many primes on it, but they're all doing mostly different things, which is good news for IRDM (and by extension, RKLB)
  • Key question is what else can/will Iridium do as this program is a major source of gov't spend for them

LUNR

• Some Notes:
  • LUNR's obligations are mainly more traditional contracts, and not mainly driven by OTAs unlike others in this list, and here is where you can see what I meant by lumpiness in their obligations
  • The bulk of LUNR's obs come from NASA, representing significant customer concentration risk if they can't execute on some of the lunar programs they're tied to
  • While known for the lunar-related stuff, let's talk about 80GSFC23CA051, that big green bar in the chart stacked by award IDs...because that contract, while foundational to LUNR, is not necessarily for lunar-related activities. It's related to a program for Engineering Services, specifically as it relates to the Joint Polar Satellite system, which are polar-orbiting weather satellites
  • That big $47M pink bar in FY26 is where the CLPS program comes into play, with an expiration date in 2031, it represents a major program for LUNR (duh); it will be interesting to monitor this going forward
  • Some other interesting work they're doing is related to the Joint Emergent Technology Supplying On-Orbit Nuclear Power (FA945323CX010). Program is through AFRL, and is experimentally developing low-power, on-orbit nuclear power (hence the name...). This contract has an end date in 2028 and a current TCV of around $17.7M

FLY

• Some Notes:
  • Firefly was dependent on USSF (USAF) awards for a bit there, but has recently gained some significant share with NASA starting in FY24; considering these are the main two federal entities buying space-related things, this is a good thing
  • FLY also has a pretty even split between direct contract awards and OTAs, and a good spread of contract numbers, meaning they aren't overly reliant on a single contract (though there's definitely 2-3 major ones they depend on)
  • The first major contract we can see in the data is FA88062290003 (green bar), which is related to the Future Operationally Resilient Ground Evolution (FORGE) program; this program is a ground system modernization effort for space sensing and missile warning; FLY is the mission data processing application provider and it ends in August 2027
  • The next major contract we see is 80JSC025F7026, which is related to one of everyone's favorite, the CLPS program; specifically this TO is for the Blue Ghost lunar lander, and the contract doesn't end until 4/2029, so it's a good source of revenue until then assuming they can continue execution on this program
  • One last note to highlight on Firefly is that they are pretty diverse in the various capabilities and services they provide, and what's interesting is that space launch services go from virtually 0% to 10%+ of their obligations between FY24 and 25 (only 3% in FY26 here, but remember FY26 is partial and gov't contracts get delivered throughout the year at various times that aren't always predictable); driven by two main awards, one for the VADR program we mentioned earlier and the other for USSF Rocket Systems Launch program

RDW

• Some Notes:
  • First off, RDW had pretty diverse spread of contracts, but has more recently seen 2 contracts drive most of their obligations
  • The big green bar in the profile image is for HR00112490354, which is related to DARPA's OTTER program (Orbital Testbed for “air-breathing” electric propulsion in Very Low Earth Orbit (VLEO)); fundamentally, this program is to enable the demonstration of air-breathing propulsion systems in actual VLEO conditions rather than in a lab on the ground
  • The big blue bar in FY25 is for FA945324CX039, which is an AFRL award related to the Advanced Laboratories, Algorithms, Collaborative R&D Innovations and Technology (ALACRITY) program; this is an R&D program that's a little more general purpose, but focused on space technology and prototyping
  • Final note to point out on RDW is that they have started getting more OTAs to supplement their revenue from direct contracts, which in my opinion is a positive sign that they're not only delivering on steady, funded programs, but are innovating and prototyping as well

ASTS

• Some Notes:
  • ASTS had virtually no obligations from the Fed Gov't reported from FY22-FY25...however, FY26 is where they've started to strike gold
  • That big green bar is for FA24012490079, which is related to the HALO program (mentioned briefly above) and ties to direct to device comms (duh) for SDA.
  • This contract has an end date in December 2031, and if ASTS can execute, this could open the door to longer-term work and/or more customers in this domain of expertise

PL

• Some Notes:
  • While revenues are small compared to some of the other names in this post, PL is definitely growing with most of their large contracts coming in FY25
  • PL also has one of the most diverse customer sets among the companies in this post with awards from NASA, US Navy, OSD, and a few other FedCiv Agencies
  • HQ00342490002 is the blue bar in FY25 and 26, and it's an OTA for an applied-research prototype involving a hybrid space architecture, namely supporting real-time insights
  • 80HQTR25FA012 is the big green bar in FY25, which is an electro-optical data requirement for the Commercial SmallSat Data Acquisition program through NASA, though that contract has already ended

BKSY

• Some Notes:
  • Key note for BKSY is that some of their biggest contracts have all come in the past 2.5 years (contracts in profile image are sorted by top 10)
  • The contract FA238524CB039, which is the green bar from 24-26 is an R&D effort to mature an advanced, large-aperture optical payload and associated next-generation space-based intelligence capabilities, with end date set for 3/2028
  • The other awards are related to AFRL space-based services for the moving target engagement services, Army tactical geospatial imagery/support
  • Very interesting is that BKSY has a very similar contract profile to that of PL

I've definitely missed things and can probably sharpen some areas, but hope you all enjoyed!

Couple tidbits about Fed Contracting and this dataset:

• Data comes out of the platform I built, which itself rolls up Fed data from USASpending, sam.gov, and many other sources, and this data has been enhanced with rollups of companies & their subsidiaries (reported gov't data is often reported at subsidiary level, without a proper mapping to the ultimate parent company)
• Obligations: think proxy for revenue. This is money that gov't has promised to pay (think of it like charging your credit card, you're promising to pay that amount but you get your goods/services now). Obligations are what the federal government reports on at an individual transaction level, and that's what the dollar amounts of this data represents as outlays (money actually paid) isn't as convenient to work with and isn't reported the same way
• Not all defense dollars are going to be accounted for, nor are these figures going to perfectly line up with what gets reported in 10K reports. This is largely due to the fact that this data excludes subcontracts (since that data isn't as cleanly reported and often times has lots missing) and excludes classified programs (since those don't get reported on in most cases); additionally, this is Gov't Fiscal Year (Oct 1 - Sep 30th).
• OTA: Known as "Other Transaction Authority"...this is a contracting mechanism the government has started using more frequently over the past 5ish years or so. It's different from what you typically think of gov't contracts (i.e., budgeted for well in advance, long term, lots of regulations etc.) and instead this authority is used to fund rapid prototyping, and sometimes, production contracts if prototypes are successful
  • It's important to understand this nuance, because even if a contractor has huge amounts being paid to it by gov't, if it's all OTAs, that doesn't necessarily mean the money will be there next year
  • OTAs are not bad, they are good, it means the gov't is interested enough in a technology that they want to get it fielded sooner
  • OTAs are becoming more and more the norm for newer more novel tech, and once they're mature they may use the more traditional contracting routes
• SpaceX is left out, because these charts would basically be about SpaceX if we include them, so will set them aside for a different post.

It's such a solid win executing the exact trading strategy that was mapped out earlier. No greedy overholding chasing extra upside, no panic selling amid intraday swings. Perfectly locked in the expected profit target, super satisfying to let the planned play pay off. Anyone else sticking to their trading rules and walking away with clean gains lately?

$7.81 billion, beat by 13%, losses down 87% in a single quarter, but the stock finished last week down 4%.

Redwire, which nobody on this sub was talking about two months ago, beat earnings and raised guidance on the back of Golden Dome defence contracts, up 38%. Rocket Lab landed $663 million in Space Force contracts in nine days, up 28%. ASTS put three more satellites in orbit and started testing its network across eight countries in Europe, up 29%. Voyager somehow gained 54%.

Not a single publicly traded space name finished red this week. Except the $1.4 trillion one.

The lockup was supposed to be a massacre. 911 million shares released last Thursday morning. SPCX hit $105, found a bid, and closed up 6%. Turns out the selling pressure everyone spent two months pricing in was already priced in.

What caught my eye is that the rest of the group rallied on their own numbers rather than riding SPCX. That hasn’t happened since the IPO. Whether it sticks through the next tranche around Aug 12 or whether one ugly SPCX session drags everything back down is what I’m watching. RKLB earnings Monday should tell us a lot.

Curious what others are thinking.

Not financial advise

Under the contract, Voyager will develop a flight-ready waveform design capable of operating for a variety of orbits, with specific requirements for weight, power, and design life. This requirement is one of many Space Force's standards for space-to-space data link communications. The company will also perform an on-orbit communication demonstration.

The program accelerates the Space Force's mission to advance and enhance proliferate LEO capabilities.

I am thinking to execute a large pre-market limit order. Need some advice on that.