Why Virgin Galactic Holdings (SPCE) Went Up This Week

Virgin Galactic Holdings Inc. (NYSE:SPCE) is the only public company in the world that is working on commercial spaceflight for customers. It plans to commence space tourism flights sometime later this year. The company, founded in 2004, started trading on the NYSE in October 2018 after merging with special purpose acquisition company called Social Capital Hedosophia.

SPCE shares have been on a roller coaster ride since going public. Virgin Galactic stock was trading around $12 at the start of 2020. The stock touched a high of $42.49 in February following the news that nearly 8,000 people are interested in flying to space with the company, with 600 of them already purchased the tickets for the first flight.

Virgin Galactic in July revealed the interior cabin design and seating arrangement of its VSS Unity spacecraft to offer media and interested people a glimpse of experience passengers will have during the actual flight. SPCE stock once again rose in December in anticipation of a test flight of VSS Unity. However, the company had to abort the test flight in the mid-air due to technical issues. The stock fell more than 17 percent after the failed attempt.

The company’s share price once again rose above $30 on Thursday following the news that ARK Investment Management is planning to launch a space-themed ETF. Industry experts believe that the said ETF will certainly add Virgin Galactic to its portfolio. Ark already owns 7 ETFs focusing different industries such as 3D printing, robotics, and genomics.

Virgin Galactic stock slightly moved down in the mid-day trading Friday following Thursday’s sharp surge. Overall, SPCE share price has increased around 120 percent over the past year, and nearly 31 percent so far in 2021.