Robinhood Gains IPO Underwriter Approval as SpaceX Eyes Retail

Robinhood Securities said it had secured approval to act as an IPO underwriter, moving from a distribution role into the main underwriting group alongside Wall Street banks. Chief executive Vlad Tenev said in a Tuesday X post that Robinhood Securities is "now approved to serve as an underwriter," without specifying which regulator granted the approval, a process that typically involves oversight from the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA).

He called the move the "natural next step" after launching IPO Access in 2021 and said the question had shifted from "why allocate to retail at all?" to "how big can the allocation be?" Those remarks come as SpaceX reportedly considers making as much as 30% of its record-setting offering available to retail investors, with demand already running at close to four times the planned size.

At the same time, crypto platforms are building parallel rails for the same listings.

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