Virgin Galactic (SPCE) could rerun a test flight of its SpaceShipTwo vehicle as early as Saturday, an important step needed before commercial flights can begin. SPCE stock surged.
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The test comes after the space tourism company aborted a powered flight on Dec. 12, when it failed to reach major milestones due to a sudden shutdown of the rocket engine’s firing sequence.
Management has said the next powered flight will test the work done since the aborted flight.
“The team installed the hybrid rocket engine in SpaceShipTwo Unity as part of preflight preparations for our flight test window opening this week. Credit to Senior Propulsion Engineer and New Mexico-born Rich C De Baca for the video walk-through ! ” pic.twitter.com/gXW3PMDa7V
– Virgin Galactic (@virgingalactic) February 8, 2021
The test also includes the original goals of the December flight, which was intended to complete data collection for the last two FAA verification and validation milestones.
Those milestones are needed before SpaceShipTwo can be approved for commercial flights.
In addition, the customer cabin and improved horizontal stabilizers and flight controls will be evaluated.
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Test Priced in SPCE Stock?
Shares of Virgin Galactic rose 6% today to 55.66 on the stock market. The SPCE stock was among the high-short stocks that captured interest from retail investors in January and has more than doubled since the beginning of the year.
Shares of Boeing (BA), whose venture capital arm has invested in Virgin Galactic, was up 0.6%.
Wall Street is extremely optimistic about the company, despite not starting a commercial service or earning revenue. The majority of analysts still have a buy rating on SPCE stock, but some are getting skittish.
UBS lowered the value of Virgin Galactic stock to natural purchase on Wednesday on a “conscious” approach to valuation. Analyst Myles Walton wrote that he thinks a successful test flight by Virgin Galactic is already priced into its stock price. UBS now has a stock price target of 52.
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