[llboston]

From Wiki [1]: SpaceX spent its own capital to develop and fly its previous launcher, Falcon 1, with no pre-arranged sales of launch services. SpaceX developed Falcon 9 with private capital as well, but did have pre-arranged commitments by NASA to purchase several operational flights once specific capabilities were demonstrated.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Falcon_9

[ceejayoz]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Falcon_1#Launches

Customers: DARPA, DARPA, DOD/NASA, mass simulator (instead of the intended payload after the first three launches), Malaysia (the intended payload of the fourth flight).

"pre-arranged commitments by NASA to purchase several operational flights" is a subsidy, as were the milestone payments along the way.

I'm a huge SpaceX fan, but let's not pretend they could've done this alone. They very nearly went bankrupt on Falcon 1, per Musk - https://www.cnbc.com/2017/09/29/elon-musk-9-years-ago-spacex... - and had they needed to self-fund those launches/payloads entirely they would not have survived. It's a beautiful example of how powerful public/private partnerships can be.

[cryptonector]

Would you call that a subsidy still if the government saved more money than it provided as the subsidy?

[johngladtj]

Would you call all options and futures subsidies? Are airlines subsidizing oil companies when they purchase oil futures in order to hedge their oil costs?

There is no indication that these commitments were underpriced by the government, so to call them subsidies is at best baseless misinformation.