Shares of Intuitive Machines Inc. reversed course to trade lower in very active trading Wednesday, a day before the much-anticipated moon landing of the space-exploration company’s commercial probe.
In the latest update on the mission, the company said Thursday that its probe, Odysseus, had completed its main-engine, lunar-orbit insertion burn and was currently in a 92-kilometer circular lunar orbit.
“Odysseus continues to be in excellent health,” the company said.
Prior to Wednesday’s pullback, the stock
LUNR,
had rocketed 120.7% over the three trading sessions following the launch of the company’s Nova-C lunar lander atop a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket Thursday morning. The stock had closed Tuesday at the highest price since April 19, 2023.
With the Nova-C scheduled to land at the moon’s south pole early on Feb. 22, the stock powered higher ahead of Wednesday’s open. It was up as much as 27% in early premarket trading before paring gains to be up 17.3% just before the opening bell at 9:30 a.m. Eastern time.
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Then the bottom fell out and the stock was down as much as 27.2%, at an intraday low of $8, before bouncing. It was down 8.8% in morning trading.
Trading volume just after the first-hour mark of the regular session was 21.4 million shares, compared with the full-day average over the past 30 days of about 6.2 million shares.
The stock has been halted three times for volatility since the open.
The Nova-C is on track to become the first U.S. spacecraft to land on the moon since Apollo 17’s Challenger in December 1972.
While Intuitive Machines’ stock has blasted 245.7% higher over the past three months, it was down 73.5% over the past 12 months.
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