Rocket Lab Shares Drop 3% on $1B Stock Offering Plan

Rocket Lab USA Inc., the aerospace company specializing in small satellite launches and space systems, saw its shares drop more than 3 percent in premarket trading Wednesday after disclosing plans for a potential $1 billion at-the-market stock offering. The announcement came a day after the stock surged 10 percent to close at $78.59, buoyed by a landmark $190 million Department of Defense contract for hypersonic testing.

The new agreement, the company's largest single launch deal to date, involves conducting 20 missions over four years using Rocket Lab's HASTE rocket system as part of the Multi-Service Advanced Capability Hypersonic Test Bed program, or MACH-TB 2.0. Administered by the Naval Surface Warfare Center's Crane Division, the initiative focuses on accelerating hypersonic flight experiments for military applications. Kratos Defense & Security Solutions serves as the prime contractor, with Rocket Lab handling Task Area 1 operations. The first launch is expected within months of contract execution. HASTE, a variant of the Electron launch vehicle, has achieved speeds exceeding Mach 5 and maintains a perfect 100 percent success rate across prior missions under the program,...