NorthStar lists in New York, falls 42 per cent
NorthStar Earth & Space became a public company this week. The Montreal space-tracking firm said Thursday it had completed its combination with Viking Acquisition Corp. I, the blank-cheque company it agreed to merge with in April. The combined company, NorthStar Earth & Space Enterprises, Inc., began trading Friday on NYSE American under the symbol NSTR, with its warrants as NSTR.WS. The deal values NorthStar at $US 300 million and came with a $US 30-million private placement anchored by Cartesian Capital Group.
The first day was rough. Viking’s shares closed Thursday at $US 7.72. NSTR opened at $US 5.30, touched $US 5.64 in its first minutes and closed at $US 4.45, 42 per cent below Viking’s last price, on about 213,000 shares. The debut also slipped a day: Viking’s Sept. 28 announcement had the shares trading Oct. 1, and moved the listing from the New York Stock Exchange itself to its small-company market, NYSE American.
NorthStar arrives on the market with a $40-million, 12-month contract to supply space surveillance data to the Royal Canadian Air Force, a deal to fly its next sensors on Kepler Communications satellites, and a new chief technology officer, Peter Klimas, named this week.
It is not a constituent of the SpaceQ Canadian Space Index. The index holds only companies with a Canadian listing quoted in Canadian dollars. SpaceQ reported in June that NorthStar was pursuing a Toronto Stock Exchange listing alongside the New York debut; this week’s announcements lists only the NYSE American. Under the index methodology, a new Canadian listing would also have to trade for 90 days before it could join.
Index gains while the TSX slips
The SpaceQ Canadian Space Index rose 0.9 per cent to 104.05 in the week ended Oct. 2. Four of its nine companies gained, two were unchanged and three fell. The S&P/TSX Composite fell 0.8 per cent, the Procure Space ETF declined 1.0 per cent and the S&P 500 slipped 0.3 per cent. Four weeks after its launch, it stands 4.05 points above its Sept. 4 base of 100.00.
The SpaceQ Canadian Space Index is an editorial measure published by SpaceQ for journalistic purposes. It is not an investable index, not a financial benchmark, and nothing in it constitutes investment advice.
The board
| Company | Ticker | Close, Oct. 2 | Week | YTD | 52-week range |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 5N Plus | VNP | $33.10 | +10.7% | +86.8% | 52% |
| C-COM Satellite Systems | CMI | $0.86 | +3.6% | +6.2% | 24% |
| Calian Group | CGY | $84.01 | +1.5% | +52.9% | 83% |
| Telesat | TSAT | $68.19 | +0.1% | +72.3% | 67% |
| Intermap Technologies | IMP | $0.89 | +0.0% | -51.9% | 2% |
| Maritime Launch Services | MAXQ | $0.43 | +0.0% | +53.6% | 58% |
| Magellan Aerospace | MAL | $34.25 | -1.8% | +85.9% | 68% |
| Baylin Technologies | BYL | $0.22 | -2.3% | -17.3% | 0% |
| MDA Space | MDA | $42.54 | -4.6% | +59.7% | 46% |
5N Plus jumps 10.7 per cent
5N Plus rose 10.7 per cent to $33.10, the week’s largest gain and the only double-digit move on the board. The company issued no news during the week. It has now gained 86.8 per cent this year, the best of the nine.
C-COM Satellite Systems gained 3.6 per cent to 86 cents. Calian Group rose 1.5 per cent to $84.01 in a week when it and Invest Ottawa announced the Northstar Defence Lab at Area X.O, the first in a planned national network of Calian defence labs. The lab has no connection to NorthStar Earth & Space. Telesat edged up 0.1 per cent to $68.19.
MDA Space falls
MDA Space fell 4.6 per cent to $42.54, the week’s steepest decline, with no announcements from the company. It closed the week at 46 per cent of its 52-week range and is still up 59.7 per cent this year.
Baylin Technologies fell 2.3 per cent to 22 cents, the bottom of its 52-week range, and is down 17.3 per cent this year. Magellan Aerospace declined 1.8 per cent to $34.25. Intermap Technologies and Maritime Launch Services were unchanged at 89 cents and 43 cents.
Number of the week: -42%
NorthStar Earth & Space closed its first day on NYSE American at $US 4.45, 42 per cent below the $US 7.72 that Viking Acquisition Corp. I, the shell it merged into, fetched the day before.
SpaceX gains
SpaceX rose 6.9 per cent, the largest gain among the 20 U.S. companies SpaceQ tracks, in a week when five rose and 15 fell. The company flew a Starship into orbit for the first time on Monday and released 26 Starlink version 3 satellites from it. Thursday brought three launches in one day. A Falcon 9 carried Canadian astronaut Josh Kutryk and the Crew-13 mission to the International Space Station in the morning. In the afternoon a second Falcon 9 on the Transporter-18 rideshare mission launched three Canadian satellites from California, two methane monitors for GHGSat and NordSpace’s first satellite. Then at 11:54 p.m. EDT a Falcon Heavy lifted off from Kennedy Space Center with NROL-97, a classified payload for the U.S. National Reconnaissance Office, the first time the agency has flown on SpaceX’s heavy-lift rocket after 22 missions on Falcon 9. Both side boosters landed at Cape Canaveral.
EchoStar gained 4.6 per cent. Its DISH DBS television subsidiary emerged from Chapter 11 on Thursday, two days after a Texas bankruptcy court confirmed its prepackaged plan, with about $US 4.35 billion less debt. Iridium Communications, Globalstar and Planet Labs each rose 0.4 per cent. Rocket Lab closed three cents lower in a week it signed Synspective of Tokyo to 20 Electron launches from 2028 through 2031, the largest commercial Electron contract in its history; the terms were not disclosed. Voyager Technologies slipped 1.3 per cent after closing a $US 402.5-million convertible notes offering on Monday.
Sidus Space fell 14.6 per cent, the steepest U.S. decline. On Monday it pulled its LizzieSat-5 satellite off Transporter-18, days before that mission flew, and rebooked it with LizzieSat-4 on SpaceX’s Bandwagon-6 rideshare, no earlier than April 2027. Momentus dropped 12.3 per cent. Two companies that launched satellites this week fell anyway: Spire Global, down 8.0 per cent, put the first three satellites built at its Boulder, Colo., factory on Transporter-18, and Satellogic, down 7.1 per cent, launched the first satellite of its Merlin constellation on a Falcon 9 from Vandenberg on Thursday. AST SpaceMobile fell 5.4 per cent; on Friday B. Riley cut its rating on the stock to Neutral from Buy and its price target to $US 65 from $US 85, citing delayed launches and rising competition.
Seraphim rallies, Innospace slips
This issue adds two companies outside North America. Seraphim Space Investment Trust, a London-listed fund that holds stakes in space companies, rose 8.6 per cent to 202.5 pence, about $3.82, without issuing a regulatory announcement during the week. Innospace, the South Korean rocket developer listed on the KOSDAQ, fell 2.0 per cent to 6,470 won, about $6.85, from its Sept. 23 close, the last before a two-day Chuseok holiday. It dropped to 5,870 won, about $6.20, on Wednesday before recovering most of the loss. Canadian-dollar equivalents use Friday’s exchange rates.
The SpaceQ Canadian Space Index is an equal-weighted editorial measure of Canada’s publicly traded space-economy companies, with a base of 100.00 at the close of Sept. 4, 2026. Full methodology (v1.0). The SpaceQ Canadian Space Index is an editorial measure published by SpaceQ for journalistic purposes. It is not an investable index, not a financial benchmark, and nothing in it constitutes investment advice.
Source: Yahoo Finance Canada. Figures are as of the close of Oct. 2, 2026. NSTR figures are from Yahoo Finance for its first trading session.