SpaceX has erased almost $1 trillion in stock market value in five weeks — more than most individual companies in the world are worth.

Retail investors who fought for shares at the $135 IPO price are down about 10% now. Those who bought four days later, at the June 16 peak of $225.64, are down around 40%. A 40% discount on the hottest company in the world may look like an obvious buy, but that instinct is exactly what needs examining.

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“Hype and quality are not the same thing,” Matthew Fleissig, CEO of the wealth management firm Pathstone, warned in a recent MarketWatch column. The next two weeks will test which one SpaceX has been trading on.

SpaceX (NASDAQ:SPCX) is…