Why Iridium Stock Trounced the Market on Thursday

By Eric Volkman – Apr 2, 2026 at 7:11PM ESTKey PointsApparently, a prominent company in the sector might be acquired.The would-be buyer is a top name in online retail.Satellite stocks were hot among investors on Thursday, and one beneficiary of this was telecom services specialist Iridium Communications (IRDM +15.32%). Following a widely read media report about a peer company potentially being acquired, Iridium's share price zoomed more than 15% higher. That crushed the essentially flat performance of the S&P 500 index. Star turn Before market open, the Financial Times published an article stating that Globalstar was in discussions with Amazon about a potential acquisition. Such a deal would bolster Amazon's current satellite internet effort, called Leo (not coincidentally, the acronym for low Earth orbit, the region of Earth's orbit most crowded with satellites). Image source: Getty Images. Citing unnamed "people familiar with the matter," the FT wrote that the two companies have been discussing a deal for some time. There were no indications of how much this might be worth. One complicating factor, according to the FT's sources, is Apple, which holds a 20% stake in Globalstar. The newspaper said that Apple and Amazon were also holding talks. Amazon is likely not Globalstar's only suitor. Late last year, it reportedly discussed a possible acquisition with the Elon Musk-led SpaceX. At the time, according to Bloomberg, this was among discussions with other companies that had some interest in buying the company. None of the mentioned companies has officially commented on the FT article. ExpandNASDAQ: IRDMIridium CommunicationsToday's Change(15.32%) $4.37Current Price$32.89Key Data PointsMarket Cap$3.0BDay's Range$29.16 - $32.9352wk Range$15.64 - $33.34Volume114KAvg Vol2.2MGross Margin47.43%Dividend Yield2.07% AI in the void The clear interest in Globalstar from deep-pocketed strategic investors highlights the value of satellite networks. These are rightly considered the "next frontier" not only in the telecom and defense industries, but also in the white-hot tech segment of artificial intelligence (AI). A popular topic in the tech world is the possibility of building AI-capable data centers in space. That said, the sudden surge of investor interest in satellite stocks in the wake of the report feels like a frenzy. While companies like Iridium have their own merits, it's always risky to trade on secondary takeover speculation. I'd leave Iridium and its peers alone in the coming days as that frenzy cools down.Read NextApr 2, 2026 •By Keithen DruryNvidia's Blackwell and Rubin Chips Will Have $1 Trillion in Lifetime Sales.

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