Mr. Musk dug into his companies’ budgets, preferring to cut too much rather than too little and to deal with the fallout later. Under Donald Trump, he is set to apply those tactics to the U.S. government.

Meanwhile, Musk’s artificial intelligence start-up xAI has raised $5bn at a valuation of $45bn, almost double its valuation a few months ago, according to the people. The fundraising has been carried out at breakneck speed as discussions between Musk and his investors began just last month.

SpaceX’s Starship rocket will be launched for a sixth test flight next week, the latest experiment by the Elon Musk-owned aerospace firm to create reusable spacecraft after a previous test resulted in a “seminal moment” for the company.