US IPO Weekly Winners & Losers

OpenAI is now in a race to go public in Q4, ahead of Anthropic.

It’s a welcome change. Not long ago, companies competed to see who could delay their IPOs the longest (Stripe being the MVP).

This week, however, new stocks hit some turbulence. Microsoft’s weak earnings fueled a tech sell-off, especially in AI-linked growth stocks. It didn’t help that the Fed kept rates steady, citing elevated inflation.

• My take: While stock valuation is more art than science, rest assured the fundamental AI story remains intact. Whether companies see real earnings growth from AI investments, or merely keep up with competitors, either way AI companies stand to be the beneficiaries of this singular shift.

The IPO Index shed -5.5% this week, compared to +0.3% for the S&P 500. Solar systems developer Nextpower was the winner, up +11.5%, while Reddit came in last, sliding -17.6% amid analyst concerns over slowing ad growth and LLMs’ apparent preference for YouTube content.

The weak market spilled over into this week’s four IPOs, none of which closed above the offer price. It’s notable that Brazilian fintech PicPay (Nasdaq: PICS) and aerospace play York Space Systems (NYSE: YSS) priced at the high end – historically a sign of strong demand – yet still traded down. Ten SPACs also went public, a four-year record.

Against that backdrop, as many as eight IPOs are lined up for the week ahead. If all of them price, it would mark the IPO market’s most active week since 2021. Biotech is staging a big comeback, alongside two consumer names (Bob's Discount Furniture and Once Upon a Farm), and adtech software firm Liftoff Mobile. Meanwhile, AI data center equipment supplier Forgent Power is aiming for the year’s first billion-dollar IPO.

That is, assuming a government shutdown doesn’t interrupt those plans.