Description •

The IPO market has woken up from its multi-year nap and is now in beast mode.

But as always, Wall Street's hottest party comes with an entrance fee and a dose of uncertainty - opaque prices, sketchy balance sheets, and a whole lot of FOMO.

So who's winning, who's losing, and who's still waiting in the pipeline? Let's find out.

The IPO Mania Returns

After years of drought, IPO mania is back in full swing. More than 150 companies have listed this year - up from 99 at this point in 2024 and just 76 in 2023, according to Renaissance Capital.

Together, they've raised nearly $30 billion, compared with $24 billion last year. First-day gains? Averaging 26%, the best since 2020. IPOs aren't just back, they're back with conviction.

Renaissance estimates we could see 40-

60 more deals before the year is out. In other words, if you thought you missed the fun, the afterparty's still ahead.

The Winners

Some debuts have been straight out of an IPO fantasy league.

Circle

CRCL, the stablecoin issuer, lit

up the screens with a jaw-dropping 168% surge on its first trading day.

Firefly Aerospace

FLY, a rocket and

lunar lander, blasted 30% higher on its IPO day, living up to its name.

Klarna

KLAR didn't exactly moon, but

a 15% pop for a lossmaking buy-now-pay-later firm isn't shabby in this environment.

Then there's Figure

FIGR, the

blockchain-native mortgage lender. Since its listing in mid-September, it's up 44% even after a midweek stumble. Investors

love a fintech-meets-crypto mashup story and Figure is playing it well.

Who said Figma

FIG? The design

software maker went vertical in its market debut, although reality has since slapped it down from those frothy day-one highs.

Still, design nerds everywhere are proudly watching their favorite platform make its way up the rankings among the world's biggest software companies.

The Losers

Not every PO has the golden touch.

StubHub

STUB, the ticketing

platform, came in hot with an 8% intraday pop above its $23.50 listing price, only to end its first session underwater at $22.

The days after? Even worse - the stock is floating near the $18 mark.

CoreWeave

CRWV, the Al up-and-

comer, is a really interesting one. First off, it stumbled at the start after pricing its shares at $40 to float in March.

It traded under its IPO price for a while before clawing back with Al hype fueling the shares by 450% May through June.

Then insider selling knocked the winds out of its sails in August.

Now it's gravitating at triple its offering price, proving IPOs are a marathon, not a sprint.

The Pricing Game

The truth is, IPO pricing is as much science as it is art (and sometimes performance art). Investment banks like

Goldman

GS, Morgan Stanley

MS MS,

and Citi

citi

C run the roadshows, build

the books, and set the price.

Oversubscribed IPOs often guarantee a strong open. Undersubscribed ones?

Crickets.

Bears hate this one simple trick: most IPOs only float about 15-20% of the company. That tiny slice of tradable shares means volatility is baked into the flotation. Throw in a 180-day lockup (when insiders can't sell), and early trading is a weird mix of price discovery and pure speculation.

The Fundamentals Still Matter

The hype is real, but the numbers don't lie. Valuations on some of these newly public firms are eye-watering. Circle trades at 130x earnings estimates, Figma at 184x. Compare that to Adobe's 5x and you see how far the IPO froth can go.

Meanwhile, many of these firms aren't consistently profitable. They post alternating quarters of red ink and black ink while investors cheer growth over everything.

Unicorn Watch: Who's Next?

Here's who's buzzing on the IPO radar and what they're worth in 2025:

• OpenAl, Al overlord, $500 billion
• SpaceX, rockets and satellites, $450

billion

• XAl /X.com, Elon Musk's Al play, $200

billion

• Anthropic, OpenAl rival, $190 billion
• Databricks, data and Al analytics, $100

billion

• Stripe, payments giant, $92 billion
• Revolut, digital banking, $75 billion
• Canva, design platform (and your CV maker), $42 billion
• Canva, design platform (and your CV maker), $42 billion
• • Fanatics, sports merch and betting, $30

  billion

  • Discord, chat for gamers (and everyone else), $15 billion
  • Solera, software and data for auto and insurance, $10 billion
  • Grayscale, crypto asset manager (part of Digital Currency Group), $10 billion
  • AlphaSense, market intelligence, $4

  billion

  • Wealthfront, robo-advisor, $2 billion
  • Quora, knowledge-sharing platform,

  $500 million

  The Risk of Chasing

  So should you pile in? Here's the trader's dilemma: first-day pops are seductive, but inflated pricing means you're often exit liquidity for early investors.

  Waiting a few days, weeks, or even months for the froth to fade, lockups to expire, analyst coverage to roll in, and the hype to cool may be the smarter play.

  Final Take

  The current IPO season is hot, but so is the risk. But every IPO is different. Circle shows monster returns are possible, while StubHub proves not every ticker deserves a ticker-tape parade.

  The winners? Companies with strong fundamentals (not just growth, but profits) and a story that Wall Street loves right now (Al, crypto, fintech).

  The losers? Overpriced firms without consistent performance. The candidates?

  Mega-unicorns waiting for their grand entrance and some smaller players ready to make a splash.

  As always, timing is everything. Here's to hoping your favorite IPO won't list right after a hawkish Jay Powell.

  Off to you: What IPOs are on your radar for this year and the next? Share your thoughts in the comments! I’d love to see them. See ya 👋