AI's Megastartups Line Up for a $3.6 Trillion IPO Wave

The numbers attached to this year's IPO pipeline are hard to fit in one's head. SpaceX, OpenAI and Anthropic are each preparing to list, and together they are reaching for valuations that add up to roughly $3.6 trillion. Three companies, one calendar year, a sum larger than the annual output of most national economies.

SpaceX is furthest down the road. The company filed a confidential S-1 on 1 April, initially targeting a valuation between $1.75 trillion and $2 trillion, a figure it has since revised upward past $2 trillion. Goldman Sachs is leading a 21-bank syndicate, the roadshow began in early June, and the listing is scheduled for 12 June. Elon Musk's rocket and satellite business is not an AI company in the strict sense, but it anchors a wave that is mostly about artificial intelligence.

The two firms that define that wave are OpenAI and Anthropic. OpenAI is running at about $25 billion in annualised revenue against a last-private valuation of $852 billion, with talk of a public debut north of $1 trillion. Anthropic, the maker of Claude, has crossed $30 billion in annualised revenue on year-over-year growth the company puts at 1,400 percent, and is reportedly in talks to raise $50 billion at a $900 billion valuation.

A finite amount of money

The bullish case writes itself. Coatue's Thomas Laffont has argued the wave will mint several trillion-dollar public companies and give ordinary investors their first real access to the AI build-out. The worry is plumbing, not enthusiasm. As venture investor Tomasz Tunguz put it, this is a $3 trillion stress test. Institutional funds have only so much capacity to absorb fresh equity in a single quarter, and three mega-listings landing in quick succession could crowd each other out, or pull money away from the rest of the market.

There is a structural wrinkle too. None of the three is expected to enter the S&P 500 this year, so index funds will not be forced buyers on day one. Demand has to come from active managers who choose to step in.

What it signals

Whatever the share prices do, the timing says something about where the industry thinks it stands. Private capital has carried these companies a remarkably long way. OpenAI and Anthropic have raised tens of billions without ever ringing the opening bell. Going public means quarterly disclosure, analyst scrutiny, and a market that reprices you every second it is open. Choosing that now is a bet that the revenue growth is real and durable enough to survive daylight.

It also raises the stakes for everyone watching the AI trade. Until now, the eye-watering valuations of OpenAI and Anthropic were private marks, negotiated between a handful of sophisticated investors. Once the shares trade freely, the whole market gets a vote, and the answer will be visible to anyone with a brokerage app.

We covered Anthropic's expanding government work and the federal push to centralise AI oversight earlier this month. The IPO calendar is the financial counterpart to those stories: the same companies, now asking the public to price the future they have been selling in private.