SpaceX, Anthropic, OpenAI can rewrite history for megacap IPOs

Investors face a key decision on when to buy shares in upcoming mega-tech IPOs like SpaceX, Anthropic, and OpenAI. Historical data shows tech IPOs often slump in their first year. However, these companies are exceptionally large and vital to the market. Experts suggest waiting to buy might be prudent, as seen with past tech giants. The history of megacap initial public offerings shows that the stocks usually slump in the first year of trading. But upcoming listings from SpaceX, Anthropic and OpenAI are big enough and systemically important enough to the market that those analogies may not apply. All of which poses a crucial timing question for investors: When is the right moment to buy shares in one of the upcoming mega-tech IPOs? "These behemoth IPOs will rapidly take up both the market share of benchmarks and the mindshare of retail investors," said Max Gokhman, senior vice president at Franklin Templeton Investment Solutions. Looking at 30 major technology IPOs over the past 15 years, Truist Wealth found that they averaged a maximum decline of 55% in the first year of trading. Forward returns skewed negative at the six-month mark as well, according to Truist calculations. There are numerous possible reasons for the weakness, including low public share floats and added selling pressure from the expiration of lockups preventing early investors from selling right away. The difference, however, is the IPOs that are coming aren't your normal megacap deals. SpaceX, which is officially known as Space Exploration Technologies Corp., is seeking $75 billion in what's set to be the largest IPO of all time, valuing the company at about $1.8 trillion. Anthropic has held private funding rounds that value it at $965 billion, and OpenAI is worth $852 billion based on its own fundraising. All three jumbo-sized offerings are expected to result in market values of more than $1 trillion or at least very close to it. There are currently only 11 companies in the S&P 500 Index with market capitalizations above $1 trillion. "I have never been asked more about an IPO than SpaceX from our retail clients and advisers," said Matt Stucky, chief portfolio manager of equities at Northwestern Mutual Wealth Management Co. "That's interesting, but at the same time it's also a little concerning just from a risk management perspective." The deals come at a time when investors are increasingly fixated on AI, both as a stock market catalyst and risk. Massive amounts of capital expenditures pledged by companies such as Alphabet Inc., Meta Platforms Inc., Amazon.com Inc. and Microsoft Corp. have boosted revenues and stock prices in numerous seemingly unrelated industries, from semiconductors to energy providers to construction firms. SpaceX, Anthropic and OpenAI are already seen as leaders in this field and are expected to further cement that status in the years to come. But that doesn't mean buying the shares right after the IPO is the best way for investors to play the stocks. "You didn't have to buy the IPO in Google and Facebook to make money on these stocks long term," Stucky said. "Just because you're not buying it day one doesn't mean that it can't be a good investment for you if you were to buy it six months, a year after the fact." The rush of large IPOs in rapid succession is reminiscent of the dot-com era of the late 1990s. Back then, high-profile companies like VA Linux Systems Inc., Ask Jeeves Inc. and Webvan Group Inc. rushed to tap the public market as investors snapped up anything related to the Internet. Then, as many of their lockup agreements expired and insiders started selling, the flood of new shares changed the market's supply-demand equation, according to TS Lombard. The concern is we could see a repeat of that boom-and-bust period. "Once the lockups end and the floodgates open for employees and venture investors to realize significant wealth, the marginal selling pressure can upset an already fragile setup," Gokhman said. "Before that happens, however, we may see the kind of melt-up that often precedes major corrections." Here's how three big tech IPOs performed in their first year of trading, compared with longer-term performance. Meta Platforms Meta Platforms, which was known as Facebook when it debuted in 2012, had a rough first day of trading and a challenging first year. The IPO priced at $38 a share and opened at around $42, but quickly gave that up to close basically flat, which is unusual because these deals are typically priced for the shares to rise. Then, over the next 12 months, it dropped more than 30% -- before taking off. Today, the stock is up more than 1,400% from its IPO price. Tesla Elon Musk's electric-vehicle maker is a good example of a stock that experienced extremely choppy trading after its IPO. Tesla Inc. shares meandered for a few months after their debut in June 2010, then rallied in November and December, before slipping again. While they were up 18% after 12 months, they also were underperforming the S&P 500 and trading well below their record high at the time. Of course, Tesla's stock price has continued to be highly volatile, but that hasn't prevented it from posting outsized gains -- the shares have soared more than 25,000% since the IPO. CoreWeave Inc.'s stock has jumped over 150% since its March 2025 IPO, but getting there has been anything but smooth. First, the offering for the cloud-computing services provider had to be downsized ahead of listing, forcing supplier and backer Nvidia Corp. to step in and anchor the sale. CoreWeave Chief Executive Officer Michael Intrator said the deal wouldn't have closed without that support. Then, the stock opened below its $40 IPO price in its trading debut -- and closed at the same level that afternoon. Then, the trajectory picked up and the shares soared more than 400% to a record high in June 2025. But they proceeded to shed half of that gain last summer, and since then trading has largely been all about highs and lows. The stock remains down 44% from its peak. Tech Chart of the Day