This article first appeared in The Edge Malaysia Weekly on January 12, 2026 - January 18, 2026
FOR the past several years, in one of the WhatsApp messaging groups that I belong to, we have been encouraging each other to make a bunch of predictions. Among my favourites is the prediction for the benchmark market gauge S&P 500’s year-end level. I believe I have come fairly close to predicting the index level in four of the last eight tries. In 2023 and 2024, I predicted the S&P 500 would be up at least over 20%. It was up 26.3% in 2023 and 25.02% in 2024 on a total return basis, including reinvested dividends. Last year, I predicted at least a 20% gain for the index which ended 2025 up 17.9%. Though not quite what I predicted but still fairly close. That said, I will concede that I got 2021 and 2022 spectacularly wrong with my index predictions.
This year, I thought I should try my hand at predicting the big initial public offerings (IPOs) in 2026 for my fortnightly column while keeping my annual market index prediction private for my WhatsApp buddies.
The S&P 500 has more than doubled over the past three years, inclusive of reinvested dividends, since the market bottomed in late 2022 amidst the fastest US interest rate hiking cycle in history. In more normal times, there is almost always a flurry of new listings as the economy and the market enter a steep recovery phase. Yet, the past two years were lacklustre for IPOs on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) as well as at its tech-heavy, crosstown rival Nasdaq. The two US bourses together raised over US$60 billion (RM243 billion) combined last year though the Hong Kong Exchange emerged as the bourse that single-handedly raised the most — over US$38 billion from IPO listings over the past 12 months. For NYSE and Nasdaq, 2025 was the best year for IPOs since 2021.
Among the year’s bigger listings were AI cloud computing firm CoreWeave, Swedish buy now, pay later firm Klarna and crypto plays Circle Internet Group and Bullish. In comparison, the London Stock Exchange saw only six companies go public through an IPO, raising just US$208 million or the lowest amount of capital raised through new listings in over three decades. Singapore IPOs raised US$2.5 billion through 38 new listings last year while 60 IPOs in Malaysia raised RM 5.96 billion in 2025.
With the US market up over 100% from the lows of late 2022 and several of the giant artificial intelligence (AI) startups ready for public scrutiny, 2026 could turn out to be a blockbuster year for IPOs — much like 1999 was for Internet firms ahead of the March 2000 dotcom bubble burst.
The IPO roster for the current year is already a formidable one. Even if only half of the top 10 companies — AI giants OpenAI and Anthropic; dual Toronto- and San Francisco-headquartered competitor Cohere; Elon Musk’s SpaceX; fintech firms Stripe and Plaid; London-based digital bank Revolut; emerging defence contractor Anduril Industries; Chinese fast fashion e-commerce platform Shein; and billionaire fashion influencer Kim Kardashian’s shapewear firm SKIMS, which are reportedly preparing for a listing in 2026 — do actually list, it will be a truly blockbuster year, probably as big or bigger than 1999 or 2000.
Two of the world’s largest tech startups — hectocorns (or private firms valued at over US$100 billion) SpaceX and OpenAI — are reportedly looking to raise between US$30 billion and US$100 billion at valuations of around US$1 trillion later this year.
Musk’s SpaceX owns Starlink, a low Earth orbit satellite constellation with 9,300 satellites in orbit. More than 68% or over two of every three satellites in orbit are now Starlink operated. SpaceX was valued at US$800 billion in an insider share sale in the secondary market last month. Musk has hinted at a 2026 IPO raising more than US$30 billion at a valuation of at least US$1 trillion. The last time a company tried to raise that much money was in late 2020 when Ant Group, the fintech affiliate of Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba Holdings, sought just over US$30 billion in an IPO that was abruptly pulled. Recently, Musk projected SpaceX revenues of about US$15.5 billion in 2025 and around US$22 to US$24 billion this year.
For its part, ChatGPT creator OpenAI needs a ton of money now and will probably seek to raise a lot more as part of its IPO later in the year because, unlike SpaceX, it isn’t generating as much and is also expected to lose tens of billions between now and 2030. It was projected to rake in US$13 billion last year but generated only US$4.3 billion in the first half. It lost US$13.5 billion in the first half of last year. So, OpenAI is losing more than three times as much money as it earns in revenue. It also has huge infrastructure commitments — over US$1.4 trillion by 2030 — just to build data centres (DCs).
Unlike rival Anthropic, which has a very focused, corporate client-centric business model, OpenAI wants to sell mostly to consumers around the world. It is also trying to build AI devices that will compete with Apple, take a share of advertising from Google and Meta Platforms, share in e-commerce from Amazon and control the whole value chain with its own infrastructure — not just DCs but chips and power plants as well — while also trying to peddle software and services, including an AI-powered SuperApp. Unlike Google or Meta Platforms that rely on cash flow from their legacy businesses to fund most of their AI spending, OpenAI’s CEO and co-founder Sam Altman is looking to borrow a lot of money and bring in an array of partners across all of its ventures. In October, it established a US$4 billion credit line with JPMorgan Chase, Citigroup, Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley. It has also turned to large private credit firms like Blue Owl to fund some of its projects. It’s a risky strategy and, to pull it off, OpenAI will need to raise hundreds of billions over the next five years.
OpenAI is currently trying to raise up to US$100 billion at a valuation of around US$750 billion. It recently also allocated US$50 billion for employee stock grants. The reason it is in a hurry to list is because it needs as much capital as it can get its hands on before the market turns sour on AI. Investment bankers say OpenAI could seek to raise at least another US$60 billion or possibly more during the IPO around the end of the year.
The first big AI IPO off the gates this year is likely to be Anthropic whose AI chatbot and its large language models are both called Claude. The firm whose shareholders include Amazon, Google and Salesforce is currently in the process of raising US$10 billion at a valuation of US$350 billion. Among the investors in the round are Philippe Laffont’s tech-focused investment firm Coatue Management and Singapore’s GIC. To give you an idea of just how far and fast the AI startup has come, just 10 months ago, Anthropic raised US$3.5 billion at a US$61.5 billion valuation. In November, it sealed a partnership with Microsoft and Nvidia who are pouring US$15 billion into the company in return for Anthropic committing US$30 billion to buy Microsoft Azure’s compute capacity powered by Nvidia’s chips. Anthropic’s primary focus is on corporate customers rather than consumers whom OpenAI is chasing. It has hired a bunch of Wall Street investment bankers and lawyers to create large language models that would do some of the repetitive work that bankers and lawyers currently do.
Another hectocorn that is expected to file for an IPO in the second half of the year is the data analytics platform Databricks. It is seen as a key part of an emerging AI tech stack. 60% of Fortune 500 companies give their data to Databricks, which helps them manage, process and analyse large-scale data for AI and analytics, simplifying tasks from data engineering to machine learning and business intelligence. Data warehousing and analytics startup just raised US$4 billion in a Series L funding round last month at a valuation of US$134 billion to help boost its data and AI platform. It also recently crossed a US$4.8 billion annual revenue run rate. Business in its key segments of data warehousing and AI grew by 55% last year. It already generates free cash flow and expects to be profitable within a year.
2025 will also be the year that Stripe and Revolut, two well-known fintech firms that were supposed to file for an IPO last year, finally do get to list on an exchange. Founded by two Irish brothers, Patrick and John Collison, Stripe has emerged as a payments behemoth. It started out as a firm that helped facilitate payments for small businesses but these days even large global e-commerce players use it. When you buy something on a website, it is quite likely that Stripe is facilitating that payment. When I pay Uber or Spotify, Stripe processes the payment. AI adoption, expansion into B2B and stablecoins are helping Stripe grow even bigger. In 2024, Stripe processed over US$1.4 trillion in payments. Payment volumes are still growing 30% annually. Stripe’s actual revenues reportedly exceeded US$20 billion last year. Recently, Stripe bought some of its own shares back at a valuation of US$106.7 billion.
Another fintech firm listing this year is London-based neo-bank Revolut which operates in 30 countries, mostly in Europe and the Middle East. It has 60 million personal customers and serves half a million small businesses. It issues credit and debit cards, takes deposits and has a suite of wealth management products including stocks, ETFs, gold, commodities and crypto trading. You can instantly transfer money to a friend or a business associate halfway around the world instead of the two or three days that a bank wire transfer might take and you can do it at a fraction of the cost that commercial banks might charge.
Among other major IPOs this year is billionaire fashion influencer Kim Kardashian’s shapewear firm SKIMS which recently raised US$225 million led by Goldman Sachs Alternatives at a US$5 billion valuation. Kardashian, once just famous for being famous, owns a 35% stake in the business. Just her Skims stake is now worth US$1.75 billion. Her other businesses and real estate are reportedly worth another US$500 million. The SKIMS listing will make the best-known Kardashian sibling far richer and more famous.
Assif Shameen is a technology and business writer based in North America
Save by subscribing to us for your print and/or digital copy.
P/S: The Edge is also available on Apple's App Store and Android's Google Play.