IPO Hopefuls Eye 2025 as Present Outlook Remains Bleak

There’s a chorus growing among companies that want to go public: Wait until next year.

The 2024 initial public offering (IPO) market rebound that bankers and executives hoped for hasn’t been realized, leaving them to hold out hope for 2025, The Wall Street Journal reported Tuesday (Aug. 27).

It’s not just recent turbulence in the stock market holding IPOs back, but also worries that the economy could grow hectic again, with the outcome of November’s presidential election and the Federal Reserve’s interest rate decision still undetermined, the report said.

Companies are postponing their IPOs. Among them is Chinese autonomous-driving technology company WeRide, which needed time to finalize documents before it could go public, per the report. Ticket reseller StubHub said in July it was pushing its pre-IPO investor roadshow to at least September.

Among the companies still considering IPOs for later in the year are artificial intelligence chip maker Cerebras, according to the report.

Earlier this month, Philippines-based mobile payments provider GCash said it wants to go public, but now is not the time.

“We recognize that the new round of investments further strengthens Mynt’s ability and position coming into an IPO,” said Martha Sazon, CEO of GCash parent Globe Fintech Innovations/Mynt, adding that an IPO “could attract interest from all types of investors wherever stock exchange we list it.”

“However, our view on the timing of the IPO remains the same,” she said. “That is, it’s subject to improvements in market condition.”

Clay Hale, co-head of equity capital markets at Wells Fargo, told the WSJ that the idea that next year could mark a comeback for IPOs has been “singing in the chorus” since spring. While there was some optimism that the market would pick up at the end of this year, market volatility appears to have erased that sentiment.

“It’s really hard to plan to do deals in the fourth quarter unless you know the market is great,” Hale said, per the report.

So far this year, firms going public via IPO in the U.S. raised $25 billion, below the $55 billion yearly average for the past decade, the report said.