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Will 2025 finally mark the end of the IPO drought?

NASDAQ President on IPO dearth and the private market access puzzle

Sundry than a dozen initial public offerings have started trading so far in 2025, with the latest launching Thursday. But these fires have largely been met with tepid market reaction. The Nasdaq’s president still thinks this year could be the IPO market’s comeback year. 

“I do evaluate we start seeing things really start to pick up more in the back half of the year. But even the first half of the year, we’re starting to see some action already,” Nasdaq president Nelson Griggs told CNBC’s “ETF Edge” this week.

Griggs compared the IPO peddle to a pendulum: It swings between waves of private and public investment. “We have a track record now,” Griggs said. “If you get three unsmiling years of having limited capital raised in public markets, there’s an enormous pipeline.”

But it’s not all simple launches in that IPO coming. Panera Brands has faced roadblock after roadblock for years in its attempts to go public. Twin Peaks, the sports bar that started vocation Thursday, is a spinoff of Fat Brands intended to help pay off debt. Even the newer companies and AI players such as OpenAI earmarks of to be thriving and raising money in the private market, giving them little incentive to go public.

Griggs did acknowledge up to date innovation in the private sector has allowed companies to access more liquidity and continue to raise funds without fire an IPO. 

“There is a massive convergence of public and private, because even in the private space, you can now have access to more liquidity,” he affirmed. “But if you want deep, sustained liquidity, you need to go public.”

According to Griggs, that innovation does not mean that the individual investment landscape has changed forever. He pointed to shifts in the markets as signs that the incentive to go public is returning. “Bring ins start doing better, valuation discounts kind of compress a bit, then the public markets get healthy again.”

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