OpenAI, Anthropic, and SpaceX are gearing up to make their public debuts, bringing their artificial intelligence enterprises under the watchful eyes of Wall Street's quarterly evaluations. This shift comes as investors are eager for rapid and significant growth in the AI sector.
As these companies prepare for their initial public offerings (IPOs), analysts are expected to press them on their routes to profitability and their ability to continue managing substantial infrastructure expenditures. OpenAI, the creator of ChatGPT, has recently joined the ranks of AI leaders looking to enter the public arena, following Anthropic's recent confidential IPO filing. SpaceX, which incorporates Elon Musk's AI initiative, xAI, is also slated to launch its market presence this Friday. Collectively, these IPOs are poised to deliver vital insights into the current state of the AI landscape and could result in hundreds of billions of dollars in stock sales.
This transition to public ownership will enhance scrutiny on their AI businesses, which are nearing valuations in the trillion-dollar range. Wall Street is known for placing immense pressure on companies to demonstrate significant growth every quarter. Nigel Green, the CEO of financial advisory firm deVere Group, noted that expectations that might seem manageable in private financing can become unyielding once a company goes public.
Currently, the financial community holds exceptionally high expectations for AI, allowing little room for less-than-exceptional performance. For instance, Broadcom previously partnered with both OpenAI and Anthropic and reported remarkable earnings growth of 48% in the second quarter, with an anticipated 180% increase in its semiconductor business over the previous year. Nonetheless, this performance failed to satisfy investors, resulting in a 13% drop in Broadcom's stock price last week—the company's worst decline since September 2024.
The downturn in AI-focused stocks extended to the broader market, with the Nasdaq declining for three consecutive days, and the S&P 500 experiencing its most significant loss since October. A special exchange-traded fund that monitors memory chip stocks also dropped by 15% last week.
Stacy Rasgon, a Bernstein analyst focusing on the semiconductor industry, remarked that investor appetite continues to demand more than just strong performance. "People want more," she stated, emphasizing the relentless expectations set by the market.
Even Nvidia, the world's leading public company by market value, hasn't been immune to this type of scrutiny. In January 2025, it saw an unprecedented loss of $600 billion in market value in a single trading session following the emergence of DeepSeek, a significant new competitor from China.
Both OpenAI and Anthropic are expected to be measured against similarly rigorous standards, with their business health serving as indicators of industry growth. Wall Street will be particularly interested in whether these companies have adequate financial resources to support their extensive AI infrastructure commitments.
OpenAI and Anthropic have shared growth indicators that suggest substantial progress, albeit not necessarily due to obligations to do so. OpenAI revealed it raised $122 billion in March, elevating its valuation to $852 billion, and indicated it is now generating $2 billion in monthly revenue after initially reporting $1 billion each quarter. Additionally, ChatGPT recently reached one billion users faster than any app in history, achieving this milestone in about three months— far quicker than Google Maps, TikTok, and YouTube, which took five to eight years.
Anthropic reported a valuation surge from $380 billion in February to $965 billion by May, indicating it has outpaced OpenAI in some metrics for the first time, according to fintech partner Ramp. It also announced a run-rate revenue of $47 billion, suggesting strong future earnings potential.
The impending IPOs suggest both OpenAI and Anthropic feel sufficiently confident in their pathways to profitability to face investor scrutiny. Neither company has yet commented publicly regarding their IPO timelines.
However, the financial figures are just a starting point. Investors are expected to rigorously question OpenAI's CEO Sam Altman and Anthropic's CEO Dario Amodei during earnings calls, probing into the prospects for their businesses and forthcoming products, and seeking assurances of undeniable growth potential. This will likely involve addressing any delays in product releases and their strategies for monetizing new offerings. Decisions such as OpenAI’s discontinuation of its video app Sora could prompt significant discussion and analysis in this new environment. As Green aptly summarized, "Private investors can back a vision and wait years for results, but public markets rarely offer that luxury."
