Are Initial Public Offerings fading, or evolving?

Damon Frith | NAB Private Wealth Wealth Editor

For much of the past decade private capital has taken on a larger role in the corporate funding space once occupied by public markets, particularly in the development of early-stage and high-growth companies.

However, the full story is more nuanced, and 2026 may mark an inflection point.

A backlog of exceptionally large private companies is moving closer to public markets, creating the potential for a historically significant wave of initial public offerings. SpaceX completed a record USD$75 billion initial public offering in June 2026¹, while OpenAI and Anthropic have submitted confidential draft registration statements for potential listings¹. With SpaceX valued at about USD$1.7 trillion at its debut and the two artificial intelligence companies carrying private valuations approaching USD$1 trillion, their transition to public markets could reshape equity benchmarks and capital flows. However, the timing, size and completion of the OpenAI and Anthropic offerings remain uncertain.

This raises a fundamental question: rather than witnessing the decline of public markets, are we in fact on the cusp of their reinvention?

A market dominated by scale and concentration

To understand what comes next, it is worth examining where we stand today.

By mid‑2025, global equity markets were valued at around USD$128 trillion², having roughly doubled over the previous decade. The United States accounts for close to half of that total, with much of the expansion driven by the extraordinary rise of large technology companies.

That growth, however, has come with increasing concentration. A small cohort of mega‑cap firms now exerts outsized influence over market returns, index composition and investor flows. This has already raised questions about diversification within public markets.

The arrival of a new wave of mega‑IPOs threatens to intensify that dynamic. Even a handful of large listings could materially shift global equity benchmarks, increasing US weightings and further tilting indices toward high‑growth sectors such as artificial intelligence, software and aerospace.

At the same time, these listings will require enormous pools of capital. Some estimates suggest that a small group of upcoming IPOs could absorb demand exceeding the total size of recent annual IPO markets.

The clear implication is that capital will need to be reallocated. Whether that comes from existing equities, other asset classes, or unallocated cash on the sidelines remains an open question, but the impact will be felt as capital allocation is impacted across markets.

Australia’s smaller, steadier market

Closer to home, the contrast is stark.

The Australian Securities Exchange is capitalised at around AUD$3.4 trillion and has grown more slowly than global markets over the past decade. This reflects a well‑known set of structural factors; heavy concentration in financials and resources, limited exposure to large‑scale technology platforms, and the gravitational pull of US markets on global capital.

Yet headline capitalisation growth does not tell the full story. Australian equities have delivered strong total returns, supported by consistently high dividend yields. Market volatility has also been lower than in many global peers, reinforcing the role of Australian equities as an income‑generating anchor within diversified portfolios.

This relative stability, however, comes with trade‑offs, particularly in terms of exposure to the high‑growth sectors now dominating global capital formation.

Australia’s position is also distinctive because the structure of its economy and equity market gives public capital a role that extends beyond providing portfolio income. The country has a globally significant resources sector and pool of listed mining and exploration companies.

For junior explorers, an IPO can provide the equity needed to fund drilling, resource definition and feasibility work well before a project generates revenue. More than 860 metals and mining companies from 85 countries use the ASX, making it one of the world's leading sources of public capital for the resources sector.

On the broader front, the recent IPO cycle shows both resilience and vulnerability. According to HLB Mann Judd, 374 companies listed through IPOs on the ASX between 2021 and 2025. Annual activity fell from 191 IPOs in 2021 to 87 in 2022 and 32 in 2023, before reaching a 20-year low of 29 in 2024 and recovering modestly to 35 in 2025³.

The cause of the decline includes higher interest rates, market volatility and lower risk appetite that narrowed the listing window, while some businesses outside resources may have preferred to remain private due to the expanded capacity of private equity, venture capital and private credit to provide an alternative funding source to equity capital.

Yet the decline was not evenly distributed. Materials companies accounted for at least 228 IPOs across the five years, or roughly 61 per cent of the total. Their share rose from 56 per cent in 2021 to 72 per cent in both 2022 and 2023, eased to 45 per cent in 2024 amid weaker conditions for battery metals, and returned to 63 per cent in 2025³. Excluding materials, IPO numbers fell from 84 companies in 2021 to just nine in 2023. Australia’s IPO market became not only smaller, but more concentrated in junior resources companies.

This matters to the broader public-versus-private debate. In technology and other asset-light sectors, deeper private markets may allow companies to defer listing until they reach large scale. Resource exploration follows a different path; it is capital intensive, high risk and can involve a substantial period before revenue is generated

However, it also forms part of the alternative pathways available for accessing the AI/tech thematic, as miners turn their attention to the critical minerals needed for energy, defence and advanced manufacturing in areas like semi-conductors, electronics and batteries.

The rise and emerging constraints of private capital

Against this backdrop, private markets have expanded dramatically.

Global private market assets under management have more than tripled over the past decade, reaching an estimated USD$15-20 trillion by 2024-25. Forecasts from Bain & Company suggest this could grow to USD$60-65 trillion by 2032, or roughly 30 per cent of total global assets under management (AUM).

Private capital has been particularly effective in funding early‑stage and high‑growth companies. It allows businesses to scale without the scrutiny and short‑term pressures of public markets, while enabling investors to capture a greater share of value creation before maturity.

But the model is not without constraints.

Transparency remains limited, liquidity is restricted, and governance has been questioned. These issues have drawn increasing regulatory attention globally. Moreover, as companies grow larger, their funding requirements escalate beyond what even deep private capital pools can sustainably provide.

This is now coming into focus.

The next generation of technology leaders, particularly in capital‑intensive fields such as artificial intelligence and space infrastructure, requires tens of billions of dollars to scale. Private markets have taken them far, but public markets remain the ultimate source of deep, liquid capital.

Why the IPO window is reopening

After several subdued years, the IPO market is showing clear signs of revival.

Improving macroeconomic conditions, stabilising interest rates and renewed investor appetite for growth and diversification are reopening the listing window. More importantly, a large cohort of late‑stage private companies has reached the scale, maturity and funding needs that make public markets more attractive.

The result is a pipeline of potential listings unlike anything seen before. Some of these companies could individually rival or exceed historical records for IPO size, with combined valuations running into the trillions of dollars.

For private equity and venture investors, this represents a long‑awaited opportunity to unlock liquidity. For public market investors, it presents both opportunity and risk.

On one hand, it expands the investable universe, providing access to high‑growth sectors that have largely been confined to private markets. On the other, it introduces new challenges around valuation, transparency and concentration, particularly where business models remain unproven or unprofitable.

Public vs private is the wrong question

The debate is often framed as a contest between public and private markets, but they are complementary components of a larger capital ecosystem.

Private markets excel at funding innovation and early growth. Public markets provide liquidity, scale and price discovery. Companies are simply staying private longer and joining public markets in a more mature, and potentially more dominant, state.

That shift has implications for investors.

Opportunities are now spread across the full lifecycle of a company, from early‑stage venture through to mega‑cap public listings. Deciding where to participate depends on appetite for risk, liquidity needs and return expectations.

In some cases, investors may never see a public listing at all. In others, the real value may have been created well before the IPO.

The next phase of market evolution

Rather than signalling the end of equities, current trends point to their evolution.

Public markets are not shrinking into irrelevance, but they are taking on a larger role as the final staging ground for companies that have already achieved enormous scale in private hands. The result is a market increasingly defined by fewer, larger and more complex listings.

For investors, the challenge is not choosing between public and private capital, but understanding how they interact, how capital will flow between them, the risks at each stage of capital injections, and the allocations investors wish to make along the growth trajectory of companies in private and public markets.

It means investors seeking entry along different paths of growth may require greater sophistication to understand both public and private markets, the allocations required and risks and opportunities presented at each point, as well as a strategy for accessing the off-ramps when it’s time to sell.