SpaceX and Anthropic are absorbing so much capital that together they look set to raise more money than all the internet-era IPOs combined.

And that’s even with adjusting for inflation.

This reverses the usual dot-com comparison. In 1999, investors had hundreds of new high-flying stocks to select from, whereas today money is going to a handful of giant deals.

Twenty-seven years ago, 476 US IPOs raised nearly $65 billion, or about $130.7 billion in 2026 terms.

Now consider that SpaceX raised $85.7 billion in June, including the over-allotment, as the largest IPO ever.

Anthropic, which filed for its IPO on Monday, is seeking as much as $100 billion according to reporting from Reuters.

If it ends up raising anywhere near that target, the two deals together would surpass the entire class of 1999.

DataTrek Research co-founder Nicholas Colas, who was a portfolio manager in 1999, wrote in a note Tuesday that any comparison to 1999 "is of very limited utility."

"These are the proverbial apples and bowling balls," he said.

To be fair, Nvidia, Goldman Sachs, UPS and BlackRock all went public in 1999, which suggests that even at the peak of a generational bubble, excellent businesses can still emerge.

But the market for new companies is slimming. The US saw just 90 IPOs in 2025, less than a fifth of the 1999 total.

As it happens, since 2001 the total number of US IPOs in a year hasn’t topped 311.

“Building out AI takes critical mass, so fair enough, but one can rightly wonder about the counterfactual of more IPOs giving investors a better shot at long-term winners,” Colas said. 

Notably, not every dollar of Anthropic's raise would go to the company.

Its S-1 said existing shareholders will sell stock in the offering too. DataTrek estimates that only a third of the IPO will be new stock sold by the company.

None of this means a handful of mega IPOs marks the top for the AI trade.

But it does mean investors are being asked to place bigger, more concentrated bets compared to the internet era.

✈ Boeing fell 10.6% after a larger-than-expected loss. CEO Kelly Ortberg said on the earnings call that Boeing is targeting a 737 Max production rate of 52 jets a month in the second half of 2027. (CNBC)

🏦 SoFi stock climbed 13.4% after raising full-year guidance. Third-quarter revenue rose 44% to $1.39 billion, and the fintech introduced 2027 projections that topped Wall Street’s estimates. (Yahoo Finance)

🚗 GM is moving its stock listing to Nasdaq from the NYSE on November 17. The automaker, which first listed on the NYSE in 1911, will keep its “GM” ticker and said the switch makes it eligible for potential inclusion in the Nasdaq-100. (CNBC)

🏭 Core capital goods orders rose 0.5% in September and missed the 0.7% economists expected. The closely watched proxy for business spending followed an unrevised 1.6% jump in August. (Yahoo Finance)

Alexandra Wilson-Elizondo is Goldman Sachs' co-CIO of Multi-Asset Solutions. We sat down to discuss the debt-funded stage of the AI trade, why the bubble debate asks the wrong question and where she sees opportunity for 2027.

Tune in on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or YouTube.

🗓 October 28, 1929: The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 12.8% on what became known as Black Monday. The selloff deepened the next day, Black Tuesday, in the crash that preceded the Great Depression.

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