I've spent a lot of this year watching capital pour into AI‑driven IPOs while Bitcoin and crypto markets slowly bled lower. And today, Goldman Sachs put a framework around what that dynamic actually looks like, and what it doesn't.
The bank's chief U.S. equity strategist Ben Snider said plainly on Goldman's podcast this week: the IPO revival is real, it's driven by AI, and it matches 2021's record pace by dollar value. But it isn't a bubble. At least not yet.
The Numbers Are Striking, But the Context Changes Everything
Roughly 50 U.S. companies have gone public so far in 2026, approximately double the number from the same period a year earlier. By deal value, total IPO issuance has already reached around $120 billion at the year's midpoint, matching the entire full‑year record set in 2021.
Those are impressive numbers. But Snider offered an important counter‑read to anyone assuming we're in dot‑com territory. Deal volume, the number of companies going public, not just the dollar value, tells a completely different story. The U.S. has averaged roughly 100 IPOs per year over the past quarter century. That's close to where we stand today. During 2021, over 250 companies went public. At the peak of the dot‑com boom in 1999, that figure was nearly 400.
The dollar value of issuance is elevated because the companies going public right now are enormous, SpaceX, SK Hynix's proposed U.S. offering, OpenAI potentially approaching. It's not hundreds of speculative startups rushing through the door the way they were in 1999.
AI Is the Fuel, But Not the Frenzy
Snider sees some familiar warning signals, elevated equity valuations, strong investor confidence, and AI as a dominant investment theme echoing technology‑driven optimism from previous market peaks. He's not dismissing the risk. He's contextualizing it.
His conclusion was direct: despite elevated dollar volumes and accelerating activity, current sentiment remains a far cry from the euphoric excess that defined the dot‑com and 2021 peaks.
That's a measured, credible call from someone who has access to capital flow data that most market observers don't.
Crypto's IPO Moment Quietly Collapsed
Here's where this story intersects directly with what I cover daily. At the start of 2026, there was genuine expectation of a wave of crypto company listings following the successful IPOs of Circle and Bullish in 2025. That expectation has been almost entirely unwound.
Kraken's parent Payward froze its IPO plan citing difficult market conditions. Ethereum developer Consensys delayed its listing to fall at the earliest. Hardware wallet maker Ledger put its U.S. IPO on hold. Digital asset manager Grayscale pushed its plans back as post‑listing performance from recent crypto debuts cooled investor appetite.
The crypto IPO pipeline didn't just slow, it essentially stalled. Every one of those companies made the same judgment: market conditions favor waiting, not listing.
Why This Matters for Crypto Markets Right Now
The IPO boom is real and Goldman Sachs says it isn't a bubble. But the boom is being driven by AI and technology, not crypto. SpaceX is worth $2.6 trillion. Bitcoin is at $58,000.
The capital flowing into this IPO cycle is the same capital that would otherwise be competing for crypto exposure. When institutional investors have a choice between a SpaceX allocation and a Bitcoin ETF, many are choosing the former right now. I've watched that rotation play out in ETF outflow data every single week since March.
Goldman's framework tells me the broader equity market isn't about to crash from IPO excess. But it also confirms that crypto is sitting outside the dominant narrative driving capital allocation in 2026, and until that changes, the macro headwind doesn't go away.
