Record levels of private capital and the recent and rapid rise of VC-funded unicorns suggest to some that public markets are a thing of the past, a holdover from the capitalism of yesteryear. Financial news of the past two decades is littered with stories of companies delaying IPOs and growing despite it — Meta, Uber, Airbnb and the like. Some still remain private, most notably Elon Musk’s SpaceX. If they can find success without going public, why should anyone else?
Take the example of Klarna — a 20-year-old company — which recently had a successful IPO on the NYSE, with a nice pop on its first day.
