TheChek News Flow

Energy IPOs surge as investors hunt for ways to play AI boom

Companies coming to market raise money at fastest pace this century, although many stocks perform poorly later

Energy companies are raising money at IPO at their fastest pace this century, taking advantage of investors’ hunt for new ways to bet on the boom in power-intensive AI data centres.

Initial public offerings for energy firms raised $12.6bn in the first half of this year, according to data firm Dealogic. That marks the highest half-year level since the peak of the dotcom bubble in late 1999 and the highest first-half figure on record. It is well above 2025’s full-year total of $4.3bn.

The surge in fundraising comes as access to the vast amounts of energy needed to run data centres emerges as a bottleneck in a multi-trillion-dollar AI investment boom.

“Investors started by buying AI-linked names like Nvidia. Then they said, ‘hold on, every chip needs energy to power it’,” said RBC clean energy analyst Chris Dendrinos. “That’s put a huge tailwind behind these companies.”

A typical AI-focused data centre uses around 876,000 megawatt hours per year, roughly equivalent to the household electricity usage of Glasgow or Salt Lake City. US electricity demand is projected to increase 39 per cent between 2026 and 2035, according to consultancy ICF, in large part due to ballooning demand from data centres.

Investors who have made huge gains betting on the chip stocks that have recently propelled US equity markets to a series of record highs are slowly shifting into the so-called “picks and shovels” companies expected to lay the infrastructure for the AI boom, analysts say.

“Power‑capacity expansion, US reshoring [and] AI‑related infrastructure investment . . . remain our central strategic allocations,” said Manish Kabra, head of US equity strategy at Société Générale.

Exchange traded fund-provider GMO this week launched a “power infrastructure ETF” to capture the returns of stocks linked to “power generation, grid and electrification infrastructure”. Energy group Standard Nuclear is expected to go public in the US later in July.

The 2026 IPO market will be remembered both for SpaceX and as “the year that financed the AI revolution’s infrastructure”, said Bill Smith, head of IPO data provider Renaissance Capital.

Among companies coming to market is Forgent Power Solutions, which designs and manufactures electrical distribution equipment used in data centres. It raised $1.7bn from its IPO in February, capitalising on strong demand and long wait times for technologies such as transformers and switchgears, which are used to protect electrical equipment.

Innio, a German gas engine manufacturer, completed a nearly $2.8bn flotation in June, riding a trend of data centres bypassing the strained electricity grid and instead powering themselves on-site.

Companies that have been able to raise money on public markets include those involved in complex, capital-heavy projects such as nuclear and geothermal power plants, while investors have also been willing to back businesses trying to develop new technologies.

“This is a moment in which speculative projects are being funded and underwritten,” said Julien Dumoulin-Smith, a Jefferies research analyst covering power, utilities and clean energy. “They’re not just limited to venture capital or private equity.”

Fervo — which went public in May, raising nearly $2.2bn — is developing “next-generation” geothermal, using oil and gas drilling methods to create underground wells to tap heat. Unlike conventional geothermal, which is widely used and relies on naturally occurring heat pockets, next-generation geothermal is being deployed in pilot-stage projects in the US.

According to its prospectus, the company will spend $1.2bn over the next year to develop its Utah power station.

Chief executive Tim Latimer told the FT that the company and its investors saw public markets as a way to grow quicker.

“These IPO proceeds and the market enthusiasm behind our goal are going to help us accelerate,” he said.

Investors have also been attracted by the relatively lower valuations at which energy companies often trade, with the energy sector on a price-to-earnings ratio of 18 times, compared with the information technology sector’s 40 times, according to Bloomberg data.

Investor interest in these IPOs comes amid growing concerns over whether hyperscalers, whose shares have soared in recent years, will be able to convert their huge spending into profits. Many traders are instead starting to look at smaller companies or those in other sectors that are likely to benefit from this wave of investment.

However, despite the surging demand for energy and the strong interest in the IPOs, there are signs that investors are buying into hot stocks at flotation, only to sell out shortly afterwards.

Nearly two-thirds of the energy companies that floated this year and last are now trading below their offer price, according to Dealogic. That compares with less than 40 per cent of IPOs across all sectors that are underwater.

X-energy, which develops small modular nuclear reactors and is backed by Amazon, came to market in April and is now trading 33 per cent below its $23 offer price. ERock, a gas generator maker, has lost 42 per cent of its value since its IPO in June, while Fermi, a data centre energy company, is down 68 per cent since coming to market in September.

Deep Fission, which is designing nuclear reactors to be buried in one-mile underground holes, raised $40mn in June, a 73 per cent cut from its initial target. The company’s shares are down 33 per cent from its Wall Street debut.

Brian Kessens, senior portfolio manager at energy-focused fund firm Tortoise Capital, said some traders are buying into IPOs then selling quickly and “rolling into the next one”.

Investment banks need to make sure they’re setting “reasonable valuations” and be more careful about selling shares to investors who are likely to flip fast, he added.

“If you think that an IPO is going to go really well, then it’s in some sense free money,” said RBC’s Dendrinos.

Some companies, like X-energy and Deep Fission, are developing technologies that critics say are not yet proven to be technically or commercially viable.

Often those faring better have “a real business now”, said Jeff Osborne, a sustainability and energy transition analyst at TD Cowen, and are “less of a science experiment”.

Goldman settles for junior roles on trio of UK deals

Wall Street bank cements position on top of league tables, but rivals have taken top billing on recent deals including ITV

Goldman Sachs has taken junior roles on a trio of high-profile British deals after missing out on top billing in recent weeks, an unusual move for the perennial leader in UK mergers and acquisitions.

In the last three weeks, the Wall Street investment bank was named in second-tier advisory roles on three British deals involving Segro, ITV and Bridgepoint.

Goldman typically eschews junior roles on UK deals, according to people familiar with the matter, because they come with either low or no fees and can weigh on the bank’s reputation as the go-to adviser for boards.

Goldman is ranked as the number one adviser on UK takeovers for the year to date, far ahead of Morgan Stanley and Rothschild, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.

“It is somewhat unusual to see Goldman repeatedly named behind independent advisers or competitors on prominent UK board mandates, because Goldman’s traditional position has been to lead the most important strategic assignments,” said Valeriya Vitkova, associate professor of finance at Bayes Business School in London.

Winning any type of advisory role — even a junior one — on the biggest deals is seen by many bankers as better than missing out entirely because it helps institutions secure credit for industry league tables. Those are based on the size or number of deals worked on rather than actual fees, which are usually confidential.

Many Wall Street firms use creative tactics to ensure they get credit on deals because league table leadership is an important calling card when pitching for future transactions. In the UK, banks also regularly parlay their position as corporate broker into advisory roles.

Goldman has secured top billing on transactions including Unilever’s combination of its food business with US spice and sauce maker McCormick, Intertek’s planned sale to private equity group EQT and the takeover of ingredients group Tate & Lyle.

But UK property group Segro last month named Evercore and Morgan Stanley as “joint lead” financial advisers as it sought to fend off a £12.6bn takeover attempt from US rival Prologis. Goldman was later added as a “financial adviser” — a more junior role — on what would be one of the biggest takeovers in Europe this year if it goes ahead.

Two days earlier, ITV announced the sale of its broadcasting business to Sky, a unit of US company Comcast. Evercore and Wall Street rival Morgan Stanley were ITV’s lead advisers, with Goldman merely financial adviser and joint corporate broker.

Meanwhile, UK private capital group Bridgepoint chose Moelis as lead adviser on its $1.4bn purchase of the real estate arm of US investment firm Kayne Anderson, calling Goldman its “capital markets adviser”.

It missed out altogether on the sale of UK asset manager Schroders to US rival Nuveen, GSK’s $10.6bn deal for biotech Nuvalent and Rio Tinto’s failed merger with Glencore.

Goldman, whose international business is co-led by one of London’s most high-profile bankers Anthony Gutman, has been locked in a battle for leadership in takeover advice for years with traditional rivals such as Morgan Stanley and JPMorgan Chase.

However, boutiques such as Evercore and Centerview have been increasingly competing for mandates on the biggest deals.

Evercore’s position in London has also been strengthened by its 2025 acquisition of Robey Warshaw, with veteran advisers Simon Robey and Simon Warshaw retaining strong relationships with chairs and CEOs at some of the UK’s biggest companies.

Goldman declined to comment.

The big bang deal in payments

The cutting-edge tech group, Stripe, had been in hot pursuit of the relatively older fintech PayPal. Then Stripe brought in Advent International as a strategic partner and the payments start-up and private equity group launched a joint bid for PayPal in what would be one of the biggest deals of all time.

The $53bn bid is seen as a way to solve PayPal’s biggest problem, which is that at online checkouts it is losing market share to Google Pay and Apple Pay, which is embedded on hundreds of millions of iPhones.

A takeover would align PayPal, one of the largest independent fintechs, with Stripe, a tech start-up that hit a $159bn valuation earlier this year, with a value proposition that could challenge the likes of Apple and Google.

People involved see the deal effort as not a sure thing and potentially a long shot. There are no signs PayPal has engaged with the offer.

The bidders will have to convince PayPal to play ball even as the company’s stock is at multiyear lows (before its shares rose on this week’s news of the bid), and recently appointed chief executive Enrique Lores pursues a turnaround.

Stripe, the payments processor led by brothers Patrick and John Collison, has been repeatedly tipped as a potential initial public offering candidate, though John Collison has said the company is in no rush to list.

Adding PayPal would bring Stripe a consumer-facing checkout brand with more than 400mn users as well as its payments app Venmo.

For its part Advent has a deep record in payments companies, having previously backed Worldpay, Vantiv and Nexi. Advent and Bain bought Worldpay in 2010 and made as much as 5.4 times their money when the group went public in 2015.

While the PayPal acquisition is in a preliminary stage, there’s a scenario in which Lores would be heavily incentivised to take a deal in the coming months.

A takeover of this size could attract a who’s who in other forms of financing that could round out an already formidable dealmaking partnership. It will also have to ultimately be on friendly terms.

Whatever happens, this could be a harbinger of deals to come. One private equity executive told DD that new tech start-ups buying established tech companies is a theme we should expect to see again. The newcomers may find that M&A is the most effective way to build a customer base.

- AWS Taipei Region, launched in June 2025, provides three physically separated Availability Zones, supporting local data-residency, low-latency, disaster-recovery and resilience requirements for regulated financial and government workloads.

- Nasdaq said rising trading volumes, potential volatility spikes, evolving regulation and movement toward near-always-on markets are making fragmented systems and batch processing inadequate; institutions increasingly need real-time controls, stronger cybersecurity and shorter maintenance windows.

- Nasdaq’s 2022 migration of a U.S. options market to AWS reduced latency by 10%; a subsequent fixed-income exchange migration handles more than 20 billion messages daily, demonstrating that core markets can operate in the cloud at scale and with resilience.

- Nasdaq is moving AI from analytics into regulated decision workflows: its SEC-approved Dynamic M-ELO order type interprets market conditions and intelligently matches buyers and sellers, while Nasdaq Calypso on AWS integrates treasury, trading, risk, collateral and post-trade processing as a managed service.

- Anthropic cited external estimates that its enterprise AI share rose from 12% to 40% in 2026, arguing enterprise discussions have shifted from whether to deploy AI to which trusted partner to use; its multibillion-dollar AWS relationship and Trainium infrastructure are intended to improve Claude performance and cost each quarter.

- Anthropic warned that AI capability cycles have compressed from years to months or weeks, but Gartner expects 40% of agentic AI projects to be canceled by 2027—not because models fail, but because organizations cannot operationalize and deliver them effectively.- KBS’s Vertigo system uses one compact 8K camera and AI reframing to generate multiple individual performer videos, reducing occupied audience seating from 30–40 seats to 5–10 and cutting processing from several hours to minutes through AWS inference.

- KBS produces more than 2,250 performer-focused videos annually for a YouTube channel with over 10 million subscribers; since early 2026, another Korean broadcaster has used Vertigo to create two revenue streams from one live feed—paid 8K panoramic content and member-specific channels that drive views and subscriptions.

- AWS said a Taiwan customer used an agentic reverse-engineering platform to document legacy systems and generate replacement code in one afternoon, completing work its team had failed to finish over two months; management positioned autonomous “digital employees,” rather than simple workflow acceleration, as the larger enterprise opportunity.

Developers Are Back to Building U.S. Warehouses

Industrial real estate under construction rose 18% in the second quarter, driven by demand from suppliers of data-center equipment

Warehouse developers are breaking ground on new buildings, betting that a yearslong slump in industrial real-estate demand is over.

More than 305 million square feet of warehouse space was under construction across the U.S. in the second quarter, up 18% from 2025 and the second consecutive quarter of annual growth, according to real-estate services firm Cushman & Wakefield.

“Developers hit pause for two years and now they’re hitting play again, but this time they’re following demand, not chasing it,” said Jason Tolliver, head of logistics and industrial real estate at Cushman.

The growing development pipeline is a significant shift from the slow construction activity of the past several years. Weak leasing activity and an overabundance of space combined to push the nationwide vacancy rate up to an 11-year high last year and led many developers to pare back construction plans.

New construction slowed down in 2024 and 2025 as developers focused on completing projects already in the works and leasing empty space. Tenants that had snatched up excess space during the pandemic dialed back their leasing amid uncertain consumer demand.

Demand for new space is now bouncing back. Companies leased more space in the second quarter than in any period since mid-2022, according to Cushman, giving developers confidence to start projects.

“We are finally at this point where the market is clearly turning a corner and has found its footing after a period where there wasn’t clarity on just how high vacancy would get,” said Mark Russo, head of industrial research at real-estate firm Savills.

Prologis, the world’s largest owner and operator of industrial real estate, said it plans to start work on $4.5 billion to $5.5 billion of developments this year, up from $3.1 billion last year. About 40% of its development starts this year are expected to be data centers as Prologis seeks to capitalize on demand for the infrastructure to power artificial intelligence. The company is due to report its latest earnings on Thursday.

Panattoni, one of the largest privately held developers in the world, is ramping up construction nationwide. The Irvine, Calif.-based company plans to start work on 62% more square footage this year than in 2025 and is working on preparing land for future development.

Still, the pipeline of construction is far below the level seen during the pandemic, when developers rushed to build warehouses to meet surging demand from companies looking to capitalize on soaring e-commerce growth. The amount of space under construction hit a pandemic-era peak of more than 725 million square feet in the third quarter of 2022, according to Cushman.

“We’re still cautiously optimistic, but nowhere near what it was three, four years ago. We’re just not in that mindset at this point,” said Doug Roberts, president of North American development at Panattoni.

Today, data-center operators and suppliers of the components needed to run the high-tech buildings are clamoring for warehouses to help fuel the rapid build-out of data centers nationwide. Leasing demand also is coming from retailers stocking up on inventory ahead of possible changes to U.S. tariffs, manufacturers bringing operations into the U.S., and third-party logistics providers seeking to meet the needs of companies looking to outsource fulfillment.

“Major companies have been on pause for quite some time now and are hitting a point where a decision needs to be made,” said Jeremy Garner, a managing director with real-estate developer Trammell Crow, a subsidiary of CBRE Group.

Garner said his company continued putting up buildings over the past few years in fast-growing markets such as Houston, where he is based. Coastal markets where work had slowed are “seeing green shoots now and reasons to move forward with more development,” Garner said.

Developers starting projects now are making a bet that leasing demand will continue to grow amid an uncertain economic outlook. The Federal Reserve has signaled it may raise interest rates this year if inflation stays elevated. Consumer sentiment remains near record lows. And companies bringing in holiday merchandise early to get ahead of rising costs due to tariffs and the Iran war are expected to reduce imports later in the year.

Henry Steinberg, head of EQT Real Estate, a division of private-equity firm EQT, said companies leasing new space are in part seeking to brace their supply chains against uncertainty after years of disruptions, from port backlogs and tariffs to natural disasters such as hurricanes.

“Tenants are realizing that with supply-chain volatility comes risk, and the best way to mitigate that risk is to create more diversity in the supply chain,” Steinberg said.

Developers Are Back to Building U.S. Warehouses

Industrial real estate under construction rose 18% in the second quarter, driven by demand from suppliers of data-center equipment

U.S. industrial real estate under construction rose 18% in the second quarter from 2025 to more than 305 million square feet.

The growth marks a shift from a yearslong slump in warehouse demand that had pushed vacancy rates to an 11-year high.

The rebound is driven by demand from data-center equipment suppliers, manufacturers, third-party logistics firms and retailers.

Warehouse developers are breaking ground on new buildings, betting that a yearslong slump in industrial real-estate demand is over.

More than 305 million square feet of warehouse space was under construction across the U.S. in the second quarter, up 18% from 2025 and the second consecutive quarter of annual growth, according to real-estate services firm Cushman & Wakefield.

“Developers hit pause for two years and now they’re hitting play again, but this time they’re following demand, not chasing it,” said Jason Tolliver, head of logistics and industrial real estate at Cushman.

The growing development pipeline is a significant shift from the slow construction activity of the past several years. Weak leasing activity and an overabundance of space combined to push the nationwide vacancy rate up to an 11-year high last year and led many developers to pare back construction plans.

New construction slowed down in 2024 and 2025 as developers focused on completing projects already in the works and leasing empty space. Tenants that had snatched up excess space during the pandemic dialed back their leasing amid uncertain consumer demand.

Demand for new space is now bouncing back. Companies leased more space in the second quarter than in any period since mid-2022, according to Cushman, giving developers confidence to start projects.

“We are finally at this point where the market is clearly turning a corner and has found its footing after a period where there wasn’t clarity on just how high vacancy would get,” said Mark Russo, head of industrial research at real-estate firm Savills.

Prologis, the world’s largest owner and operator of industrial real estate, said it plans to start work on $4.5 billion to $5.5 billion of developments this year, up from $3.1 billion last year. About 40% of its development starts this year are expected to be data centers as Prologis seeks to capitalize on demand for the infrastructure to power artificial intelligence. The company is due to report its latest earnings on Thursday.

Panattoni, one of the largest privately held developers in the world, is ramping up construction nationwide. The Irvine, Calif.-based company plans to start work on 62% more square footage this year than in 2025 and is working on preparing land for future development.

Still, the pipeline of construction is far below the level seen during the pandemic, when developers rushed to build warehouses to meet surging demand from companies looking to capitalize on soaring e-commerce growth. The amount of space under construction hit a pandemic-era peak of more than 725 million square feet in the third quarter of 2022, according to Cushman.

“We’re still cautiously optimistic, but nowhere near what it was three, four years ago. We’re just not in that mindset at this point,” said Doug Roberts, president of North American development at Panattoni.

Today, data-center operators and suppliers of the components needed to run the high-tech buildings are clamoring for warehouses to help fuel the rapid build-out of data centers nationwide. Leasing demand also is coming from retailers stocking up on inventory ahead of possible changes to U.S. tariffs, manufacturers bringing operations into the U.S., and third-party logistics providers seeking to meet the needs of companies looking to outsource fulfillment.

“Major companies have been on pause for quite some time now and are hitting a point where a decision needs to be made,” said Jeremy Garner, a managing director with real-estate developer Trammell Crow, a subsidiary of CBRE Group.

Garner said his company continued putting up buildings over the past few years in fast-growing markets such as Houston, where he is based. Coastal markets where work had slowed are “seeing green shoots now and reasons to move forward with more development,” Garner said.

Developers starting projects now are making a bet that leasing demand will continue to grow amid an uncertain economic outlook. The Federal Reserve has signaled it may raise interest rates this year if inflation stays elevated. Consumer sentiment remains near record lows. And companies bringing in holiday merchandise early to get ahead of rising costs due to tariffs and the Iran war are expected to reduce imports later in the year.

Henry Steinberg, head of EQT Real Estate, a division of private-equity firm EQT, said companies leasing new space are in part seeking to brace their supply chains against uncertainty after years of disruptions, from port backlogs and tariffs to natural disasters such as hurricanes.

“Tenants are realizing that with supply-chain volatility comes risk, and the best way to mitigate that risk is to create more diversity in the supply chain,” Steinberg said.