More than 1,000 companies went public in 2021, a record-breaking time for new issues, but this year's market for initial public offerings was the complete opposite. Only 83 traditional IPOs have priced, raising $8.5 billion as of Dec. 9, according to data from Dealogic. This is a 78% drop from the 384 offerings that raised $148.8 billion for the same time period in 2021. Returns for special purpose acquisition companies, or SPACs, are worse, with the number plunging 86% from last year.
“The current environment is the worst it’s been since the great recession,” said Matt Kennedy, senior IPO strategist at Renaissance Capital, a provider of pre-IPO research that manages two IPO-focused ETFs (NYSE: IPO, IPOS).
