Is the Death of the IPO Greatly Exaggerated?

You might have heard the news over the past few weeks: The IPO is officially dead. Yes, many were quick to claim that Uber’s less-than-stellar (and that’s putting it mildly) stock debut was the final death knell of the “IPO craze.”

It was going to be the dot-com boom all over again. Get ready for Pets.com and Go.com redux. Uber’s face plant could certainly portend some future readjusting of the hype around each new tech IPO. But some also believe the boom will continue.

Indeed, The Wall Street Journal believes the IPO gravy train is still rolling strong, with investors “salivating over a huge backlog of initial public offerings” despite the lackluster starts for Uber and its rival Lyft. It points to companies such as content delivery firm Fastly, chemical-materials maker Avantor, and tech-enabled Chinese coffee chain Luckin Coffee, which all had strong market debuts recently. Perhaps it is simply the hype itself that needs to be dialed down a bit—especially over IPOs like Uber—and to come in line with reasonable expectations.