The crypto IPO pipeline has largely frozen this spring. Kraken paused its US listing in March after filing confidentially in November 2025. Ledger shelved its planned debut in mid-May, opting for a private share sale instead. Grayscale pulled its IPO in late May, and isn't expected to restart before the fourth quarter. Consensys pushed its $7 billion target listing to at least fall 2026. The only major crypto firm that actually went public this year — BitGo, which listed in January — saw its stock fall 22% on day two and now trades roughly 36% below the $18 IPO price.
Why the retreat
The timing isn't great for crypto listings. Bitcoin is at about $69,552, down roughly 45% from its October 2025 peak of $126,080. US spot Bitcoin ETFs bled $2.3 billion in net outflows during May, including a 10-day outflow streak, as institutional money rotated into AI equities. Meanwhile, the Big Five hyperscalers — Amazon, Microsoft, Google, Meta, Oracle — are on pace to spend over $600 billion on infrastructure in 2026, with roughly $450 billion going into AI compute and data centers. That's a 36% jump over 2025. AI is where the public market appetite is, and crypto isn't getting a warm reception.
Kraken's secondary share sale to Deutsche Börse in April valued the exchange at $13.3 billion — about a third below its previous $20 billion valuation. The company also cut roughly 150 jobs and rolled out new automation tools. Blockchain.com confidentially filed for an IPO in late May, but it's testing a cold market, not jumping in.
The AI IPO wave that's stealing the show
SpaceX filed its S-1 on May 20, targeting a valuation between $1.75 trillion and $2 trillion with a $75 billion raise. Pricing is expected in mid-June. Anthropic confidentially filed for an IPO just two days ago, on June 1, at a $965 billion valuation — surpassing OpenAI on paper for the first time. OpenAI itself is preparing a fall 2026 IPO debut. The contrast is stark: crypto firms are delaying for regulatory legitimacy and institutional shareholder bases they still lack, while AI companies are sprinting toward the public markets with massive valuations and investor demand.
For crypto, the path to a public listing remains open but uncertain. Blockchain.com's confidential filing is a test of whether any digital-asset company can break through before the AI wave crests. Kraken may revisit its IPO once market conditions improve. Grayscale won't try again until at least Q4. Consensys is eyeing fall. The real question is whether any of them will want to debut alongside SpaceX's $75 billion raise or Anthropic's nearly $1 trillion valuation — or whether they'll wait until the AI hype cycle cools. That answer probably comes by mid-June, when SpaceX prices.
