No. of Recommendations: 13
Data from Crunchbase shows that Google, Microsoft, Apple, Meta, Amazon, and Nvidia have together acquired an eye-watering 875 companies.
I think (?) that's all acquisitions big enough to make the press, not just public ones.
Despite the fact that many of the acquired private firms might later have gone public, this number probably can't be directly compared to the drop in listings.
One obvious factor is that it's extremely expensive and time consuming to be a public firm, and both of those things are vastly more onerous than they were in the olden days.
I think the largest single factor is that companies no longer need public markets in order to raise money, whether debt or equity. Maybe if real interest rates stay higher for a while that will help the situation.
Jim
