GoKawiilEnergy 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 centers.
Initial public offerings for energy firms raised $12.6 billion 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 $4.3 billion.
The surge in fundraising comes as access to the vast amounts of energy needed to run data centers 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 center 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 percent between 2026 and 2035, according to consultancy ICF, in large part due to ballooning demand from data centers.
Credit: David Ryder/Bloomberg Access to the vast amounts of energy needed to run data centers has become a bottleneck in a multi-trillion-dollar AI investment boom Access to the vast amounts of energy needed to run data centers has become a bottleneck in a multi-trillion-dollar AI investment boom Credit: David Ryder/Bloomberg
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.