The first big IPO of the year receives a warm Wall Street welcome, though most of its early gains evaporate.
BitGo Holdings, Inc. got the market for initial public offerings off to a good start in 2026, as investors scrambled to buy shares in the digital-asset infrastructure company.
The South Dakota-based company, which provides wallets, validation, trading and custody services for the cryptocurrency world, may have made its debut at a time of heightened uncertainty surrounding digital assets, but that didn't seem to deter investors from buying in.
The stock shot as high as $24.34 on Thursday, more than 25% above where the IPO had priced. But BitGo shares promptly gave up most of those gains, ending the day at $18.25, up 2.7%.
With 2026 expected to be a big year for IPOs, investors have been showing signs of interest in newly public companies. The Renaissance IPO ETF IPO, an exchange-traded fund whose components include 39 of the more liquid newly public companies, has rallied 4.4% in January, while the S&P 500 index SPX has gained 1.3%.
BitGo said late Wednesday that its IPO of 11.8 million shares had priced at $18 a share, which is above the expected pricing range provided last week of between $15 and $17 a share.
The company raised $198.5 million through the IPO, and selling shareholders pocketed $14.3 million.
With 115.56 million shares outstanding, the IPO price values the company at $2.08 billion.
The lead underwriters of the IPO were Wall Street heavyweights Goldman Sachs and Citigroup. BitGo does make money and is expected to report 2025 net income between $3.16 million and $3.52 million, after losing $7 million in 2024. Revenue is expected to rise sixfold to about $15.5 billion from $2.5 billion a year ago.
While all that looks good, the market for digital currencies has been on shaky ground, as bitcoin (BTCUSD) has failed to produce a meaningful bounce following the sharp selloff in October and November. It is currently trading below $90,000, or nearly 30% below the record highs seen in early October.
While there was a brief and sharp bounce last week amid some large institutional purchases, bitcoin quickly pulled back after some expected progress on pro-crypto regulation didn't happen.
SynFutures co-founder Wenny Cai said bitcoin's drop below $90,000 followed more than $1 billion in liquidations by investors, while a more durable headwind for crypto is "regulatory uncertainty."
Cai stressed that the uncertainty isn't long term, however, as the institutional adoption trend of 2025 may have slowed but isn't expected to be reversed.
BitGo's customers aren't just crypto-native companies but also include traditional financial-services firms. And in December, the company said it received government approval to convert its BitGo Trust Co. to a federally chartered bank for digital assets.
"By becoming a federally chartered digital asset trust bank in the United States, BitGo is setting the new standard for transparency, security, and regulatory clarity across the evolving landscape of financial services," Chief Executive Mike Belshe said at the time.
BitGo may be the first crypto company to brave the IPO waters this year, but it won't be the last. Crypto platform Kraken filed paperwork in November for an IPO with an estimated valuation of $20 billion.
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