A $2 trillion debut would be the largest initial public offering<\/a> (IPO) ever, and the company it would take the record from is barely two months into public life. SpaceX (NASDAQ:SPCX) priced the current largest IPO on record in June, at a valuation of about $1.77 trillion.<\/p>\n That makes SpaceX a timely case study. Anyone weighing whether to chase the next record listing can look at exactly what the market did with the last one.<\/p>\n Image source: Getty Images.<\/p>\n A $2 trillion ask<\/p>\n The reported appetite for Anthropic rests on explosive growth. Preliminary figures the company shared with prospective investors put second-quarter revenue above $11.5 billion, more than double the first quarter’s $4.73 billion, according to documents seen by Bloomberg News. Investors who spoke to the Financial Times expect annualized revenue of $100 billion to $120 billion by the end of the year.<\/p>\n Days before filing, Anthropic raised $65 billion at a $965 billion valuation. In other words, its backers are now discussing a price about double what they paid in late May.<\/p>\n Worth noting, too: According to the same reporting, Anthropic’s own senior executives haven’t fixed a valuation target, even privately. The $2 trillion figure belongs to the investors, not the company.<\/p>\n Up 67%, down 22%, back to even<\/p>\n SpaceX<\/a> sold 555,555,555 shares at $135 apiece on June 11, raising $75 billion at the offer in the largest IPO on record — and about $86 billion in all, once its underwriters exercised their option to buy 83.3 million more shares. Trading began the next day, and the first public trade came at $150.<\/p>\n The 10 weeks since gave buyers the full range of outcomes. Shares ran as high as $225.64, a 67% gain from the offer price. They then fell as low as $104.83, which is 22% below it.<\/p>\n As of this writing, the stock sits within a few percent of $135 — about 40% below its high, and almost exactly where it started.<\/p>\n So the investors who got shares at the offer price have made essentially nothing in two months. And anyone who bought at the opening trade is down about 9%.<\/p>\n The sellers set the record<\/p>\n The business performed the whole time, which is what makes the return so instructive. SpaceX grew second-quarter revenue 92% year over year to $7.81 billion, and its AI segment’s revenue more than tripled year over year to $2.6 billion. The company signed $14.1 billion of cloud computing contracts during the quarter, narrowed its net loss to $541 million from $1 billion a year earlier, and ended June with $47.5 billion in backlog.<\/p>\n Growth like that usually moves a stock. Across the full 10 weeks, on net, it hasn’t moved this one — because the offer price had already charged for it. Even today, SpaceX trades at about 57 times revenue, annualizing its second-quarter figure. The sellers, in short, set a record price precisely because the growth story was at full strength — and the buyers have spent two months waiting for the story to catch up to what they paid.<\/p>\n Anthropic’s math could work out better. If revenue lands where its backers project, a $2 trillion valuation would be about 18 times the annualized revenue they expect by December. That is a lower price against hoped-for sales than SpaceX commanded.<\/p>\n But it still assumes annualized revenue grows another 50% or more from the $65 billion annualized run rate the company reported for late July. And it prices that assumption in before the company has reported a single quarter in public.<\/p>\n Of course, SpaceX’s two months prove nothing about the next two years, and a business that keeps doubling can outgrow any starting price eventually. But I think the two-month record is worth taking at face value.<\/p>\n The largest IPO ever delivered a 67% surge, a 53% collapse from that peak, and, for the investor who simply bought and held from the start, a return of about zero — all while the business nearly doubled its revenue year over year. A record-setting price means the growth is charged upfront. 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