CBRS is a California-based semiconductor firm. It designs chips that are as big as a dinner plate and that take up an entire semiconductor wafer. TSMC makes the semiconductors. They’re being installed in data centers in the UAE, where potential users can rent time. The chips are apparently super-fast and generate less heat than conventional designs.
The company went public yesterday.
Early talk had been that the IPO price would be around $125 a share. Demand was high enough, however, that the underwriters upped that to $150 and then to $185.
The stock didn’t open until after noon, implying that there was initially an immense imbalance between supply and demand. It debuted at a price of $385.
As I’m writing this, just after 10am eastern time, the stock is at about $285.
This reminds me a lot of the ipo of Meta (then Facebook) in 2012. …same situation, insanely high demand, a struggle to find an opening price. That ipo marked the cresting of a wave of speculative interest in the internet. And, in hindsight, it signaled that one should become more defensive. Of course, the stock is now 13x the ipo price, despite its first-year dip, handily outperforming NASDAQ, which is up by about 9x over the same span.
The main difference I see between now and then is that the unusually low growth, rising inflation economy that the administration in Washington has fashioned doesn’t seem to offer clear alternatives for investors to diversify into. It may be that even pricey tech is the best shelter available against Washington’s ineptitude.