StubHub Eyes Potential I.P.O. as Soon as This Year

StubHub, a ticketing software company, has held talks with bankers in recent weeks about holding an initial public offering before the end of the year, two people with knowledge of the matter said, testing Wall Street’s appetite for a return of tech I.P.O.s.

The talks are preliminary, said the people, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the discussions were private. StubHub told Wall Street analysts in an investor meeting on Thursday that it was aiming to raise more than $1 billion in a public offering, according to one attendee.

The tech public offering market has gotten off to a slow start this year. But a growing number of companies appear ready to contemplate public listings, despite market volatility stemming from President Trump’s constant changes to economic policies.

Among the tech companies exploring listings this year are CoreWeave, a provider of cloud computing services for A.I. companies, which unveiled its investor prospectus on Monday. Discord, the social chat app popular with the video game community, has also met with investment bankers to discuss preparations for an I.P.O.

A representative for StubHub did not respond to a request for comment.

StubHub, a ticket reselling site founded in 2000 by Eric Baker and Jeff Fluhr, grew quickly in its early days. People could use the site to buy secondary-market tickets for everything from concerts to sports events.

In 2006, Mr. Baker, who was pushed out amid tensions with Mr. Fluhr, founded ViaGogo, a similar ticketing company focused on European ticket reselling and events. In 2019, ViaGogo announced it was buying StubHub for $4 billion.

Shortly after, the Covid pandemic hit, with lockdowns putting concerts and live performances on hold and in effect kneecapping 95 percent of StubHub’s business. Mr. Baker weathered the storm, and the company saw a surge in business as lockdowns lifted and fans returned to venues en masse.

The company eyed an I.P.O. last year at a $16.5 billion valuation, the people with knowledge of the talks said, but shelved its plans amid a dearth of public listings of similar companies.

Recently, there have been concerns on Wall Street that ticketing companies are seeing slower sales growth as fans cool on concerts after an initial surge of postpandemic interest.

But executives at StubHub have said its business is still growing. The company’s gross ticket sales grew by close to 50 percent in the last three months of 2024, said one attendee of the investor meeting on Thursday.