StubHub is planning an initial public offer and is “aiming to go public by late summer,” according to sources cited by Cory Weinberg of THE INFORMATION. StubHub has “more than” $2B in debt, many times its estimated profits. The company will “test investors’ appetite for companies with strained balance sheets.” StubHub has “ambitious hopes” for the valuation it would achieve -- preferably in line with the $16.5B valuation at which it raised money during the boom of late 2021 -- and “may call off the public listing if it can’t get close to that number.” Working “in StubHub’s favor” is the fact that a “post-pandemic boom” in sports and live concerts has “bolstered its business.” Sources said that the company, which has been working with JPMorgan and Goldman Sachs on a listing for the past two years and has “already confidentially filed IPO paperwork with regulators, hasn’t yet set a date for its public listing.” Online ticketing rival SeatGeek has also been “seeking a potential listing this year, which means similar companies might end up vying for investors’ attention at around the same time” (THE INFORMATION, 4/12).
