X-Energy opened at $30.11 on its first day of trading on Friday, closing at $29.20 for a 27% gain over its $23 IPO price.
The Rockville, Maryland-based company sold 44.3 million shares, raising $1.02 billion in an offering that was upsized from an initial target of around $800 million. The $23 price was well above the marketed range of $16 to $19.
By the close, the company carried a market capitalisation of $11.5 billion.
A bet on a reactor that does not yet exist
X-Energy designs the Xe-100, a high-temperature gas-cooled small modular reactor that uses Triso fuel pebbles containing thousands of uranium fuel particles. The pebbles burn hotter and longer than conventional fuel, and the reactor delivers both electricity and industrial heat.
The company has not yet built a working reactor. It aims to deliver its first unit in the early 2030s.
Its lead project is a four-unit plant at Dow's Seadrift chemicals site in Texas, where the Xe-100 would replace ageing fossil fuel infrastructure. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission accepted the construction permit application in May last year.
The company also has an agreement with Amazon to deploy more than 5 GW of Xe-100 capacity across the US by 2039, starting with the Cascade Advanced Energy Facility in Washington state, developed with regional utility Energy Northwest. A separate deal with Centrica targets 6 GW of deployment in the UK.
The financials behind the hype
X-Energy reported a net loss of roughly $390 million on revenue of $94 million, excluding grants, last year. That compares with a net loss of $126 million on revenue of $84 million the prior year. Losses are widening significantly faster than revenue is growing.
Ark Investment Management indicated interest in buying as much as $105 million of shares at the IPO price. Founder and chairman Kamal Ghaffarian controls 61% of the class B shares, while affiliates of Ares Management hold 26%.
JPMorgan, Morgan Stanley, Jefferies and Moelis led the deal.
Wider context for the SMR sector
Citigroup analyst Vikram Bagri wrote in a client note that the IPO launch suggests continued appetite among investors for small modular reactors.
That appetite is clear across the sector. Oklo, backed by Sam Altman, carries a market capitalisation of around $11 billion despite being pre-revenue. NuScale Power, the only SMR developer with NRC design approval, is valued at roughly $3.7 billion. Bank of America has framed the broader nuclear buildout as a potential $10 trillion opportunity over the coming decades.
The common thread is AI-driven power demand. Data centre energy consumption as a share of total US electricity demand is projected to grow from around 4% in 2024 to nearly 12% by 2030. Hyperscalers, including Amazon, Google and Meta have all signed nuclear power agreements in the past 18 months.
What investors are buying
X-Energy's IPO tells a clear story about market appetite. Investors are willing to pay a premium for companies positioned in the path of AI infrastructure spending, even when revenues are minimal and commercial deployment is years away.
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The company's failed $1 billion SPAC attempt in 2023 is a useful reference point. The difference between then and now is the hyperscaler power agreements, the NRC progress and a market that has decided nuclear is no longer a fringe bet.
Whether a $11.5 billion valuation for a company that has never built a reactor proves justified will depend on execution over the next decade. For now, the market has made its view plain.
The recap
- X-Energy completed an upsized IPO raising $1.02 billion.
- Company sold 44.3 million shares priced at $23 each.
- X-Energy expects Nasdaq listing under ticker XE on Friday.
