eToro (FINALLY!) goes public

Author

Alex Wilhelm
May 14, 2025 • Estimated Reading Time: 8 minutes

Top News

  • eToro goes public! After a called-off SPAC, an IPO filing, and an IPO delay, consumer trading service eToro got out the door this week, pricing its debut above expectations. Investors thought it was still too cheap at $52 per share, pushing its value to $67 by the end of regular trading. After a long public-market drought only partially punctured by CoreWeave’s early-2025 listing, eToro’s strong — eventual — IPO pricing and early trading is a boon to other unicorns that have their eyes on getting out this year. Speaking of which…

  • Chime files to go public! Consumer neobank Chime filed to go public today — Alex’s notes on its financials are here — bringing a multi-decacorn startup valuation to the precipice of conversion to public equity. To say that the Chime IPO is a big deal is underselling it; Chime was valued at around $25 billion back in 2021, after all. The good news is that Chime has done well for itself in recent years, posting strong revenue growth, narrowing losses, improving revenue quality, and increasing revenue diversity. It looks strong. And with a host of VCs holding onto paper gains for years now, its debut could make a lot of venture LPs more than a little happy.

  • TensorWave raises $100M: Returning to the AI beat, TensorWave’s AMD-powered compute service is now $100 million richer thanks to a new funding round. Most interesting, however, is not the check that TensorWave recently cashed but instead the growth that underwrote the investment. Namely, that the company has $100 million worth of bookings for the year, and when we factor in growth over the next 2.5 quarters, should exit 2025 on a comfortable nine-figure run rate. That means TensorWave is now — presuming its underlying economics are solid — part of the IPO conversation. Any company scaling into the nine-figures is an S-1 candidate. Good. We are about to cash out a few leading TWIST500 companies, and will need new names. (Surprise: TensorWave is joining the list in our next update!)

TWiST500

Which OpenAI model do you use the most? I default to 4o, because that’s what the ChatGPT app serves me unless I tell it to use something else. If you are like me, however, you might want to take a second look at picking a different model now that OpenAI is baking GPT-4.1 into the ChatGPP app directly after initially only releasing it via its commercial API.

OpenAI says that GPT-4.1 is “a specialized model that excels at coding tasks [and] instruction following” that is quicker than its o-series models that are also available. So, if you are running coding tasks inside ChatGPT, and are a paying subscriber to OpenAI, you might want to give 4.1 a spin.

It’s notable how quickly AI models went from old-school Apple OS vibes (here’s the thing, use it, we don’t offer infinite flavors) to Windows Vista aesthetics (here are 47 different versions, choose your own adventure). I know a bit about each OpenAI model, because I get paid to stay on top of such things. But if you are a regular user? Well, you might not know the real difference between o4-mini, 4o, 4.1, o3, 4.5, o4-mini-high, or GPT-4.1 mini, right?

More options are welcome. But I wonder if we’re at peak model variety density. There’s probably a business model out there in making a tool that auto-selects the best AI model for a user query, just so that we can avoid the drop-down-menu-drama.

Quibbles aside, the news from OpenAI underscores how quickly AI models continue to advance. And it’s a good thing that Sam Altman and friends are busy shipping — Google’s AI confectionary is also cooking up tasty AI treats that are chasing the same market. — Alex

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This Week in Startups

E2125: On a special Tuesday TWiST, Alex chats with founders from two cutting edge frontier technologies reshaping our world. First up, ZioSec hopes to improve cybersecurity by putting AI agents on the case. Then, hear about how Terabase wants to use mobile robotic factories to transform how we build and maintain our solar power infrastructure.

E2124: Jason, Lon, and Alex examine Perplexity’s WILD $14 billion valuation and openly wonder why they need MORE funding. Plus, does Y Combinator REALLY think Google should be broken up, and if so, why don’t they stick to their guns? All that and the guys chat with Streamfog’s Kevin Bondzio about the promise of AR-powered podcast ads.

E2123: On Friday’s TWiST, Jason, Alex and Lon debate why Instacart CEO Fidji Simo left that job to join the team at OpenAI: was it just the money, or a chance to do something more COMPELLING than helping people order groceries? Plus, everyone’s thoughts on the US justice system’s first-ever AI-generated victim statement, Jason urges viewers to read “The Checklist Manifesto,” and a chat with Where2Wheel founder Brittany Peregoff about her off-roading marketplace and the economic promise of agritourism.

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