Hot IPO

Hot IPO

An IPO that is extremely popular, leading to a dramatic rise in price immediately after the IPO. Hot IPOs are usually overbooked. They were especially popular in the 1990s during the dot-com bubble when it was common for IPOs to occur at, say, $10 per share, and almost instantly spike to $50 or $60 per share. An IPO is a risky investment in general; a hot IPO may be even riskier, especially when the company's earnings are small or non-existent, as was the case in the dot-com bubble. See also: Publicly-traded company.