When Alphabet—Google’s parent company—announced a record-breaking $85 billion stock sale, the message was clear: investor appetite for AI-related offerings is not just strong; it’s ravenous. Originally, the company planned to sell $40 billion in various equity instruments, including two different share classes and smaller “depositary shares” priced to attract a wider range of investors. But demand was so overwhelming that the sale ultimately raised $45 billion, as CEO Sundar Pichai shared in a post on X Monday. Among the buyers was Berkshire Hathaway, still famous for its value-investing focus, which snapped up $10 billion worth.

Alphabet intends to sell another $40 billion in the next quarter, bringing the total to $85 billion. Even $80 billion would have surpassed the previous record for equity offerings, set by Brazilian oil producer Petroleo Brasileiro SA with $70 billion in 2010, according to Bloomberg. Of course, these investors are buying shares in Alphabet—not a younger, potentially debt-heavy AI startup. Alphabet is a robust business: it reported $110 billion in revenue (with healthy profit margins) in the first quarter alone, a 22% increase year over year. Still, the proceeds from this stock sale are specifically earmarked for AI. As Pichai described it, this is “part of our multi-year investment strategy to meet the AI opportunity ahead and support the demand we’re seeing from enterprises and consumers.”

At Google I/O last month, he noted that the company expects to spend between $180 billion and $190 billion on capital expenditures this year—mostly on AI infrastructure and data centers. The timing of this successful sale matters beyond Alphabet itself. As Anthropic prepares to go public, the enormous demand for Alphabet’s offering is a promising sign for the broader AI IPO pipeline. It suggests that public investors—especially large institutional ones—are ready to commit significant capital. The upcoming SpaceX IPO is expected to shatter records for cash raised and valuation, and Anthropic’s deal is projected to do the same, possibly surpassing SpaceX. OpenAI is also waiting in the wings.

But all of this hinges on public investor appetite—not just private venture capital—remaining strong and staying that way. Nearly $8 trillion in AI spending has been committed over the next five years, an unprecedented sum. That money has to come from somewhere: individual company revenues, loans, and capital raised through stock sales. The question every AI company eyeing an IPO should be asking right now is whether public markets have the stomach to absorb that much capital for that long.