Epic Games Stock: Will Epic Games IPO Next Year?

Get access to pre-IPO Epic Games stock via the ARK Venture Fund available at SoFi Invest. All U.S.-based investors 18+ are eligible to invest. $500 minimum investment. Explore other opportunities to own shares before and during the Epic Games IPO. 

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Notable Epic Games News

02/08/2024: Disney Deal Values Epic at $22.5 Billion, 7% stake
02/07/2024: Disney and Epic Games Epic Partnership
12/11/2023: Epic Games wins antitrust lawsuit against Google
11/08/2023: Google offered Epic $147 million
09/28/2023: Epic Games Is Cutting About 16% of Staff
Older news…

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About Epic Games

Epic Games is a video game company based in Cary, NC. It’s best known as the creator of the first-person shooter game Fortnite, one of 10 most popular online games globally, with more than 350 million registered users. 

Fortnite is free to play, but the company makes money from in-app purchases (that do not give players an advantage). 

Since its founding, the company has created more than 50 games and recently acquired the HouseParty smartphone app and several game development technologies.

It also created the Unreal Engine, a game development software framework for use by other game developers. 

Epic Games was founded in 1991 by Tim Sweeney. 

Disney acquired a $1.5 billion stake in Epic Games, exciting its Star Wars and Marvel fans worldwide. 

Ownership

Founder and CEO Tim Sweeney is the primary owner of the company. At one point, his stake was more than 50%, sources have estimated his stake is now about 28%. 

Tencent Holdings (TCEHY), the Chinese conglomerate and largest video game company worldwide, purchased a 40% equity stake in Epic Games in 2012. 

Disney purchased a $1.5 billion stake in Epic Games in February 2024. No valuation was disclosed. However, based on pre-IPO market data from early January, the stake could be as much as 10%. 

Other shareholders include early investors, employees, and venture capital firms, including Baillie Gifford, Fidelity, Lightspeed Venture Partners, the Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan Board, T. Rowe Price, Blackrock, David Tepper, KKR, Sony, Smash Ventures, and KIRKBI (holding company of The Lego Group).

Its most recent private funding round (April 2022) valued the company at $31.5 billion. 

IPO Potential

The Epic Games IPO date is currently unknown. The company is majority-owned by its founder and CEO, so it won’t go public until he says so. 

As private demand for ownership remains high, Epic Games does not need to go public in the immediate future. 

However, as Epic Games has increased its equity shareholders to include more venture capital firms, a future IPO is more likely so private investors can cash out.

Private investors are patient but will eventually need liquidity. 

We won’t know the date until one of two things happens:

• The Epic Games IPO date range leaks to the financial press
• The SEC releases a publicly-available Epic Games S-1 filing

Typically with a high-profile company of this size, reports of intent to have an IPO will leak to the press a year or two ahead of the IPO. As of mid-2021, we haven’t seen reporting on a potential IPO, indicating the Epic Games IPO may be a few years off. 

Even when the company and SEC publicly release the S-1 filing, we still won’t know a firm date. However, the IPO date typically occurs a month or two after the S-1 is released to the public.

Because Epic Games is a so-called unicorn, you can be sure that the Epic Games IPO date announcement will be big news. 

Valuation

The Epic Games valuation was reported as $22.5 billion by The Information in February 2024.

The previous confirmed valuation was $31.5 billion ($900 per share) during the April 2022 Series H raise. 

Private transactions on the Hiive marketplace that occurred in early January 2024 valued Epic Games at closer to $15 billion. 

How to Buy Epic Games Stock

It’s normally a challenge to acquire shares of a stock that are not yet trading on the public markets. It is possible, but you may not be eligible, and it may not be worth the hassle. 

For example, if you look at Uber stock, individual investors salivated for years, waiting for it to trade publicly. When it finally went public, the stock price fell. So you were better off waiting to buy the stock instead of buying it before the IPO. 

However, there are a few ways to own Epic Games before the IPO. It’s now easier than ever with the ARK Venture Fund. Here are the details. 

1. Acquire Epic Games Shares Pre-IPO

As of early October 2022, the ARK Venture Fund led by Cathie Wood purchased a stake in Epic Games. 

All U.S.-based investors are now eligible to invest in the fund for a $500 minimum investment via SoFi Invest. 

You will only own a small portion of the company. But the fund is a diversified way to own a pool of pre-IPO startups. You’ll gain access to several high-growth companies with one purchase. 

If you are an accredited investor, there may be other options. 

Founders, early employees, and investors are often in a difficult predicament. They own valuable shares of a company that doesn’t trade publicly. 

These shareholders might have multi-million dollar net worths because of their stock holdings, but the stock is not liquid because it doesn’t trade on an exchange. 

A few other platforms have evolved to give these individuals a way to liquidate their holdings before the IPO.

Some of the most prominent include Hiive, Linqto, EquityZen, and Forge Global. Learn more about pre-IPO investing platforms. 

However, these platforms are only available to accredited investors. 

Accredited investors may join these sites and attempt to buy shares of these companies when they become available. 

The shares are only offered to accredited investors because the company’s financials are not publicly filed with regulators yet, increasing the risk to investors. 

For high-profile companies, demand is high, lowering your chances of acquiring shares, even if you’re accredited. 

2. Buy Epic Games After the IPO

Since acquiring pre-IPO shares is delicate and usually reserved for wealthy investors (accredited), the most likely way you’ll own the stock is to wait patiently for the IPO to complete. 

In many cases, investors can get in at or below the IPO price. This is not always true.

But Uber, which many predicted to rise steeply, actually fell on the IPO date.

The moral here is that spending significant effort to own a company before the IPO may not be worth it. You may also spend time and effort to obtain shares but only receive a small allocation. Even if the stock soars, your upside gain may be limited.

Your best chance to own the stock is by waiting for the IPO and making a purchase of Epic Games stock through a no-fee online brokerage account. You can open the account well before the IPO, then place your first trade to learn how to buy shares of a company. 

3. Participate in the Epic Games IPO

Ambitious investors may attempt to position themselves to invest in the Epic Games IPO once it arrives. Most retail investors will not get access.

The wealthiest clients at the top investment banks will get IPO shares in the hottest deals.

Your chances of getting IPO shares depend on four factors:

• IPO demand
• Your broker and eligibility
• Your assets under management at the broker
• Propensity to flip shares

As IPO demand increases, the chances of receiving IPO shares decrease. Therefore, the IPOs that are most interesting to the masses are the hardest to access. 

Lower-demand IPOs may be available to retail investors who are customers of participating brokers. 

What are the Best Online Brokers for IPO Investing?

For an extensive list of IPO-friendly online brokers and their eligibility, check out this page.

Wealthy customers ($1 million+ accounts) at Fidelity, TD Ameritrade, and Schwab may have a shot at some IPOs, depending on demand. 

TradeStation is the best option for investors with less than $250,000. Both give limited access to lower-demand IPOs and secondary offerings through a partnership with ClickIPO, an IPO investing app.

Joining a broker that offers access to IPOs does not guarantee a share allocation, especially in high-demand IPOs. You are probably better off waiting for the company to start trading after the IPO. 

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

Is Epic Games Publicly Traded?

No, the company is privately owned.

What is the Epic Games Stock Symbol?

Epic Games has not yet submitted public filings to the Securities and Exchange Commission. Therefore, we don’t know what the Epic Games stock symbol will be. We can only speculate about the Epic Games ticker.

Here are two suggestions, both of which are available in the U.S.:

• EPIC
• EG

What is the Epic Games Stock Price?

Since Epic Games is not publicly traded on a stock exchange, there is no public Epic Games stock price yet.

However, early 2024 private transaction data provided by Hiive indicates multiple share lots have traded hands at $420 per share. 

News Archive

04/25/2023: Apple declares ‘resounding victory’ after Epic Games decision
04/25/2022: Epic Games CEO Tim Sweeney talks the metaverse, crypto, and antitrust
04/11/2022: Sony and KIRKBI Invest in Epic Games 
04/07/2022: LEGO and Epic Games Team Up to Build a Kids Metaverse 
04/05/2022: How Epic Games is changing gaming—and maybe the metaverse
04/04/2022: Epic Games Raises $144 Million for Ukraine Aid
03/02/2022: Bandcamp is Joining Epic Games
02/16/2022: There are now more than 500 million Epic Games accounts
02/04/2022: How Sony can make a comeback in the console wars
11/23/2021: Epic Games acquires Rock Band maker Harmonix
11/04/2021: Fortnite to shut down in China as Beijing intensifies video game crackdown
10/08/2021: Apple asks judge to pause Epic Games antitrust orders as it appeals ruling
09/10/2021: Epic Games court ruling unlikely to seriously damage Apple’s services business
07/21/2021: Epic Games acquires Sketchfab, a 3D-model sharing platform
03/21/2021: Fortnite-owner Epic Games worth $28bn as fundraising taps lockdown bonanza
01/05/2021: Fortnite Creator Is Buying a Dying Mall to Develop New Headquarters
08/13/2020: Fortnite vs. Apple and Google: Everything you need to know
08/06/2020: ‘Fortnite’ creator Epic Games is now valued at $17.3 billion after blockbuster funding deal

Conclusion

For ordinary investors, it was difficult to acquire pre-IPO Epic Games shares before the ARK announcement. Now is the time to buy Epic Stock via the ARK Venture Fund at SoFi Invest

Otherwise, you’ll need to wait for the IPO date.

But that’s not necessarily a reason to be disappointed. Google’s shares rose 18% on the day of its IPO. Many people probably sold that day. Had they held for the next decade, their holdings would have been up 1,000%.

When the Epic Games IPO is near, please perform due diligence on the SEC S-1 filing and don’t buy Epic Games stock with money you can’t afford to lose. 

Disclosure: The web page contains affiliate links from our partners. If a reader opens an account or buys a service from a link in this article, we may be compensated at no additional cost to the reader. Opening an account with a broker that provides access to IPOs does not guarantee the customer allocations of specific IPOs. The author owns a position in the ARK Venture Fund. This article is an advertisement on behalf of Social Finance, Inc., or SoFi Lending Corp. 234 1st Street, San Francisco, CA 94105. California Finance Lender #6054612. NMLS #1121636.