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Amazon-Backed X-Energy’s $1 Billion IPO Puts Nuclear Power Back in the AI Spotlight
24 April 2026
3 mins read

Amazon-Backed X-Energy’s $1 Billion IPO Puts Nuclear Power Back in the AI Spotlight

Rockville, Md.—April 24, 2026, 09:01 (EDT)

  • X-energy’s IPO came in upsized, with the company selling 44.25 million shares at $23 each to pull in roughly $1.02 billion.
  • Shares were set to debut on Nasdaq under the ticker “XE” this Friday, after the offering landed roughly 21% north of its initial price range ceiling.
  • Public investors now have a more straightforward entry point to the small modular reactor theme with the listing. Still, the company hasn’t produced a commercial Xe-100 reactor, nor has it made final calls on actual deployments.

X-energy pulled in roughly $1.02 billion through a larger-than-expected U.S. IPO, setting its share price above the stated range—a move that gauges appetite for nuclear power stocks linked to AI and data-center energy demand. The company, based out of Rockville, Maryland, put 44,254,659 Class A shares on offer at $23 apiece. Shares were slated to start trading Friday on the Nasdaq Global Select Market under the ticker “XE.” X-energy

This deal drops just as the IPO market looks to regain its footing after a March slowdown, with demand from cloud and AI giants putting nuclear energy back on the radar for mainstream investors. Small modular reactors—SMRs—are at the center: developers tout them as a faster, more cost-efficient alternative to traditional reactors, built in repeatable pieces.

X-energy boosted both the number of shares and the price after originally pitching 42.86 million shares in a $16 to $19 range. Underwriters picked up a 30-day option for another 6,638,198 shares. The deal is slated to wrap up April 27, pending customary closing conditions. J.P. Morgan, Morgan Stanley, Jefferies, and Moelis ran point as lead bookrunners.

Nasdaq slotted X-energy’s opening-bell event for 9:15 to 9:45 a.m. ET in New York, and founder and chairman Kam Ghaffarian was tapped to handle the bell-ringing. That schedule hit just ahead of the official U.S. cash market open at the dateline.

X-energy is working on the Xe-100, a high-temperature gas-cooled reactor targeting 80 megawatts of electric output per unit or process heat for industry. The company details a four-unit setup totaling around 320 megawatts, with helium for cooling and TRISO-X fuel—this uses HALEU, uranium enriched above standard reactor fuel but kept below weapons-grade.

Amazon’s name carries most of the weight in this deal. Back in 2024, X-energy disclosed that Amazon anchored a financing round worth about $500 million, with both sides targeting over 5 gigawatts of new U.S. power projects by 2039. “New sources of carbon-free energy” that can be brought in “cost-effectively and safely”—that’s what the companies need, Amazon global data centers VP Kevin Miller said at the time. X-energy

Amazon isn’t the only name in the mix here. According to X-energy, Dow, Centrica and Amazon together could anchor over 11 gigawatts of planned capacity in the U.S. and Britain—if all contingent options come through. Speaking to the Financial Times back in November, CEO J. Clay Sell said those customer deals had “distinguished” X-energy from rivals, pushing its order backlog “north of 11 gigawatts.” Financial Times

Dow’s first large-scale U.S. rollout is planned for its Seadrift, Texas, plant. Alongside X-energy, the companies filed a construction permit with the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission in March 2025—a process Sell says could take as long as 30 months to clear. That approval, once in hand, would mark a key milestone for a project both sides see as a test case for whether the technology really can be “quickly and efficiently replicated” to meet surging U.S. electricity needs. X-energy

Earlier this month, Fluor said it landed a contract with X-energy to take on the Dow project, starting out with front-end planning, feasibility analysis, cost management and risk mitigation tasks. “Fit-for-purpose baseload power in an industrial setting,” is how Pierre Bechelany, president of energy solutions at Fluor, described X-energy’s technology. Fluor Newsroom

Still looks early stage on the books. X-energy’s 2025 services revenue landed at $94.3 million, with grant income of $14.8 million, while net loss widened to $389.8 million—much deeper than the $126.0 million loss in 2024. The company’s filing also logged $149.9 million net cash outflow from operations and $117.2 million in capex for last year.

The race among advanced nuclear developers is picking up. TerraPower, Kairos Power, Newcleo, and others are scrambling to secure suppliers or ramp up their own manufacturing, aiming to lock in tough-to-get components—think steam generators, reactor vessels, specialty forgings—for reactor fleets slated for the 2030s. X-energy has struck supply deals with SGL Carbon, Doosan Enerbility, and IHI tied to its Xe-100 program.

There’s a risk here: investors are buying into the idea before the plant is even up. X-energy has made it clear—it hasn’t delivered a commercial Xe-100, hasn’t locked in final investment decisions anywhere, and it’s flagged all the usual hurdles: first-of-a-kind costs, regulatory review, fuel supply issues, delays. All of it could hit the business. So Friday’s debut isn’t about profits right now; it’s a bet on whether the public market wants to bankroll a long and expensive push to put new nuclear on the grid for AI, industry, and beyond.

Khadija Saeed is a financial markets reporter at TS2.tech, specializing in stocks, technology and emerging industries. She studied economics and finance at the London School of Economics and previously worked in market research before moving into financial journalism. Her coverage focuses on the companies, innovations and economic trends influencing global investors.

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