Medline’s (MLDN, $29-$40.67 range today) market debut arrived like a late-December house call: right on time, surprisingly upbeat, and armed with far more supplies than anyone ordered.
Biggest IPO of the year
Medical-supplies giant Medline raised roughly 6.3 billion dollars in its initial public offering, selling about 216 million shares at 29 dollars apiece in an upsized deal that pushed its equity valuation north of 50 billion dollars. That haul secures Medline the title of largest IPO of 2025, a year when bankers had begun to wonder if the new-issue calendar had permanently gone into quarantine.
A healthy first-day pop
Investors wasted little time prescribing a premium, sending the newly minted MDLN shares up roughly +20% in early Nasdaq trading, with the stock opening around 35 dollars versus its 29 dollar offer price. The jump suggests that, at least for one morning, the old IPO ritual—discount, debate, then day-one euphoria—remains in stable condition.
From private equity ward to public market
Medline’s journey to the public markets began years earlier, when private equity heavyweights including Blackstone, Carlyle, and Hellman & Friedman acquired a controlling stake in the company at a roughly 30 to 34 billion dollar valuation. The new listing crystallizes a substantial paper gain for those sponsors, who now have a liquid ticker symbol and a refreshed narrative to match their original investment thesis.
Betting on bandages, not buzzwords
In a year dominated by talk of artificial intelligence, the largest offering did not come from an algorithm, but from a business that sells the unglamorous essentials of modern medicine—gloves, gowns, and a long list of items hospitals only notice when they run out. For investors, the appeal is straightforward: Medline delivered more than 25 billion dollars in annual net sales and over 1 billion dollars in net income recently, giving the story a cash-flow backbone rather than a purely conceptual spine.
What the deal signals for 2026
Medline’s bold pricing, upsized share count, and robust first-day trading provide underwriters with something they have not had in years: a live case study suggesting that large, earnings-rich issuers can clear the market without heroic discounts. If that lesson holds, the company’s debut could mark more than the year’s biggest IPO; it may be the moment corporate boardrooms stop treating the public market like an optional procedure and start viewing it again as a standard part of long-term care.
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