It was pitched to investors as “the biggest initial public offering (IPO) in a generation”.

Firmus Technologies – a developer of artificial intelligence (AI) data centres – planned to raise A$7 billion from investors on the Australian Securities Exchange later this month.

Just days ago, bankers working on the deal declared investor interest in the A$11-a-share offer was “well in excess” of what was needed to go ahead.

The company and its backers claimed Firmus was worth almost A$44 billion, which would have made it Australia’s second-largest share market listing, behind Telstra in 1997.

Yet, by Friday morning, it was off.

What went wrong? And what are the lessons investors should apply to all companies to guard against hype and protect their money?

The warning signs were obvious

There were plenty of red flags ahead of this listing, covered in detail only yesterday in The Conversation, when the IPO was still meant to be going ahead.

Firmus is losing money. Only two of its data centres are currently operational, with the rest in the planning or construction phase.

Most remarkably, Firmus’ claimed value had soared eight-fold in less than a year.

In November 2025, a private funding round valued it at about A$6 billion. In August this year, it had climbed to more than US$10.5 billion (about A$15 billion).

Yet this month, Firmus........

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