Why Arthur Hayes Called a Bull Market for Worldcoin—and What the OpenAI IPO Means for AI Tokens

Anthropic's IPO filing. The same day, Anthropic filed a confidential S-1 with a projected valuation approaching $1 trillion, supercharging the narrative that AI-linked tokens were the nearest liquid proxy for the coming flood of AI IPOs .

Real-world adoption. Worldcoin partnered with the band Thirty Seconds to Mars for a "human-only" ticketing system using World ID, giving the asset a concrete use case beyond speculation .

Technical breakout. WLD broke above multi-month resistance at $0.39, a level that had capped every rally since February, triggering momentum traders and pushing 24-hour volume above $640 million .

Futures activity exploded alongside spot buying. Derivatives volume surpassed $2.3 billion in a single day, and open interest rose 21% to $341 million . On-chain metrics painted a similar picture: whale transactions hit 64, active addresses reached 1,309, and new wallets spiked to 379—all 2026 highs within a single 24-hour window . Santiment flagged the move as a likely FOMO event, cautioning that the sudden spike in activity coincided too neatly with the price jump to be purely organic .

Hayes's liquidity halo thesis

The core of Hayes's argument is that the upcoming OpenAI IPO creates a "liquidity halo" for Worldcoin . The reasoning works like this:

OpenAI—co-founded by Sam Altman, who also co-founded Worldcoin—is preparing for what could be one of the largest tech IPOs on record, with valuation estimates ranging from $800 billion to $1 trillion . The company has already secured $122 billion in funding and reported $5.7 billion in Q1 2026 revenue .

Most retail investors won't be able to access pre-IPO shares. Hayes's thesis is that they will look for the most liquid on-chain proxies instead—and WLD is the most direct token connected to Sam Altman and the AI ecosystem . Unlike competitors such as NEAR Protocol, which is also flagged as an AI-beta play, WLD's association with Altman gives it a unique narrative hook in a market hungry for AI exposure .

Hayes framed WLD as a pre-IPO bull-market bet, arguing the IPO catalyst would drive demand for both World ID and the WLD token . The catch: Worldcoin and OpenAI are legally independent entities, and WLD has no direct financial claim on OpenAI's revenues or valuation . It is a narrative trade, not a fundamental one.

Worldcoin's market snapshot

WLD peaked around $0.44–$0.46 on June 2, a 19–22% daily gain . Its market cap climbed to roughly $1.42–$1.46 billion, and 24-hour volume topped $643 million . The monthly gain reached as high as 79% by some data providers, making it one of the strongest-performing tokens in the AI sector over that window .

But the rebound sits on a deeply depressed base. In late May, WLD had been trading near $0.26–$0.27, dragged down by regulatory suspensions in multiple jurisdictions and relentless pressure from token unlocks . The all-time high of $11.74 in March 2024 means the token was still down 96–98% from its peak even after the surge . On June 3, the price had already slipped back to roughly $0.38, a 12.8% retracement from the prior day's high .

The 2026 mega-cap IPO landscape

The Worldcoin rally didn't happen in isolation. It was swept up in a broader narrative around three of the most anticipated tech IPOs in history:

• OpenAI. Targeting a late-2026 or early-2027 listing. Secured $122 billion in funding at an $852 billion private valuation and generated $5.7 billion in Q1 2026 revenue . The CFO has pointed to 2027 as more realistic, but market speculation remains concentrated on late 2026 .
• Anthropic. Filed confidentially on June 2, 2026, with a projected valuation approaching $1 trillion—news that landed on the same day WLD surged and directly boosted AI crypto tokens .
• SpaceX. Filed confidentially earlier in 2026 targeting a $1.75 trillion valuation and a $50–75 billion raise, with a possible June 2026 debut .

Analysts have warned that these IPOs could cut both ways for crypto. Together, they could represent the largest equity capital raises in history, potentially pulling tens of billions from global markets—including risk assets like Bitcoin . The same IPO wave that creates demand for proxy tokens like WLD could also drain liquidity from the broader crypto ecosystem, making the trade more fragile than the narrative suggests.

For Worldcoin specifically, the scheduled 43% reduction in daily token unlocks from July 24, 2026, could ease supply pressure, but regulatory scrutiny over biometric data collection and the lack of a clear profit model remain structural headwinds . The token is up significantly from its 2026 lows, but the fundamentals haven't changed as fast as the price.