The Morningstar PitchBook Unicorn 30 Index (U130), which tracks the performance of the 30 largest late-stage venture-backed companies with a valuation of $1 billion or more, has risen 13.4% in 2025 through May 13, solidly outpacing the 0.5% rise for the Morningstar US Market Index for the same time period.
Experts at Morningstar Indexes and PitchBook attribute the strong growth in market value for the UI30 in 2025 to a wave of high-profile valuation events, driven largely by developments in the artificial intelligence (AI) space. Notably, large AI players OpenAI and Anthropic, which represented 3.9% and 3.6% of the index, respectively, as of April 30 each saw significant new investments in the first quarter. OpenAI raised a $40 billion venture growth-stage financing round, bringing its post-money valuation to $300 billion, while Anthropic raised two rounds totaling $4.5 billion, bringing its post-money valuation to $61.5 billion.
CoreWeave’s IPO further fueled index performance, reflecting rising investor demand for AI infrastructure. Stripe, whose platform powers many AI-native businesses, completed its third employee tender offer in a year, increasing its valuation to $91.5 billion — more than double its pre-money valuation from 2023. Additionally, Google announced a $32 billion agreement to acquire Wiz, a cybersecurity firm playing a growing role in securing AI workloads.
Emily Zheng – Senior Research Analyst, US Venture Capital, PitchBook
"AI stands out as an exception to an otherwise sluggish dealmaking environment. The current tariff exemptions on semiconductor chips may widen the valuation gap between AI & ML and other sectors. However, whether these exemptions will become permanent policies or provide merely temporary relief remains to be seen."
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