New Delhi, June 10 -- Investors have been here before. A transformative technology arrives, valuations detach from earnings and markets start pricing the future today. Capital markets financed booms in railways, dotcoms, social media and crypto plays, only to watch many companies collapse once reality caught up with what former Fed chair Alan Greenspan called 'irrational exuberance.'

Investors are now being asked to bankroll a new crop of companies whose sky-high valuations depend less on what they earn today than what they might achieve someday. Think of the interplanetary ambitions of SpaceX or the quest for artificial general intelligence (AGI) at OpenAI and Anthropic.

With initial public offerings (IPOs) lined up in the US, these th...