Anthropic, the company behind the Claude chatbot, has confidentially filed a draft S-1 with the SEC ahead of a potential US listing. Last valued at $965 billion in its latest round, it now sits above OpenAI on paper. A public filing this autumn revealed its first detailed financials, including a $80.7 billion net loss in the first half of 2026.
🔑 Key takeaways
- Confidential S-1 filed on June 1, 2026, followed by a public filing in late October 2026.
- Revenue of $16.3 billion in the first half of 2026 against a net loss of $80.7 billion.
- Cash and equivalents of $112.4 billion as of June 30, plus $19.3 billion in short-term investments.
- Pricing reportedly targeted for November 19 or 20, with no official share count or price range published yet.
A confidential filing opens the door to a wave of listings
On June 1, 2026, Anthropic announced it had confidentially submitted a draft registration statement on Form S-1 to the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC, the US markets regulator). The confidential route lets a company prepare an offering while keeping certain financial details out of public view during the preparatory phase. The company said the number of shares and their price had not been set, and that the offering would depend on market conditions.
The filing is part of a wave of large-scale transactions. SpaceX released financial information in late May ahead of its own IPO, and OpenAI is also reportedly preparing one. According to analysts at Wedbush Securities, the three companies have opened the window on an IPO market that had been relatively dormant for several years, turning their timetables into a race to reach public markets in the coming months.
In practice, the process runs through several sequential steps:
- Confidential submission of the draft S-1 to the SEC, completed on June 1, 2026.
- Public filing of the registration statement, which must occur at least 15 calendar days before the launch of the investor roadshow.
- Roadshow presentations to institutional investors.
- Pricing of the offering and number of shares, followed by the first trading session.
The company’s rise, founded in 2021 by former OpenAI executives, has been unusually fast. In the week before the filing, it announced a raise of $65 billion at a $965 billion valuation, placing it ahead of OpenAI, which was valued at $852 billion in March 2026. Anthropic also reported annualized revenue of $47 billion, drawn from sales of its technology to individuals and organisations, many using Claude to write code and handle professional tasks.
Figures circulating in the press vary widely. According to the Financial Times, investors were pencilling in a valuation between $1.5 trillion and $1.75 trillion. Earlier reports pointed to a raise of up to $100 billion at a $2 trillion valuation. These are estimates: Anthropic has not published an official valuation range.
| Entity | Valuation | Context |
|---|---|---|
| Anthropic (recent round) | $965 billion | $65 billion raised |
| OpenAI | $852 billion | March 2026 funding |
| Anthropic (FT estimate) | $1.5 to $1.75 trillion | Investor expectations, unconfirmed |
| Anthropic (earlier reports) | $2 trillion | Potential raise of $100 billion |
First detailed numbers from the public filing
The public filing, submitted this autumn, provided the first detailed financial data. Anthropic reported $16.3 billion in revenue for the first half of 2026, alongside a net loss of $80.7 billion. Third-quarter revenue reached $16.8 billion, up from $11.5 billion in the second quarter. The company told investors gathered at its San Francisco offices that it was profitable on an adjusted basis during that quarter.
That adjusted profitability does not erase the scale of the spending ahead. As of June 30, the company held $112.4 billion in cash and cash equivalents, plus $19.3 billion in short-term investments. It nonetheless said it expects to increase infrastructure investment sharply, which would weigh on future cash flows. Anthropic spends billions of dollars training and running its Claude models. It works with Google and Amazon and also rents graphics processing capacity from SpaceX’s Colossus 1 data centre.
| Metric | Value | Period |
|---|---|---|
| Revenue | $16.3 billion | First half 2026 |
| Net loss | $80.7 billion | First half 2026 |
| Revenue | $11.5 billion | Second quarter 2026 |
| Revenue | $16.8 billion | Third quarter 2026 |
| Cash | $112.4 billion | As of June 30, 2026 |
| Short-term investments | $19.3 billion | As of June 30, 2026 |
Enterprise adoption is accelerating. As of September 30, more than 1,900 customers had generated at least $1 million in trailing twelve-month revenue, including about 250 above $10 million.
A vision of AI paired with acknowledged risks
In the prospectus, Anthropic presents AI as a technology capable of transforming society, while also acknowledging explicit risks.
“We believe that AI is one of the most consequential technologies in human history. Managed well, it could accelerate scientific innovation, bring cures for major diseases closer, and solve problems that have resisted generations of human effort.”
Anthropic, public S-1 filing
The same document warns that advanced AI systems, if not developed, deployed and operated with appropriate safeguards, oversight and security measures, could pose catastrophic or existential risks, particularly if they were misused, weaponised or allowed to operate with a high degree of autonomy. These risks are listed as general risk factors, without a timetable or quantified probability.
A selective IPO market and mixed signals
Market reaction to the public filing was broadly positive. In premarket trading, Nvidia gained 1.4%, Broadcom 1.5% and Micron 2.3%, names directly exposed to demand for AI chips and infrastructure.
On the crypto platform Hyperliquid, the ANTH contract, which lets traders bet on the expected pre-listing share price, traded near $1,980 around 9:00 a.m. Eastern, when the S-1 was expected. It then fell about 6% to roughly $1,857, before settling near $1,875 shortly after 12:05 p.m. UTC, up 1.8% over 24 hours on roughly $12 million in volume. These levels are a gauge of sentiment rather than an official price: volume is modest and the contract is not a formal valuation.
The market remains selective. Shares of Elice, a South Korean data centre provider, fell 32% in their first session after a $151 million raise. Firmus Grid, a group backed by Nvidia, postponed its listing after investors challenged the proposed valuation, while several other companies pushed back their plans citing market conditions.
Two strategic readings
Scott Stevens, founder and chief executive of Gray Peak Financial, highlights how quickly Anthropic overtook OpenAI, in 12 to 14 months. In his view, Anthropic is far more oriented toward enterprises, coding and software development, whereas OpenAI built its early profile on consumers and first-use AI.
Gil Luria, analyst at DA Davidson, argues that OpenAI and Anthropic are in a race to list before capital runs short. He also sees a second motive: letting Anthropic set the terms for how a frontier model company reports its financial statements, in a way that favours its business model.
“The combined capital demand from SpaceX, OpenAI and Anthropic will be so large that it is likely to disrupt capital markets, so going first will be a major advantage.”
Gil Luria, Analyst, DA Davidson
The timetable remains fluid. Yahoo Finance reported in June that a public filing could come as early as the following Friday, without confirmation from the company. CoinDesk, in a piece dated October 26, 2026, reported that the public filing was ultimately submitted on a Monday morning, with the aim of a November offering. Pricing was reportedly still on track for November 19 or 20, according to Liz Claman, a presenter at Fox Business. The number of shares and the price range had not been published at that stage.
Outlook: three scenarios to watch
Anthropic’s case shows how quickly an AI company can rise to the front of capital markets. Three scenarios emerge from the available data.
- Favourable scenario: a well-received listing confirms the valuation and clears the path for OpenAI and SpaceX. Revenue growth and adjusted profitability become the central arguments.
- Middle scenario: a delayed or downsized offering, with investors demanding a discount, as the Elice and Firmus Grid cases suggest.
- Unfavourable scenario: infrastructure spending heavier than planned, combined with a more fragile IPO market, weighs on cash flows and compresses the valuation.
The published data do not settle the question. More than $130 billion in cash and investments provides a sizeable buffer, but the first-half net loss and the planned rise in infrastructure spending make the financial trajectory dependent on enterprise revenue growth continuing at pace.
Sources
- CoinDesk, October 26, 2026
- Financial Times
- Al Jazeera, June 1, 2026
- Yahoo Finance, June 2026
- NPR, June 1, 2026
Cet article est publié à titre informatif et éducatif. Il ne constitue en aucun cas un conseil en investissement. Faites vos propres recherches (DYOR) avant toute décision.
