Anthropic’s IPO filing on Monday has been slammed as “nuts” by the CEO of deVere Group, an independent financial advisory group. Nigel Green, the CEO, said this in a press release following the publication of the Claude maker’s S-1 registration statement for a Nasdaq listing under the ticker ANT. It reportedly targets the listing in the week of 16 November.
Markets expect it could raise as much as US$100 billion at a valuation of around US$2 trillion, which would make it the biggest stock market debut in history.
“Anthropic is asking ordinary investors to help bankroll one of the largest spending commitments any company has ever made, at a price of around US$2 trillion, while warning in the same document its growth may slow and it could need more money sooner than expected. Frankly, it’s nuts,” Green said.
“Nobody’s disputing the business is extraordinary. The issue is who carries the risk if the spending runs ahead of the revenue. After this listing, the answer is the public.”
According to the registration statement, revenue hit a staggering US$16.3 billion in 1H 2026, up from a mere US$1.1 billion a year earlier. Even more eye-watering, third-quarter revenue alone (with adjusted profit) is expected to reach US$16.8 billion.
But the losses are what stood out.
Anthropic posted a net loss of US$80.7 billion over the first six months, although around US$72 billion of that was a non-cash accounting charge tied to the rising value of convertible bonds.
“To be fair, most of that US$80.7 billion is paper, the result of Anthropic’s own valuation soaring. Strip it out and the business still lost almost US$9 billion in six months, and the cash bill is only getting bigger,” Green revealed.
In the prospectus, Anthropic said it expects to spend up to US$120.5 billion on Nvidia-powered compute from SpaceXAI into 2029, around US$3.1 billion a month once fully delivered, and up to US$114.5 billion with Google through 2033. In total, the frontier lab has committed to at least US$518 billion over a decade on cloud services, computing and infrastructure.
Green elaborates: “These are numbers on the scale of national budgets. The revenue growth is astonishing, but it has to stay astonishing for years to cover commitments this size, and Anthropic itself warns its growth rate may not be sustainable and could fall.”
Even more eye-catching are the revelations that the company will not pay dividend for the foreseeable future, and that the founders will hold 50.1 per cent of the voting power.
Green explains the impact: “Public shareholders will be putting in the money without getting control, income or certainty.”
Charity on the side
Anthropic has also placed 5 per cent of its shares into its own Anthropic Public Benefit Fund, with the board able to add up to 2 per cent more each time the stock rises 50 per cent above the previous milestone.
“Directing a slice of the company to the public good is admirable. Buyers need to understand, though, that the fund is designed to grow as the share price climbs, so dilution is built into success,” Green pointed out.
The prospectus also warns of AI’s potential to pose catastrophic and existential risks to humanity, an extraordinary risk factor for any company seeking public money.
“It’s a remarkable thing to read in an IPO document. Credit to Anthropic for the candour, but investors are being asked to price a technology its own makers say could go catastrophically wrong.”
Looking ahead, Green believes the listing will shape far more than one company’s fortunes.
“This IPO is a referendum on the entire AI trade. If it soars, expect a queue of AI listings and even more capital piling into the theme. If it stumbles, valuations across tech could reset fast. A listing this size is also likely to find its way into index funds and pensions fairly quickly, so millions of savers may end up owning a slice whether they’ve chosen to or not.”
“The roadshow will show how much investors are prepared to pay for a future that hasn’t arrived yet. Adjusted profit is a start, but the question every investor should be asking is when it turns into real cash profit after paying for all that compute. The IPO filing doesn’t answer that,” Green said in conclusion.