Anthropic's $2 Trillion AI Dream Is Facing a Reality Check as Investors Reconsider Its Valuation

Anthropic's IPO story just got more complicated. According to Reuters, as summarized by Traders Union, some current and prospective investors discussed a valuation of around $1.5 trillion at the company's investor day in San Francisco on October 14, down from the roughly $2 trillion previously expected for the November share sale. This is investor discussion, not a finalized IPO price.

The trigger was growth, not a collapse in the business. Anthropic told prospective investors that third-quarter revenue reached $16.8 billion, up about 45% from the second quarter. That is strong in absolute terms but a big slowdown from the pace earlier in the year. The figures reported so far show the shape of the problem:

• Quarterly revenue rose from $4.7 billion in Q1 to $11.6 billion in Q2 and $16.8 billion in Q3, so sequential growth fell from about 147% to 45%, per Stocktwits' account of the Reuters report
• Anthropic said it was profitable on an adjusted basis in the quarter, and the Financial Times reported it earned $1.70 in revenue per dollar spent on computing, according to CNBC
• The company did not discuss its September annualized revenue rate or a full-year outlook, The Decoder noted, which some investors may have read as a gap

Context matters here. Anthropic's private valuation was $965 billion in May, so even $1.5 trillion would be a large step up, and last year it grew revenue twelvefold to nearly $4.6 billion while posting an operating loss of more than $8 billion, excluding certain writedowns.

The adjusted profit figure eased some worries about the heavy cost of building AI, while the slower growth made others louder. The listing is being watched as a test of whether public markets will pay trillion-dollar prices for AI labs at all, and the final number will depend on demand from investors rather than on any figure floated at an investor day.