Anthropic's IPO price slips again: investors now talk $1.2-1.3 trillion, down from $1.5 trillion

Some prospective investors in Anthropic's planned stock offering are now discussing a valuation of roughly $1.2 trillion to $1.3 trillion, Bloomberg News reported Friday, as summarized by Investing.com, citing a person familiar with the matter. That compares with the $1.4 trillion to $1.5 trillion investors had earlier relayed to bankers. The person said no final decisions have been made, and an Anthropic spokesperson declined to comment.

How the number has fallen

• Early October: investors discussed figures as high as $2 trillion, per the Bloomberg account.
• After the investor briefing on Anthropic's financials: $1.4 trillion to $1.5 trillion.
• Friday, Nov. 6: about $1.2 trillion to $1.3 trillion, after the sell-off.

The Wall Street Journal reported Thursday, in an exclusive, that major investors doubted the company could reach $1.5 trillion. According to the Investing.com summary, three prospective investors said the offering would probably have to price lower, one suggesting nearer $1 trillion, and the paper raised the possibility of a smaller raise or a delay. We could not read the Journal's full article, so we are relying on that summary.

Reuters reported on Thursday, in a piece carried by the New York Post, that the roadshow was expected to start the week of Nov. 9, with pricing the week after. People familiar with investor discussions told Reuters that Anthropic may have to offer a bigger discount to win commitments, and that the company could wait for calmer markets if AI assets stay under pressure. Some expect the offering to raise as much as $100 billion.

The number behind the number

A drop from $1.5 trillion to $1.25 trillion is about 17%, and from $2 trillion to $1.25 trillion about 38%. Over the same stretch the Nasdaq 100 is 14.7% below its Oct. 6 peak at Thursday's close, by our chart. In other words the IPO talk has fallen by more than the index it will list into. Investors were not marking Anthropic down in line with the market. They were removing a premium.

The Investing.com summary says the Nasdaq 100 fell 6.4% on Thursday, wiping out about $2.3 trillion of value in its largest one-day decline on record. Our Thursday close story has the full session.

What the filing leaves open

Reuters said investors are waiting for Anthropic's October revenue, which the company left blank in its amended S-1. Our reading of that filing is in the amended S-1 story: third-quarter revenue of $16.96 billion and an operating loss of $567 million. The blank October figure matters because buyers are trying to tell whether growth re-accelerated after the slowdown in recent months that Reuters' sources describe.

Who it hits

For anyone holding shares in the large cloud and chip suppliers tied to Anthropic, a delayed or discounted offering is one more signal about how much the market will pay for AI revenue. Reuters noted a delay would likely add to concern about the health of the AI ecosystem. For a small business that pays for AI tools, nothing changes this week: the IPO decides what Anthropic's owners are paid, not what the product costs. A lower price would, however, mean the company raises less per share it sells, and Reuters' sources say the company needs the capital.

What to watch

Whether the roadshow launches on schedule next week, the price range in an updated filing, and the October revenue figure. Any of those would settle more than the current talk, which is a negotiating range and not a price.

Related: the FTC probe of OpenAI and Anthropic; markets.

Sources: Bloomberg News via Investing.com; Wall Street Journal via Investing.com summary; Reuters via the New York Post; Anthropic's amended S-1 as covered in our archive; Nasdaq 100 chart from Yahoo Finance data. Valuation figures are what prospective investors are discussing, not a price. This is market information, not investment advice.