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Wall Street is bracing for Anthropic’s IPO, a major test of investor appetite for one of the AI industry’s leading companies. Just a few weeks ago, its CEO called for an industry-wide slowdown due to growing safety concerns.
The IPO could take place as early as November. Anthropic’s IPO was highly anticipated after the company announced in June that it had confidentially filed for an IPO.
Anthropic could raise as much as $100 billion in an IPO, which would value the company at about $2 trillion, according to the Journal. The seismic sums would propel Anthropic among the 10 most valuable companies in the world.
Anthropic’s IPO would mark a major milestone in the AI boom that has taken over markets in recent years. But the journey to the IPO was complicated and there were delays.
Anthropic’s plans have been muddied by questions about AI regulation and security risks. Former employees, as well as CEO Dario Amodei, have raised concerns in recent weeks, sparking an industry-wide call to slow AI development to better manage risks. Tech leaders, including Amodei, signed an agreement at the White House last week to “self-police” the development of AI.
At the same time, the outlook for all potential IPOs has become more complicated in recent months.
The market has become more uncertain as interest rates rise. Bond yields have jumped in recent weeks, pushing up borrowing costs, as traders adjust to the energy shock from the Iran war and central banks raise rates.
Some companies got cold feet. Oura, a technology company that makes wearable health tracking rings, said it would go public this fall before announcing last week that it would delay its debut due to market uncertainty. Holtec Nuclear, an energy company, also recently suspended its planned IPO, citing bad sentiment affecting the stock market. And OpenAI announced it would delay its IPO until next year due to AI security concerns.
“There’s rising interest rates. There’s the war in Iran. You have a more fragile economy than AI,” Heath Terry, head of AI investment research at Citi, told CNN. “I think that’s what created some sort of uncertainty.”
“IPOs need a stable market environment, they need positive investor sentiment, and with this kind of broader, unstable economic landscape, it makes it a lot more difficult,” Terry said, speaking generally about IPOs and not specific companies.
Still, Anthropic is reportedly moving forward with its IPO plans while it raises capital. If Anthropic raises $100 billion and debuts with a valuation of around $2 trillion, it would surpass SpaceX’s IPO and become the largest ever. SpaceX ultimately raised about $86 billion in its IPO and debuted with a valuation of $1.77 trillion, thanks in part to its vision for its own role in AI.
SpaceX’s high-profile IPO beat previous public offerings, with Saudi Aramco in second place, having raised about $29 billion in 2019.
“SpaceX was an exception – the largest IPO ever in the world, by far. And it’s very possible that they will be in second place (approximately) in a month,” said Jay Ritter, professor emeritus at the University of Florida.
Certainly, the risk of seeing AI take over the world has been discussed for years. But surveillance has intensified in recent weeks after multiple incidents involving AI agents going rogue and trying to hack other systems.
Reuters obtained a copy of Anthropic’s IPO prospectus, which has not yet been released, last week and reported that it contained warnings that the company’s AI model could potentially cause a “catastrophic or existential risk to humanity.”
Even if technology leaders have agreed to self-regulate, Anthropic is still expected to grow its business and compete with competitors like OpenAI. Increased security concerns would exist whether the company was publicly traded or not, experts told CNN.
Higher interest rates can also lower stock valuations and dampen the IPO market. But waiting for the IPO doesn’t guarantee interest rates will fall, and for a cash-hungry company like Anthropic, the IPO can still make sense, said analysts and Ritter, a professor emeritus at the University of Florida.
Delaying an IPO indefinitely also carries the risk that market conditions deteriorate or other unforeseen challenges arise, and it becomes more difficult to get back on track toward an IPO. At the same time, the Nasdaq Composite is currently trading at an all-time high, which is a positive scenario for a tech IPO.
“You can’t really plan an IPO to eliminate all future uncertainty about your company and your product,” Jill E. Fisch, a professor of business law at the University of Pennsylvania Carey School of Law, told CNN.
“I don’t think there is a magic line for a company: ‘Yes, now we have crossed the threshold, we have resolved all the security issues and we can now move forward with 100% confidence.’ I don’t think it really works that way,” Fisch said.
Anthropic and OpenAI are in a mad race to produce advanced AI models, and the companies are spending billions of dollars in cash to advance research and development. Anthropic lost $42 billion in 2025 and plans to spend more than $500 billion on IT and infrastructure in the coming years, according to Reuters.
However, the company reportedly told investors it would be profitable for a second consecutive quarter this year, according to the Financial Times. Anthropic builds its revenue by renting advanced models of its Claude bot to large companies.
Angelo Zino, a technology analyst at CFRA Research, said that while market conditions may not be conducive to every company’s IPO plans, he thinks Anthropic is in a league of its own. He cited strong signs of demand for its products and a path to profitability despite the company’s huge capital expenditures.
“I think there will be a very strong appetite and demand for Anthropic,” Zino said.
AI has been the central theme that has propelled the stock market to record highs in recent years. Faced with its stratospheric valuation, Anthropic is asking investors to believe in its ability to continue to monetize its AI services and increase its market share.
“If the company executes its business model, everything will be fine,” said Ritter, a professor emeritus at the University of Florida. “But you know, a lot of times things don’t work out.”
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