Anthropic, the developer of the artificial intelligence chatbot Claude, has filed for an initial public offering (IPO) in the United States, moving the company closer to a stock market debut that could come as early as November.

The San Francisco-based company submitted its registration statement to the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) on Monday, October 26, following its confidential submission of IPO paperwork in June. The filing sets the stage for what could be one of the largest public listings in history, and it opens a rare public window into the financial mechanics of a frontier AI laboratory, figures that private companies in the sector are not ordinarily required to disclose.

Anthropic plans to list its shares under the ticker symbol ANT. The filing did not disclose the number of shares it intends to offer or the valuation it is seeking. According to Forbes, the company is considering a valuation of between $1.5 trillion and $1.75 trillion, with the offering potentially raising about $100 billion or more. Meanwhile, the Wall Street Journal reported that the listing could take place during the week of November 16, ahead of the US Thanksgiving holiday. Share counts, pricing and the final valuation are customarily settled in later amendments to the registration statement as the offering approaches.

Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley are leading the IPO, with 20 other banks also named in the filing.

$81 Billion Loss Despite Rapid Revenue Growth

Anthropic reported revenue of approximately $16.3 billion for the first half of 2026, up from $1.2 billion in the same period a year earlier, according to its filing. Despite the surge in revenue, the company recorded a net loss of about $81 billion over the six-month period.

More than $72 billion of that loss was attributed to charges associated with changes in the valuation of convertible notes. The company also spent nearly $9 billion on computing capacity and cloud infrastructure during the first half of the year, compared with $2.3 billion a year earlier.

Ahead of the filing, Anthropic had also informed investors that its third-quarter revenue rose to $16.8 billion, representing an increase of nearly 50 per cent from the previous quarter.

The financial disclosures come as AI companies face growing scrutiny over the cost of developing and operating advanced models, including expenditure on computing infrastructure, data centres and cloud services. Once public, Anthropic would be required to report results on a recurring basis, placing its revenue growth and spending under regular public review.

Governance Structure and Public Benefit Fund

The filing outlines a multi-class share structure comprising five categories of shares with different voting rights. Under the proposed arrangement, Anthropic's seven founders would retain 50.1 per cent of the company's total voting power through Class F shares. Its Long-Term Benefit Trust would hold Class T shares, giving it the authority to appoint a majority of the board of directors. Founder-weighted voting arrangements of this kind have precedent among major technology listings, where they are typically used to preserve founder decision-making after going public.

The filing also details plans for an Anthropic Public Benefit Fund. Subject to shareholder approval, the company intends to allocate at least five per cent of its shares to the fund after going public. The fund is designed to support donations to non-profit organisations and direct distributions to specific populations, excluding political donations and lobbying activities.

Background

Founded in 2021 by former OpenAI employees and researchers, including Chief Executive Officer Dario Amodei, Anthropic develops Claude, a family of AI models that competes with products such as OpenAI's ChatGPT and Google's Gemini. Amazon, Google and Nvidia are among the company's major investors, having committed billions of dollars to support its development.

Anthropic's prospectus also acknowledges concerns that its technology could pose catastrophic or existential risks to humanity, alongside its potential to address major global challenges.