Anthropic reportedly presses ahead with IPO plans

Anthropic is pushing ahead with its IPO despite a rocky backdrop: one of Nasdaq’s biggest recent sell-offs, and fresh revelations that a CEO near the center of the industry’s AI boom had an affair with a suspected Chinese spy. Per The Wall Street Journal, the valuation range gets locked in this week, with trading due to open Thursday or Friday of next week.

Anthropic’s eventual price will serve as a gauge for the broader AI boom. Some institutional investors are reportedly pushing for a figure below the $1.5 trillion target that was under discussion as recently as last week — itself a comedown from the $2 trillion floated only a few months earlier.

The pricing follows OpenAI, Anthropic’s main rival, which was reportedly valued at $1.25 trillion last week after bringing in $11 billion of new funding, well under the $20 billion figure it had originally pursued.

Why it matters

Investors are treating Anthropic’s price as a referendum on how far AI valuations have cooled — a number below the $1.5 trillion range would mark a steep markdown from the $2 trillion some were discussing only months ago, and would land just as rival OpenAI’s own fundraise fell short of its target.