Anthropic reports $17bn in Q3 revenue before supersized IPO

Anthropic on Monday reported revenue of nearly $17 billion in the period ending September 30, as investors brace for its keenly awaited and potentially record-breaking IPO.

The maker of Claude, a family of large language models and an AI chatbot, reported $33.24 billion in revenue for the nine months ending on September 30, according to an amended filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, a 1,200 per cent increase from the same period last year. It reported a $104 billion net loss during the nine-month period, although this was largely driven by a change in fair value of convertible notes and derivative liabilities.

Anthropic reported third-quarter revenue of $16.95 billion. The company said it had a net loss of $23.29 billion during that period, compared to a net loss of $12.13 billion from the same quarter last year.

Operating expenses jumped to $17.52 billion, a 292 per cent increase from the same period last year.

In the amended S-1 filing with the SEC, Anthropic said it has commitments of about $895.4 billion. About $447.5 billion is expected to be incurred before the end of 2030, it said.

Anthropic filed for an initial public offering last week that is widely expected to be one of the biggest ever, rivalling SpaceX, which went public in June. Anthropic is anticipated to make its Wall Street debut this month.

The AI start-up requires significant capital because of the high costs needed to train AI models.

Its IPO comes during a renewed wave of anxiety over the massive financing needed to power the AI buildout. Investors rotated out of tech stocks last week after disappointing results from Amazon, Intel and Google parent company Alphabet. Apple, Palantir and AMD were due to report this week, with the bellwether Nvidia due to report earnings later this month.

White House National Economic Council Director Kevin Hassett dismissed concerns over AI financing in an interview with CNBC on Monday, arguing there is plenty of capital to fund it.

“It’s actually, like, a really well-financed ecosystem,” he said.

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The so-called hyperscalers who have committed hundreds of billions of dollars to the AI buildout have lately turned to debt and equity raises to secure the funding, compared to the free cash flow that defined the buildout's initial phase.

Mr Hassett said that while it is true that some companies may have a lot of debt, there are also some “really, really big-pocketed companies sort of lurking all over the place, owning the equity, owning the debt, perhaps willing to pounce if somebody has trouble”.

Anthropic's IPO is being led by Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley, with 20 other banks also participating, according to the filing. The Emirati technology investment company MGX participated in Anthropic's $65 billion Series H funding round in May, and its $30 billion Series G funding round in February.

Anthropic plans to trade on the Nasdaq Global Select Market under the ticker symbol “ANT”.