Anthropic IPO Book Oversubscribed as Investors Weigh $64 Billion Deal

Anthropic is selling 825 million Class A shares at $70 to $78 each, raising as much as $64.4 billion, with pricing set for Nov. 18 and Nasdaq trading to begin under the ticker ANT on Nov. 19. Institutional interest is outpacing the early days of SpaceX's roadshow, two people familiar with both offerings told Reuters. The order book was oversubscribed by a single-digit multiple, modest by hot-IPO standards, but bankers and investors called the demand impressive given the deal's size. They expect the book to grow before the roadshow ends next Wednesday.

The amended registration statement covers 801.4 million shares from the company and 23.6 million from selling stockholders, in line with the roughly $64 billion deal Reuters said Anthropic is expected to price. Anthropic declined to comment on the report. Reuters noted that details, including demand, could still change. As of Friday, Anthropic had filed no final prospectus with a price with the SEC.

What are investors asking?

The roadshow questions center on durability. Investors want to know whether Anthropic can keep its lead as Alphabet's Google catches up in advanced models, and whether Claude can carry its edge in coding into the much larger market for knowledge workers. Some are also wary of paying a high valuation during a broader shakeout in AI stocks.

Anthropic's own filing names the same risks. It lists Google and OpenAI as primary competitors. It says they have "substantially greater financial, technical, and marketing resources" and, in some cases, greater access to compute. The prospectus warns that open-weight models could "exert pricing pressure on our offerings" and that the company's concentration on its models means any demand decline would have "a direct and disproportionate impact" on revenue. It calls Claude Code "the clearest manifestation" of the AI collaborators Anthropic wants to extend to more than a billion knowledge workers.

How do the banks reach the valuation?

Banks on the deal estimate 2028 revenue at roughly $270 billion to $280 billion and apply enterprise-value-to-revenue multiples to that figure. Sell-side projections put revenue at about:

• $52 billion to $53 billion in 2026
• $135 billion to $137 billion in 2027
• roughly $270 billion to $280 billion in 2028, per the deal banks

Buy-side views diverge. One investor who placed an order projects 2026 and 2027 revenue 10% to 15% above the sell-side figures. Another who did due diligence but stayed out forecasts 2028 revenue about 30% below the banks' estimate.

Anchoring on 2028 is a year closer than the 2029 revenue some investors considered aggressive in SpaceX's valuation case. SpaceX and CrowdStrike serve as benchmarks, though true peers are hard to find.

Anthropic's reported figures give the projections context. Third-quarter 2026 revenue was $17.0 billion, more than 12 times the year-earlier figure. The company posted a 15% adjusted operating margin and a $23.3 billion net loss that includes a large non-cash charge tied to its rising valuation. Its spending plans are larger still. The filings list about $901 billion of cloud, chip and data center commitments, which chief executive Dario Amodei this week called the company's "deepest business dilemma".

Why did some investors complain?

Some investors told Reuters they received little detail. One said the company did not give detailed answers to some questions. One group meeting had no dial-in line, a departure from standard practice, and representatives of lead underwriters Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley read mostly from prepared remarks. Anthropic and Morgan Stanley declined to comment. Goldman did not immediately respond.

The order book is also narrower than it might be. Banks have turned away orders from Chinese and Hong Kong investors over US arms-export rules, Bloomberg has reported.

The book is expected to keep building until the roadshow closes Wednesday, and the final price will test whether investors accept a valuation built on revenue two years out.