Three Large Investors Say Anthropic's IPO Valuation Must Fall, One Says Toward $1 Trillion

Since Anthropic's amended S-1 showed slowing growth and anchor investors began pressing for a $1.5 trillion to $1.6 trillion valuation, the pushback has hardened: three large investors now say even that number is too high.

The three investors, who plan to take part in the offering, told the Wall Street Journal on Thursday, Nov. 5, that the valuation will likely need to be lowered. One said it could end up closer to $1 trillion. Another raised the possibility that Anthropic postpones the listing. Scaling back the size of the offering is also on the table, the Journal reported.

Anthropic declined to comment on investor doubts.

Timing and size

Anthropic has been aiming to price the deal the week of Nov. 16 and had been expected to raise up to $100 billion. That would be the largest IPO on record, ahead of SpaceX's June listing, which raised $86 billion.

Reuters, citing four people familiar with investor talks, reported separately that prospective buyers doubt the roadshow can start next week, the week of Nov. 9, in time for a November listing. Some investors view $1.5 trillion as the high end of expectations and want a more attractive price before committing, Reuters' sources said.

Seeking Alpha, citing the Journal, reported that Anthropic could raise about $80 billion instead of up to $100 billion, and that some investors want to see October results first. Anthropic has not set a share count or price range. Executives and advisers were expected to meet in the coming days with options open, the Journal said.

The market backdrop

The selloff landed two days after the U.S. midterms. Companies in the Nasdaq composite lost about $2.5 trillion in market value on Thursday, according to Reuters, its biggest one-day drop since April 2025. Chipmakers, data center operators and neocloud firms fell by double digits, and SpaceX shares fell almost 14% over two days.

The midterm results lifted lawmakers skeptical of AI and brought pledges of data center moratoriums. Sen. Elizabeth Warren has already written to Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei about risks the company disclosed in its prospectus. In October, New York City Comptroller Mark Levine urged Anthropic to pause its IPO until it addressed AI safety and governance concerns.

OpenAI has shelved its own listing until next year, according to market reporting.

What the filing shows

The amended S-1 reports about $17 billion in third-quarter revenue, roughly 12 times a year earlier. Sequential growth slowed to about 47%, from 144% in the second quarter and 132% in the first.

The filing shows a third-quarter net loss of about $23 billion. Anthropic disclosed $895.4 billion in spending commitments stretching as far as 2045, mostly for computing power and infrastructure. Nearly half comes due by December 2030, including about $69.8 billion in the 12 months after Sept. 30. The company reported $146.6 billion in cash as of Sept. 30.

For scale, Anthropic's Series H in May raised $65 billion at a $965 billion post-money valuation. A $1 trillion IPO would sit less than 4% above that.

October is the missing number

The prospectus omits October annualized revenue, and analysts are focused on it. Li Zhaoyu, managing partner at Amont Partners, said on the Chinese-language program "Late Talk" that extrapolating third-quarter growth yields only $85 billion to $90 billion. The market expects more than $100 billion, he said.

If October falls short, Li argued, management will struggle to justify $1.5 trillion, and holding $1.2 trillion to $1.3 trillion "is a question." He singled out a roughly $161.2 billion Broadcom contract as the most inescapable commitment. He also flagged a maturity mismatch: long-term leased compute against shorter-term rented revenue. He cited WeWork as a cautionary tale.

Li does not buy the full bubble story, though. He called the AI bubble thesis excessive panic. His point is that no one, including Amodei, OpenAI's Sam Altman or Amazon, has a definitive answer on how steep the demand curve is.

What comes next

The next marker is whether the roadshow starts the week of Nov. 9 as planned. Anthropic's executives and advisers are expected to meet in the coming days to decide on valuation, size and timing, and the company has not said which option it will choose.