Anthropic has reportedly selected Nasdaq for a potential October IPO that could value the Claude developer at as much as $2 trillion, just as rival OpenAI has taken a 2026 listing off the table.
Business Insider reported Sunday, citing a person familiar with Anthropic’s plans, that the company had selected Nasdaq for its potential initial public offering and had been targeting an October listing. The report said some estimates have put Anthropic’s valuation at $2 trillion, although that figure has not been finalized.
Anthropic has not publicly confirmed either Nasdaq or the October timetable. The company has, however, confirmed that it confidentially submitted a draft Form S-1 to the Securities and Exchange Commission on June 1. Anthropic said at the time that the number of shares and their price had not been set and that any offering would depend on market conditions and other factors.
Axios reported Monday, citing people familiar with the matter, that Anthropic’s IPO schedule remained on track despite the latest debate around AI safety.
Anthropic Reportedly Expects a Second Positive Quarter
The exchange report arrived alongside a separate Financial Times report pointing to improving operating economics ahead of the potential listing.
Anthropic has told a small group of shareholders that it expects positive adjusted operating income for a second consecutive quarter, the FT reported, citing multiple people familiar with the matter. The adjusted measure excludes costs including stock-based compensation.
According to the same report, Anthropic posted adjusted operating profit in the second quarter as revenue increased 14-fold from a year earlier to $11.5 billion.
The FT also reported that gross margins were above 80% before accounting for revenue shared with distribution partners such as Amazon and the costs of training Anthropic’s models. Annualized revenue reached $65 billion by the end of July, up from about $9 billion at the end of 2025.
Those figures put more operating detail behind a valuation that, so far, remains a figure supplied through people involved in or familiar with the IPO process rather than one disclosed in a public prospectus.
FinanceFeeds previously examined that distinction in its coverage of OKX launching OpenAI and Anthropic pre-IPO perpetual futures with up to 10x leverage. Those contracts give traders synthetic exposure to the companies’ expected valuations but do not represent ownership of their private shares.
OpenAI Is Moving on a Different Timetable
The reported Anthropic timetable now contrasts directly with OpenAI.
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman told Fortune in an interview published September 12 that the company would not list this year. Asked whether 2026 was off the table, Altman said, “I would say not 2026.”
That leaves the two companies moving toward different public-market timelines even as both remain central to the wider debate over the pace of AI development.
FinanceFeeds examined the broader market implications Monday in The AI Trade’s First Threat From Inside: What a Deliberate Slowdown Does to $700 Billion in Capex, as semiconductor and other AI-linked stocks sold off following industry calls for a more deliberate pace of frontier-model development.
For Anthropic investors, however, the next concrete milestone remains the IPO documentation. Its June filing is still confidential, and Business Insider reported that the company will need to release its financial information at least 15 days before an investor roadshow begins.
