Anthropic seeks $2 trillion valuation in blockbuster IPO offered to Australian investors
The Claude AI maker is targeting a $2 trillion valuation in its blockbuster Nasdaq listing, with Australian investors set to get their first chance to buy into the AI juggernaut.
AI juggernaut Anthropic will press ahead with a stock market listing at a valuation up to $US1.4 trillion (A$2 trillion), despite a sentiment downturn leaving the initial public offer priced below earlier expectations as high as $US2 trillion.
Anthropic’s regulatory filing on Tuesday confirmed it will issue 825 million shares at between $US70 to $US78 per share. The filing also confirmed Australian investors will be offered the chance to buy shares in the maker of the popular Claude AI tool.
At the top of the guided share price range, Anthropic will have raced to a $US1.4 trillion valuation, less than six years after being founded as a tech start-up in January 2021.
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By continuing you agree to our Terms and Privacy Policy.In total the listing is expected to raise $US61 billion in cash at the $US74 mid-point of the expected share price.
Australian offer
Disclosures in Anthropic’s November 10 filing reveal it expects to publish a separate ‘Australian Prospectus’ as part of its its efforts to raise funds from local investors.
Australia’s largest retail trading platform Commsec is expected to offer shares in Anthropic to investors at the IPO.
CommSec-owner the Commonwealth Bank itself has a privately-held stake in Anthropic now worth more than $1.5 billion.
Other named partners include discount brokers Stake and Sharesies, which are popular with younger sharemarket investors.
More established brokers named as official partners include Morgans, Bell Potter, Morgan Stanley Wealth Management, and Macquarie.
These firms typically distribute shares to high-net-worth clients as part of broader financial services offerings that include research and investment advice. They will also hope a successful float erases memories of the disastrous attempt to find buyers for data centres hopeful Firmus.
Future of AI
Anthropic’s prospectus presents a Jekyll-and-Hyde view of AI, warning that the technology could eventually lead to human extinction while also highlighting its enormous potential for investors.
“We believe that AI is one of the most consequential technologies in human history,” the prospectus reads. “If managed well, it could rapidly accelerate scientific innovation, greatly increase economic growth rates, bring cures for major human diseases within reach, and solve problems that have resisted generations of human effort.”
Anthropic also sees Australia as an important destination for expanding the data centre capacity needed to deliver its AI services.
“We have also entered into leases for data centre capacity in Australia and Canada, and we are pursuing data centre capacity in additional jurisdictions outside the United States,” the updated prospectus says.
Anthropic generates revenue by selling access to its Claude AI tools to corporate customers, software developers and individuals, helping them automate tasks and build AI capabilities into their own products.
The company generated revenue of $US33.2 billion in the first nine months of 2026 and says it is on track to generate more than $US81 billion in sales over the next 12 months.
About a month ago, investors and media reports suggested Anthropic could command a valuation as high as $US2 trillion. The lower IPO valuation represents a discount of about 30 per cent, reflecting volatility in AI markets.
In its last private funding round in May 2026 the company was valued at $US965 billion. The company plans to list on the Nasdaq under the stock code ANT.
Nvidia crisis pressures AI trade
The regulatory filing comes as shares in AI chipmaker Nvidia tumbled again on Tuesday amid an investigation into an alleged affair involving its chief executive Jensen Huang and a woman identified as Alice Huang, who has been described as a suspected Chinese spy.
Nvidia swung as much as 4 per cent lower on Tuesday lunchtime in the US and dragged Wall Street’s flagship Nasdaq 100 Index down 0.5 per cent.
A host of companies tied to demand for Nvidia’s chips also fell including Australian data centre developer IREN, which dropped 3.5 per cent in New York.
Other so-called neocloud companies, which buy Nvidia chips and sell computing capacity to AI developers, also declined, including CoreWeave and Nebius.
