Anthropic’s $80.7 Billion Loss Complicates a $1.5 Trillion IPO

By Nathan Brooks

Anthropic’s draft IPO prospectus put its net loss at $80.7 billion in the first half of 2026, up from $13 billion a year earlier, Reuters reported on Oct. 20, 2026. The San Francisco-based company expects to go public in November, and some investors now weigh a lower valuation of about $1.5 trillion.

A $72 billion accounting charge accounted for much of the first-half deterioration, according to the draft prospectus reviewed by Reuters. The charge represented nearly 90% of the $80.7 billion headline loss. It reflected higher estimated fair value for bonds that could eventually convert into Anthropic shares, and the document said it did not represent cash costs tied to operations.

The charge was not an operating cash cost, but Anthropic’s business remained loss-making. Reuters reported in September that the company posted a $42 billion net loss in 2025, mostly from a similar entry. As Anthropic’s valuation climbed, the estimated fair value of its notes tripled year over year.

Investors must also separate net losses from operating losses. The 2025 calculation excludes the charge and produces an operating loss of about $8.1 billion on $4.6 billion in revenue. That figure is not directly interchangeable with the $80.7 billion and $13 billion net losses.

What does this mean for IPO investors?

For prospective investors, the disclosure sets accelerating revenue against rapidly expanding capital needs. At an Oct. 14 meeting, Anthropic told prospective IPO investors that third-quarter revenue had risen 45% from the previous quarter to $16.8 billion, Reuters reported, citing people familiar with the matter.

Second-quarter revenue reached $11.6 billion after more than doubling from the first quarter. Reuters said the third-quarter figures eased some concerns about the enormous costs of developing AI systems. Some investors were still disappointed by the slowing sequential growth rate.

For IPO buyers, the valuation hinges on whether revenue can keep pace with infrastructure spending. Reuters’s reporting shows a 45% sequential revenue increase alongside a $518 billion decade-long commitment. The latest disclosures also left some investors weighing a lower valuation.

Anthropic has committed to spend at least $518 billion over a decade on cloud services, computing and infrastructure, Reuters said. On a simple annualized basis, the commitment equates to at least $51.8 billion a year. That arithmetic does not assume Anthropic will spend the same amount each year.

The S-1 showed nearly $9 billion of first-half spending on computing capacity and infrastructure, up from $2.3 billion a year earlier. That was $6.7 billion more and nearly four times the prior-year outlay. At the first-half pace, the six-month spending would annualize to about $18 billion, a mechanical run rate rather than a forecast.

Reuters said those outlays underscore the high cost of the AI race. Investors are scrutinizing whether sums poured into chips and data centers will generate sufficient returns. For Anthropic, the IPO turns that market-wide test into a company-specific debate about revenue growth against capital intensity.

Reuters also pointed to the popularity of Claude Code. Anthropic has benefited from the coding assistant, which developers use to write software and build apps. The figures Reuters cited do not break out its revenue.

A cooler reception for Anthropic’s IPO could weigh on the wider AI market, Reuters said. Investors see the sector’s near-term prospects as hinging largely on the share sale’s success, ahead of rival OpenAI’s potential listing next year.

Anthropic did not respond to a Reuters request for comment. The November IPO will show whether investors are willing to look past the $72 billion accounting charge and value a company with $16.8 billion in third-quarter revenue and at least $518 billion in planned decade-long spending.