Anthropic's Oct. 18 proposal would place 5% of its shares in the Anthropic Public Benefit Fund, directing part of the company's equity toward public causes while leaving recipients and governance undecided.
Stockholders must approve the plan. Anthropic says it would form the fund as a wholly owned limited liability company (LLC), a structure it chose to support different kinds of giving, from nonprofit grants to direct distributions for specific populations. The proposal sits alongside the co-founders’ giving pledges and an employee equity donation-matching program.
Anthropic identified labor-market effects as one possible area of work and said it has committed $200 million to studying and addressing AI's effects on the labor market. It has not named recipients, set eligibility rules or said whether workers would receive direct payments. The company says shares held by the fund would not support lobbying or political contributions.
The board could enlarge the fund's allocation if Anthropic's value rises. For each 50% increase from a baseline the company has not disclosed, the board may add 2 percentage points. Anthropic says its co-founders have pledged 80% of their equity holdings to giving, while about half of employees participate in an equity donation-matching program. Counting those commitments with the fund, the company estimates about one-fifth of its shares would serve public-benefit aims.
OpenAI said its foundation held a 26% stake in OpenAI Group after the company's 2025 recapitalization, with the stake worth about $130 billion. OpenAI said the foundation's initial $25 billion commitment would focus on health and technical solutions for AI resilience.
Nan Ransohoff, Stripe's head of public goods, described AI-linked giving as a “third wave” in a May essay, following philanthropy associated with industrial-era and internet-era fortunes. She estimated annual intended giving connected to OpenAI and Anthropic at $37 billion to $100 billion. The high-end scenario assumes company valuations double and funders spend 15% each year; it is an estimate, not a company commitment.
Phil Buchanan, president of the Center for Effective Philanthropy, told the Associated Press that the plans were “all so abstract.”
Anthropic's latest disclosed post-money valuation was $965 billion, announced May 28 alongside a $65 billion funding round. On June 1, the company said it had confidentially submitted a draft registration statement to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. Anthropic said any IPO would depend on market conditions, and that the offering price and share count had not been set.
Stockholder approval is the next step. Anthropic said it would provide more information about the fund's structure and governance in the coming months, without setting a date.
