Anthropic’s rapid revenue growth and large infrastructure commitments have sharpened a debate over whether AI’s economic gains will flow to model makers, cloud providers, businesses or users.
Brad DeLong, professor emeritus at the University of California, Berkeley, and economics writer Noah Smith discussed Anthropic’s proposed IPO in a recording dated Nov. 7. Dan Wang, a research fellow at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution, moderated the discussion.
DeLong argued that coding agents are Anthropic’s “one proven, monetized business” and said competition from platform companies could make other AI services harder to monetize. Smith said “business decision-making is mostly conditional forecasting” and argued AI could change how companies make decisions and organize their operations. These are competing views; Anthropic’s filing does not show which products or tasks are profitable.
In its amended Form S-1 filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission on Nov. 2, Anthropic reported $33.242 billion in revenue for the nine months ended Sept. 30, 2026, up from $2.545 billion in the same period a year earlier. Third-quarter revenue was $17 billion. Consumption-based revenue accounted for $26.3 billion, or 79% of the nine-month total, while subscriptions brought in $6.9 billion, or 21%.
The filing reported a $1.3 billion operating loss and a $104.039 billion net loss for the first nine months. The net loss included a $94.324 billion expense tied to changes in the fair value of convertible notes, derivative liabilities and SAFEs. For the third quarter, Anthropic recorded a $567 million operating loss, compared with $974 million in operating income in the quarter ended June 30. The company attributed the third-quarter loss primarily to $5 billion in short-term compute costs and $2 billion in noncash donation-matching charges.
Anthropic disclosed about $895.4 billion in aggregate compute and infrastructure commitments as of and subsequent to Sept. 30. About $447.5 billion was expected to be incurred before Dec. 31, 2030, and $69.8 billion was due in the 12 months after Sept. 30. The company said it typically secures compute 12 to 18 months before it becomes available.
Anthropic said it intends to list Class A shares on the Nasdaq Global Select Market under the proposed ticker ANT. Its amended filing left the share count and price range blank, and the shares cannot be sold before the registration statement takes effect. The company’s IPO terms remain open.
