RGS

By William Gavin

If market pressures keep building, Anthropic 'could reasonably decide it is better to stay private and wait for a better opportunity,' one portfolio manager says

Anthropic, which makes the Claude suite of products, is one of the pillars of the AI boom.

Anthropic may be just days away from making a major step toward becoming a public company - but there's still time for things to change.

The company is one of the biggest pillars of the artificial-intelligence industry, and its anticipated initial public offering is likely to reinforce that. Anthropic is reportedly seeking a valuation of as much as $2 trillion, which could result in an even more explosive IPO than SpaceX's (SPCX) $1.77 trillion debut earlier this year.

According a Reuters report on Thursday, the Claude chatbot maker plans to hold its IPO in the middle of November, which means time is running out to file some important paperwork. The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission requires a company to publicly file its prospectus at least 15 days before it launches a roadshow.

Jay Ritter, who leads the University of Florida's IPO Initiative, told MarketWatch that Anthropic has some time if it still wants to go public before Thanksgiving. If the company were to hold its IPO as late as Nov. 24 and start its roadshow with investors on Nov. 16, Anthropic would have until late next week to publicly file its S-1 document, he said.

However, it's also possible that Anthropic decides to push back its IPO. The company was once expected to publicly unveil its IPO prospectus shortly after Labor Day, which could have set the stage for it to list later in September. Experts say it's likely, but not certain, that Anthropic will still want to make a debut now.

Anthropic did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The market has become less hospitable to AI companies lately, which is one factor that could give pause to Anthropic's management team. Joe Tigay, a portfolio manager at the Rational Equity Armor Fund HDCAX, told MarketWatch that persistent inflation and high energy prices could also be cause for concern.

"Historically, that combination of slowing growth and persistent inflation can be where stock markets crack. If those pressures keep building, Anthropic could reasonably decide it is better to stay private and wait for a better opportunity," Tigay told MarketWatch over email.

But the market needs a successful Anthropic IPO to prove that AI has staying power, argued Jim Lebenthal, chief market strategist at Cerity Partners. He noted that the longevity and economics of the AI industry have been further called into question recently.

Shares of the neocloud company CoreWeave (CRWV), for example, have dropped roughly 30% over the last two weeks on concerns about the company's ability to manage its debt. Even companies that are swimming in cash have been swept up in the downward action. Micron Technology's stock (MU) has lost 17% over the past month against the broader backdrop of fears over AI spending and financing.

"It's reasonable to have questions. It's reasonable even to have doubts," Lebenthal said. "But the health of the overall equity market and the health of the U.S. economy relies vitally on the artificial-intelligence industry being successful."

Of course, Anthropic's reasons for going public wouldn't be to buoy stock-market sentiment toward AI. Simply put, Anthropic needs the cash, according to Andrew Rocco, a stock strategist at Zacks Investment Research.

The biggest AI companies have shown that "they're basically willing to spend as much as they can in order to capture more customers and try and be the dominant AI player," Rocco told MarketWatch. "In my view they're going to try and get this out because they do need that capital, especially since it's going to be probably harder to just raise it in the private market."

Anthropic could spend as much as $750 billion on AI compute capacity in the coming years, according to the Wall Street Journal, which cited a copy of its draft IPO prospectus. The Journal also noted that Anthropic recorded a net loss of more than $80 billion in the first half of 2026 against revenue of $16.3 billion, though the loss was largely driven by accounting adjustments rather than fundamental business developments.

Rocco noted that prediction markets show an 80% chance of the company going public by the end of the year.

-William Gavin

This content was created by MarketWatch, which is operated by Dow Jones & Co. MarketWatch is published independently from Dow Jones Newswires and The Wall Street Journal.