Anthropic IPO taps Goldman, Morgan Stanley for $500M fee pool

Anthropic has tapped Morgan Stanley and Goldman Sachs to lead its initial public offering, with a fee pool exceeding $500 million and an S-1 filing expected as early as this week.

The prospectus filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission could come within days, according to the Financial Times, while Reuters reported the IPO marketing push has slipped to mid-October at the earliest. The listing is expected to be the largest AI IPO on record.

Morgan Stanley will hold the "lead left" role on the deal, with Goldman Sachs serving as stabilization agent to support the stock after listing. Barclays and JPMorgan are also expected to participate. The four banks could share more than $500 million in fees, comparable to the SpaceX IPO where Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley each collected $100 million from a similar pool.

Anthropic's revenue run rate reached $65 billion at the end of July, a sevenfold increase from a year earlier and higher than OpenAI's. Management pegs the total addressable market at $30 trillion, above SpaceX's $28 trillion estimate. The company has overtaken OpenAI by focusing on enterprise clients and charging premium prices for its frontier models, which it says are the most advanced in the industry.

The S-1 document will be the first time Anthropic discloses detailed financials. As a private company, it has not been required to publish profit margins, free cash flow, or operating costs. The filing will give investors their first look at whether the company's breakneck growth is translating into sustainable economics — a question that has defined the AI investment debate since the sector's valuation surge began.

The growth has come at enormous cost. Anthropic pays SpaceX more than $1.5 billion a month for computing capacity and has signed additional compute deals in recent months. The company spends billions of dollars monthly, raising questions about how long it can sustain this pace before turning profitable. The S-1 will reveal the gap between revenue and the capital required to train and run frontier models.

The listing will benefit Anthropic's largest backers. Amazon's stake is valued at more than $400 billion from its $8 billion investment, while Google and Nvidia also hold positions. The IPO's reception could set the tone for AI equity valuations across the sector, with investors weighing whether the company's revenue trajectory justifies its massive compute spending.

The roadshow, where management pitches the stock to institutional investors, is expected to follow the S-1 filing. Reuters reported the marketing push could begin in mid-October, later than the September timeline initially suggested. The final pricing and valuation multiple will depend on investor demand during the roadshow, and the outcome will be closely watched as a barometer for the broader AI investment cycle.

This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute investment advice.