Anthropic Files for IPO With Up to $2 Trillion Valuation in Sight: Where to Trade Pre-IPO Exposure

Key Takeaways

• Anthropic has filed paperwork to go public on Nasdaq under the ticker ANT. Reports suggest the company could be worth between $1.5 trillion and $2 trillion.

• The company could raise $100 billion or more, but the final price and timing of the IPO have not been confirmed.

• Eligible traders can get exposure to Anthropic before its IPO through Binance's ANTHROPICUSDT and Liquid's ANTH perpetual contracts.

Anthropic has officially filed to sell shares to the public for the first time. This could lead to one of the biggest stock market listings ever. Crypto traders are already using markets linked to the value of the company that makes Claude.

On October 26, the company submitted an S-1 registration statement, a document that companies file when they plan to go public. Anthropic plans to list its Class A common stock on the Nasdaq Global Select Market under the ticker symbol ANT.

The company has not yet decided how many shares it will sell or what price it will charge. Its registration statement has also not yet taken effect.

Reports suggest that Anthropic could be valued at between $1.5 trillion and $2 trillion.

Before the shares become available on the stock market, eligible traders can use financial contracts linked to Anthropic's value. However, these contracts do not give traders ownership of the company's future Nasdaq shares.

Anthropic Plans a Major Stock Market Listing

According to The Wall Street Journal, Anthropic could raise $100 billion or more and start trading during the week of November 16. Both the amount it hopes to raise and the expected timing could still change. Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley are leading the group of banks managing the share offering.

The reported valuation would be a big increase from the amount Anthropic was worth in its most recent funding round.

In May, the company announced a $65 billion Series H funding round. This valued the company at $965 billion after the new investment. Investors included Altimeter Capital, Dragoneer, Greenoaks, and Sequoia Capital.

If Anthropic reaches a $2 trillion valuation, it would be worth a little more than twice its previous private-market valuation. This shows how much investors expect businesses to adopt artificial intelligence tools.

The company's prospectus also shows the financial challenges behind its rapid growth. Revenue for the first half of the year reached about $16.3 billion, compared with $1.2 billion during the same period a year earlier.

Anthropic reported a net loss of $80.7 billion. Much of this loss came from a non-cash accounting charge caused by changes in the estimated value of financial agreements used to raise money. Its operating loss, which measures losses from running the business, was much smaller at $693 million.

This makes it important to understand the difference between accounting losses and the actual results of running the business when judging its financial health.

Anthropic's fast revenue growth supports the argument that the company is valuable. However, the final IPO price will determine how much investors must pay today for the company's expected future success.

Where Can You Trade Anthropic Before the IPO?

Binance Futures offers a pre-IPO perpetual contract called ANTHROPICUSDT, which launched on June 2. The contract is settled in USDT, a cryptocurrency linked to the US dollar. It can be traded at any time, day or night, and offers leverage of up to 20 times. Access depends on the trader's location and whether their account meets the platform's requirements.

Traders need to understand how Binance estimates the company's value. At first, Binance based its calculations on an estimated one billion shares. The platform clearly warned that the actual number of shares in the IPO could be different.

Because of this, the contract's quoted price should not be treated as Anthropic's final Nasdaq share price.

Another option is Liquid's ANTH perpetual market. It lets eligible users take positions that could gain or lose value as the reference value of Anthropic changes. Traders can take a long position if they expect the value to rise or a short position if they expect it to fall.

Liquid says that each price point represents an implied company value of $1 billion. For example, a reading of 1,800 would mean a suggested valuation of $1.8 trillion. It would not mean that Anthropic's actual stock price had been confirmed.

These markets let traders bet on how Anthropic's value might change before its public shares begin trading. The contract symbols are also different from ANT, the ticker symbol the company plans to use on Nasdaq.

Pre-IPO Perpetual Contracts Do Not Give You ANT Shares

Buying an Anthropic-linked perpetual contract does not guarantee a place in the IPO, and the contract will not automatically turn into company shares when Anthropic goes public.

Liquid clearly states that its contract does not give traders the right to vote as shareholders, receive shareholder information, or get shares in a future offering. Instead, these contracts provide price exposure without giving the trader ownership of the stock. Any gains or losses are settled through the trading account.

Funding charges, leverage, and market liquidity can have a big effect on returns. A trader might correctly predict that Anthropic's value will rise and still lose money if their position is liquidated or holding costs build up over time.

The IPO could also change how these contracts work. Binance says its pre-IPO perpetual contract will switch to a standard perpetual contract linked to a traditional asset after the exchange issues a notice.

Traders should therefore read each platform's rules for this change and understand how it calculates the contract's price.

For now, these markets let traders debate and trade on Anthropic's possible value while investors wait for the company to confirm its final share count, price range, and listing schedule.