Business and economy·October 26, 2026, 16:22

Anthropic's IPO plans: Big accounting loss, but positive operating cash flow

AI-generated from the sources listed, with automated source checks.

Anthropic reports a net loss of USD 80.7 billion in the first half of 2026, which according to Fortune mostly stems from non-cash accounting adjustments to convertible instruments. According to Fortune, the company is expected to list in November, but the timing has not been confirmed.

Anthropic, the company behind the AI model Claude, has published a prospectus (known as an S-1) ahead of an IPO. The figures here come from media reviews of the prospectus.

The net loss in the first half of 2026 was USD 80.7 billion. According to Fortune, the loss mostly stems from non-cash accounting adjustments to convertible instruments. These are loans that can be exchanged for shares. Fortune cites a single item of USD 72.4 billion from the convertible loans. Non-cash means the money has not actually left the company's coffers. The figure is therefore not a measure of how much the company has spent on running its business.

Operations in numbers

For all of 2025, revenue was USD 4.6 billion, according to a summary of the prospectus from AI Weekly.

Fortune reports an operating loss of USD 693 million in the first half of 2026, compared with USD 2.1 billion in the first half of 2025. Adjusted operating income was USD 1.6 billion. Cash flow from operations was positive at USD 3.9 billion, according to Fortune. That means operations themselves brought in more cash than they cost, though it says nothing about the company's overall cash flow.

Customers and large commitments

About 25% of revenue comes from a handful of customers. The sources disagree on the details, however: AI Weekly says 25% comes from two customers, while Fortune says 25% comes from the five largest. According to Fortune, almost half of revenue flows through the cloud marketplaces of Amazon, Google and Microsoft.

Anthropic has also committed to USD 518 billion in compute capacity over roughly ten years, according to AI Weekly. About 80% of that cannot be canceled.

IPO plans and risks

The listing is expected in November 2026, in Thanksgiving week according to Fortune. Valuation talk is in the range of USD 1.5-2 trillion, but both the timing and the valuation are expectations and have not been confirmed. The lead banks are Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley, and according to ANI also J.P. Morgan and Citigroup.

The founders retain 50.1% of the votes through Class F shares. The prospectus also cites risks such as employee retention and the possibility that AI systems could act harmfully on their own and at scale.