Anthropic IPO Could Raise $100 Billion and Flag AI Backlash as Key Risk

Anthropic's IPO prospectus, expected to be filed within weeks, will list negative public sentiment toward artificial intelligence and data centers as a key risk factor, according to people familiar with the matter — an extraordinary disclosure for a company that could simultaneously stage the largest initial public offering in history. The reporting from CNBC came as The New York Times reported that the Claude maker could aim to raise as much as $100 billion in the blockbuster listing. For anyone following AI industry coverage, the juxtaposition captures the industry's moment perfectly: record-breaking financial optimism shadowed by rising public resistance.

A $100 billion raise on the table

The numbers around Anthropic's public debut keep escalating. The company, valued at close to $1 trillion in private markets, confidentially filed to go public in June in what will be among the biggest IPOs on record. Elon Musk's SpaceX — which competes with Anthropic through its AI division — raised $85.7 billion including the underwriter option just two months ago, by far the largest offering to date. Investors now expect Anthropic may top that mark, with CNBC's sources projecting the company could float at a valuation of around $2 trillion. The Times' reporting on the $100 billion raise target makes explicit what those projections imply: a single company raising more than three times the largest IPO of the pre-AI era.

Behind the scenes, Anthropic has been holding preliminary "test-the-water" meetings with bankers and investors in San Francisco. Chief Financial Officer Krishna Rao has been fielding pointed questions, according to CNBC's sources: how the company plans to fend off competition, how open-source models squeeze its margins, and what happens to Anthropic's growth if the breakneck pace of data center construction slows down.

Why backlash belongs in the risk factors

Companies are required to outline risk factors in investor disclosures both for transparency and legal protection, and Anthropic has an unusual amount to disclose. Public sentiment has turned sharply against the physical footprint of the AI boom. According to a Gallup survey published in May, seven in ten Americans oppose AI data center construction in their own area, with close to half of respondents "strongly opposed." Roughly a quarter of those surveyed are in favor.

That opposition is now shaping national politics. With midterm elections less than three months away, politicians on both sides of the aisle have begun pushing back on data center development. In Florida's Republican gubernatorial primary this month, winner Representative Byron Donalds campaigned on proposed restrictions on data centers in the state. On the same day, Pennsylvania's Democratic Governor Josh Shapiro signed an executive order placing strict standards on data center development. Anthropic, like its rival OpenAI, is leaning on infrastructure partners to build out capacity at warp speed to serve demand for advanced models — a strategy that presumes communities will keep accepting warehouses full of GPUs. Increasingly, they may not.

The backlash risk cuts in both directions for investors. Skyrocketing capital expenditure on data centers is the engine of AI revenue growth, but it is also the industry's largest cost line and, now, a growing political liability. A regulatory chill on new construction would simultaneously throttle model training capacity and cloud inference supply — precisely the scenario Rao was reportedly asked about in the test-the-water sessions.

From confidential filing to public scrutiny

The prospectus will be the first detailed public look at Anthropic's finances, and expectations are stratospheric. The company has been reported to have posted its first quarterly operating profit earlier this year on revenue that pulled ahead of OpenAI's annualized figures, according to industry reporting, and analysts have discussed 2028 revenue forecasts in the range of $190 billion to $200 billion. If the filing lands in the coming weeks as expected, it will set up a listing that could dwarf SpaceX's record and crystallize the largest valuation ever assigned to a young company going public.

Yet the same document must also tell investors what could go wrong — and near the top of that list will be the possibility that the public simply turns on the industry building the future Anthropic is selling. Sources told CNBC the risk factor language will address both anti-AI sentiment broadly and data center opposition specifically. Anthropic declined to comment on the reporting.

The listing that will define the AI bubble debate

Bullish investors see Anthropic's IPO as the coronation of the AI era: a profitable, fast-growing frontier lab converting private-market euphoria into public-market capital. Skeptics see a top signal — a $2 trillion float priced off 2028 projections, marketed to retail investors in an economy increasingly hostile to the data centers underpinning it. The filing's own risk factors will give both camps their talking points.

What is certain is the calendar. The prospectus is weeks away, the midterms are under three months out, and every poll suggests the politics of AI infrastructure will get louder, not quieter, between now and the ringing of the opening bell.

Stay Ahead of AI

For deep coverage of AI finance, policy, and the companies shaping the industry, bookmark AI Buzz Wire.

Read more AI news →