Anthropic's IPO filing: You can't say you weren't warned

If you get bit in the butt from buying shares of Anthropic's IPO you can't say the company didn't warn you about the risks. The company spent 94 pages outlining the risks and said, "it is very dangerous when people buy your company's stock based on expectations you cannot fulfill or incorrect predictions about how you will behave."

At least you can't say you weren't warned. Anthropic's IPO filing may be the biggest experiment in investing reverse psychology ever. Anthropic is basically saying AI is "one of the most consequential technologies in human history" and it can be managed well or blow up spectacularly. Fortunately, Anthropic has values unique to the company that makes it a great steward of AI. Just ask the company.

Anthropic said:

"To build AI is to harness cognition itself, and anything so powerful can be used for ill as well as good. Anthropic is a deeply values-driven organization founded in a large part to help the world realize AI's benefits and avoid its dangers."

Anthropic's filing makes the case that AI will boost biology and medicine and cure diseases. Claude could be a doctor and Anthropic could be a biotech company at some point. Anthropic also argues that AI is a productivity boon to every sector of the economy and better the world. There will also be the need for a lot of guardrails and study about the possible economic impacts due to AI.

The company noted that it has partnered with governments to the tune of $200 million to run studies about AI's impact on the economy. "We do this to find evidence about which types of interventions are effective, so that if society does encounter economic disruption, we will have helped build and de-risk the right tools to use in the response," the company said.

Anthropic essentially makes the case that it has "a very different approach from that of a typical company" and can juggle the risks and rewards of AI. "We believe deeply in the power of entrepreneurial capitalism to deliver massive benefits to humanity," said Anthropic.

Anthropic also went through its business model and flywheel. Anthropic prefers improvement and investment loops.

You can wade through the S-1, perform a dramatic reading and even play a drinking game based on how many times Anthropic said "consequential," "safety," "risks," and "judgment." But in the end, Anthropic's IPO filing is about the numbers and those range from impressive to potentially scary. Here’s a look:

• Anthropic's revenue per employee is more than $6.6 million as of Sept. 30, up from $1.4 million in the previous year.
• The company is pursuing revenue growth and optimization. Claude Opus 5.5 lowered costs per tasks by about 40% compared to Claude Opus 5.
• As of June 30, Anthropic raised $141.1 billion of capital, had cash and cash equivalents of $112.4 billion and short-term investments of $19.3 billion.
• For the six months ended June 30, Anthropic had revenue of $16.3 billion. For 2025, revenue was $4.58 billion.
• Compute and infrastructure costs for the six months ending June 30 were $8.94 billion, more than all of 2025.
• Net loss for the six months ending June 30 was $80.03 billion.
• The company said it has substantial commitments for compute, leases that haven't commenced and costs expected to be incurred running through 2045. The catch is that Anthropic didn't disclose those numbers in multiple areas of the prospectus.
• 83% of Anthropic's revenue is consumption based.
• Anthropic said it has more than 11,900 enterprise customers with $100,000 or more in revenue, 1,900 generating more than $1 million a year and about 250 customers with more than $10 million a year.