Michael Burry Calls Anthropic's Valuation a Bubble Worth 78 S&P 500 Companies

Michael Burry says Anthropic’s valuation could buy 78 profitable companies in the S&P 500, a price he calls a bubble.

The list includes Domino’s, Clorox, lululemon, and Hormel Foods, though Burry did not say which Anthropic valuation he used. The company’s last private round, in May, priced it at $965 billion ahead of a planned initial public offering (IPO).

How Does Anthropic’s Valuation Stack Up Against UPS?

In his Substack post, Burry also benchmarked the figure against the 1990s. He said United Parcel Service (UPS) held the 1990 to 2000 record for inflation-adjusted pre-IPO valuations, at $119 billion.

That price equaled 26 times earnings and 2.4 times sales, Burry said. UPS was 92 years old and earned a net margin of about 8.6%.

A fun game in times like these is to go to the S&P 500 Index and see how many profitable companies one can buy with the bubble private company valuation. The number that Anthropic’s valuation buys is 78, including Domino’s, Clorox, Smucker, Stanley Black & Decker, Deckers,…

— Cassandra Unchained (@michaeljburry) October 8, 2026

Anthropic, by contrast, was founded in 2021. Its leaked draft prospectus shows a $42 billion net loss for 2025, Fortune reported. Reuters reported that most of the loss was an accounting charge rather than operating spending.

However, the same filing shows $11.5 billion in second-quarter 2026 revenue and points to a second straight operating profit.

It also lists $518 billion in planned cloud and infrastructure spending in coming years.

Will Public Markets Pay for Growth Before Profit?

Altimeter Capital, Dragoneer, Greenoaks, and Sequoia Capital led the $65 billion round that set the $965 billion mark, CNBC reported.

Prospective investors now put fair value between $1.8 trillion and $2 trillion. Anthropic is targeting a listing before Thanksgiving, according to the same report.

The post follows Burry’s stock market warnings. On Oct. 5, he said stocks sit in a denial stage he expects to last six to nine months.

Days after the May round, he told Substack subscribers that Anthropic’s long-term worth near $1 trillion was far from assured.

A listing near $2 trillion would test whether public investors pay for revenue growth ahead of earnings. Reuters reported that analysts see the first AI lab to list as the pricing reference for the sector.