Anthropic Plans Nasdaq IPO, Set to Achieve Profitability for Two Consecutive Quarters

TradingKey - According to a report by the Financial Times, the developer of the Claude large model has revealed to select shareholders that its adjusted operating profit this quarter is expected to be positive for the second consecutive quarter. For a frontier AI company founded just five years ago, this shift not only signifies enhanced commercialization capabilities but also helps alleviate long-standing market concerns over the high-investment, high-burn business model of AI firms.

According to people familiar with the matter, Anthropic has selected Nasdaq as its potential IPO listing venue, with the company's valuation potentially reaching $2 trillion or even higher. Previous market reports indicated that Anthropic was preparing for a public listing and planned to provide relevant materials to select investors and address their questions prior to formal filings. This suggests that the company's listing process is gradually advancing, although the exact timeline remains subject to change.

The improvement in profitability is the most closely watched aspect of this IPO. The report noted that Anthropic achieved positive adjusted operating profit in the second quarter and is expected to maintain this trend in the third quarter. The relevant metrics exclude certain costs, including stock-based compensation.

Meanwhile, before deducting revenue sharing paid to distribution partners such as Amazon and model training costs, the company's gross margin has exceeded 80%, demonstrating that revenue growth driven by Claude's commercialization is gradually reflecting economies of scale.

In terms of revenue performance, Anthropic's pace of expansion in recent quarters has been equally astonishing. The company's second-quarter revenue grew approximately 14-fold year-over-year to $11.5 billion, and as of the end of July, its annualized revenue had climbed to around $65 billion, compared with only about $9 billion at the end of 2025. The market expects that Anthropic's annualized revenue by the end of this year could further reach $120 billion, and if the growth momentum continues, its scale by the end of 2027 could even approach nearly three times that level.

Such rapid revenue growth has also become an important basis supporting Anthropic's high valuation. Joey Brookhart, an analyst at SemiAnalysis, believes that if Anthropic can continue to maintain its current growth rate and profit margins, competitors will face increasing pressure to catch up, as the company has accumulated vast compute resources.

However, the market environment Anthropic faces for its listing is far from easy. As AI model capabilities continue to advance, industry concerns regarding training costs, energy consumption, information security, and potential societal impacts are all heating up.

Amid its IPO preparations, Anthropic Chief Executive Officer Dario Amodei recently publicly advocated for slowing the pace of advancing AI model capabilities. He believes that as next-generation model capabilities continue to strengthen, the industry needs to handle safety risks more cautiously. This view was subsequently echoed by OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk.