There has been a notable increase in discussions surrounding a possible Anthropic initial public offering (IPO) in late August, with September often mentioned as the month when the artificial intelligence (AI) giant will hit the stock market.
Cryptocurrency traders on the prediction platform Polymarket, however, appear to believe that the firm will not go public quite so soon.
Indeed, odds of a September IPO remain low and at only 16% despite the frequent mentions of the month, per the data Finbold retrieved from Polymarket on August 28. Crypto traders appear confident that trading will begin in October – 81% – per the market titled ‘In which month will Anthropic IPO?’
Additionally, it appears that only a handful of other months are taken at all seriously by the bettors, with 2% odds for December and 1% that there will be no offering before 2028. Every other timeframe stands, at press time on Friday, below 1%.
The stance appears confirmed by a different market – ‘Anthropic IPO by __?’ – which puts the odds of ‘by September 30’ at a low 15%, ‘October 15’ at 73%, ‘October 31’ at 91%, and ‘December 31’ at only a slightly higher 93%.
These predictions also appear backed by an August 27 report indicating that the AI firm will unveil its prospectus after Labor Day – September 7, 2026 – and that it will go public either later in the same month or early in October.
Anthropic benefits from series of bullish developments ahead of IPO
Elsewhere, the increase in the chances of Anthropic going public relatively soon was accompanied by a series of positive developments and optimistic announcements for the firm.
To begin with, a federal court ruled on Thursday that the Pentagon acted illegally when it labeled the AI firm a ‘supply chain risk’ after it refused to have its technology used in completely autonomous weapons systems.
California federal judge Rita Lin explained that the decision not only violated Anthropic’s First Amendment rights, but was also contradictory since the label effectively blocked the company from working with the U.S. government while Secretary Hegseth’s threats to use the Defense Production Act against it positioned it as ‘essential to national security rather than a threat to it.’
Meanwhile, along with the ruling restoring some potentially major opportunities for the AI firm, reports indicating that it intends to claim $30 trillion in potential revenue came as another – and different – driver of bullish sentiment.
Notably, Anthropic’s alleged plans for possible sales claims stand slightly above the AI-related total addressable market SpaceX (NASDAQ: SPCX) claimed ahead of its own IPO.
The figure is curious since the artificial intelligence company reportedly hopes for an even larger offering than Elon Musk’s newer public company, with a target valuation of $2 trillion and plans to raise $100 billion.
Finally, despite the convergence of bullish factors and announcements, the expected September or October Anthropic IPO is not bereft of critics and skeptics.
Why the potential Anthropic IPO remains controversial
George Noble, a veteran investor and asset manager, for example, opined that the entire move is a scheme to help Nvidia (NASDAQ: NVDA) help continue the AI ‘boom’ artificially.
“I actually think the whole thing is a rig job between NVDA and Anthropic, because apparently Anthropic is seemingly timing their IPO filing on the back of the NVDA Q. NVDA needs Anthropic to be a public company to raise the money and help keep the shell game going,” Noble wrote on X on August 27 before adding that “Even NVDA cannot finance the whole thing on their own and buy all of their own revenue, although they sure seem to be trying.”
Despite the flurry of bullish claims, including OpenAI’s Sam Altman saying his firm will have achieved artificial general intelligence (AGI) by the end of 2026 and Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang remarking that AGI already exists, the benefits and specific financial results of AI have been arguably harder to track down than the technology’s drawbacks.
A loose example of the trend is that, rather than focusing on achievements already made, revenue accrued, and major use cases proliferated, the narrative remains focused on the future, with frequent claims that the industry is still in its infancy.
The theories and principles of what is now known as ‘generative AI’ date back to the middle of the previous century, and the ongoing ‘boom’ started in late 2022 with the public release of ChatGPT.
Is the Anthropic IPO just ‘exit liquidity’ for the wealthy?
Additionally, and despite vehement denials, the circularity and concerning interconnectedness within the sector appear to have only grown worse.
Anthropic remains the prime renter of AI compute, with contracts with both SpaceX – despite Elon Musk’s vocal hostility toward the firm – and Meta (NASDAQ: META) – a company that claimed to think it has a use for its capacity earlier in 2026 – even though the narrative would imply there is no shortage of demand for data centers.
Nvidia is itself at the center of the worrying trend, as it has been heavily investing in firms buying its own chips, reportedly agreed to purchase Hugging Face for just under $13 billion days after the company appeared to be struggling to find a buyer, and owes roughly 70% of its accounts receivable balance to just five clients.
Lastly, with the AI ‘boom’ drawing a lion’s share of venture capital funding, straining the finances of even the largest technology firms with its voracious hunger for capital, and leading to varying debt issues for multiple blue-chips, some believe than Anthropic IPO could be an attempt to use retail investors as ‘exit liquidity’ for the ultra-wealthy.
On the other hand, however, many analysts, reporters, and executives remain firmly on the bullish side, dismissing the concerns and highlighting the potential of the technology and the companies behind it. Jensen Huang, for example, positioned investing in Anthropic, SpaceX, and OpenAI at their IPOs as akin to having invested in Amazon (NASDAQ: AMZN), Meta, and Google (NASDAQ: GOOGL) early.
Featured image via Shutterstock
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