Investors have put in orders for about six times the shares Anthropic PBC is selling in its initial public offering, people familiar with the deal said, as the company and its bankers head into the final days of marketing what could become the largest stock market debut on record.
The order book stood at roughly two times the shares available after the first day of the roadshow on Tuesday and reached about six times by the end of Thursday, the people said. That is faster than the SpaceX offering in June, which was about two times covered after its second day. Bankers expect the book to keep growing before pricing, the people said, and have told prospective buyers that existing Anthropic backers will get priority, meaning some investors will receive smaller allocations than they want.
The price range has not changed from the $70 to $78 a share set on Tuesday. At the top end, the 825 million shares would raise about $64.4 billion. Combined with a $26 billion private placement to seven technology companies including Nvidia and Alphabet, the total could reach about $90.4 billion at a fully diluted valuation near $1.4 trillion.
Amodei and Dimon make the pitch
Chief Executive Dario Amodei made the case directly on Friday in a livestreamed conversation with JPMorgan Chase Chief Executive Jamie Dimon at the bank’s Manhattan headquarters, one of the last stops on the roadshow. Amodei described the central business problem at Anthropic as lining up enough computing power to meet demand without overspending, since the company must commit to data center capacity long before it knows how much its products will sell. He said Anthropic tends to buy less capacity in advance than its forecasts would justify and adds more when demand runs ahead.
Asked why the company is going public now, Amodei pointed to that uncertainty. More cash on hand, he said, gives Anthropic a larger buffer, and he suggested the company is not trying to squeeze out the highest possible valuation. Instead, he said it would rather set modest expectations and beat them.
A tougher backdrop than SpaceX had
The conservative tone reflects the market. The Nasdaq 100 has fallen about 7% over the past three months after an interest-rate increase, worries about heavy borrowing to build AI infrastructure and voter backlash against data centers in the midterm elections. Talk of a $2 trillion valuation has faded. Unlike SpaceX, which marketed its shares at a fixed price, Anthropic is using a traditional range, which gives large investors more say over where the deal prices.
Some buyers are already passing slices of their expected allocations to others, and holders of pre-IPO stakes are offering them through special purpose vehicles. Analysts at Evercore estimated the underwriting banks could collect about $395 million in fees, including roughly $44 million for JPMorgan, which is running retail sales in the U.S.
Anthropic expects to price the offering on Wednesday, Nov. 18, and begin trading on the Nasdaq Global Select Market under the ticker ANT the next day. Earlier this week, people familiar with the deal said the book was already covered several times, and Anthropic opened a retail offer in Australia.
Section: More Memphis TN business news
Memphis business profiles
Filed under: Memphis TN Business News
