Anthropic's stock market filing shows early investors in line for huge gains

Anthropic, the company behind the Claude AI assistant, has filed paperwork to go public, and it shows its early investors are in line for very large gains. The filing, called an S-1, comes just over three years after its first major round of venture capital funding.

Who stands to gain

Spark Capital led that first big round in spring 2023. It owns more than 1% of the company, a stake that could be worth tens of billions of dollars in short order. Bessemer Venture Partners has put in $800 million since 2024, the largest bet in its history, for a stake of almost 1%.

Why the speed stands out

SpaceX set the record for the largest IPO (the first sale of a company's shares to the public) only months ago. Its first venture investors came in during 2002. Anthropic is on a path of about three years. Bessemer partner Byron Deeter said no company has gone from zero to where Anthropic is in this amount of time.

When Bessemer first invested, an $18 billion price tag looked steep to many. Some called it a "FOMO bet," meaning investors who missed out on OpenAI were chasing a second chance. OpenAI, the maker of ChatGPT, expects to go public next year.

What is not known yet

The material does not say when Anthropic's shares will start trading, at what price, or what the company will be valued at. Anyone who wants to buy in or follow the stock will need to wait for those details.