The Truth Behind the $80.7 Billion Net Loss

Anthropic publicly filed its S-1 with the Securities and Exchange Commission on October 26. It will list its Class A common stock on the Nasdaq Global Select Market under the ticker symbol ANT. The number of shares and the offering price range remain blank. Twenty-four underwriters are on board, with Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley listed at the forefront.

Opening the ledger reveals two contrasting figures. Revenue for the first half of 2026 stands at $16.29 billion. This is a 14-fold leap from the $1.16 billion reported during the same period a year prior. However, the net loss for the same period is $80.7 billion. This loss is nearly five times the revenue.

The gap between the two numbers stems from accounting, not operations. Of the $80.7 billion net loss, $72.4 billion resulted from changes in the fair value of convertible notes and similar financial instruments. As the company's valuation rises, the appraised value of the equity to be handed over to investors later also increases, and this increment is recorded as an expense. It does not represent an actual cash outflow. The actual operating loss was $693 million. An operating loss of $693 million against $16.29 billion in revenue means the company is almost at the breakeven point relative to its scale.

The company's coffers are also well-padded. As of June 30, it holds $112.4 billion in cash and cash equivalents, along with $19.3 billion in short-term investments. Since its inception, it has raised a cumulative $141.1 billion in capital. In its most recent private funding round in May, it secured $65 billion at a valuation of $965 billion.

On the other side of the ledger are the bills for computing. The minimum payment obligations for lease and commercial contracts signed or amended after June 30 amount to approximately $245 billion. Of this, the non-cancelable minimum payments for short-term contracts stand at roughly $21 billion. This indicates that no matter how fast revenue grows, computing capacity must be reserved beforehand in this business.

The revenue trajectory is as follows: $41 million in 2023, $386 million in 2024, and $4.59 billion in 2025. As of September 30, there are over 1,900 customers generating more than $1 million in revenue over the trailing 12 months, and about 250 customers generating over $10 million. The heavy focus is on enterprise accounts rather than individual subscriptions.

The voting rights structure is also notable. There is a single share of Class F stock that holds 50.1% of the voting power on most matters. Additionally, as of June 30, approximately 847 million non-voting shares—equivalent to 5% of the fully diluted shares—were transferred to a public benefit subsidiary. It is a structure designed to go public without surrendering control.

The IPO schedule and offering price remain open. However, the true value of this document does not lie in the offering price. It lies in the fact that an AI lab's profit and loss, previously known only through estimates and leaks, have been revealed in audited figures for the first time. This ledger will serve as a baseline for evaluating the financials of other research labs in the future.