Anthropic Expects Its IPO to Match or Beat SpaceX's $86 Billion Record - Memeburn

Users on X are questioning whether the product justifies the valuation, citing rate limits, invisible watermarks and pricing

Anthropic is preparing what could become the largest initial public offering in history. The Claude developer expects its upcoming IPO to match or exceed the $86.2 billion that SpaceX raised when it went public in June, Bloomberg reported on August 20, citing people familiar with the matter.

The company could file its IPO paperwork publicly as soon as the end of this month. If it clears that mark, 2026 would set the record for total US IPO volume, with companies that debuted on public markets already bringing in $160.6 billion as of August 19.

But the mega-listing arrives alongside a quieter, more telling shift. Anthropic is also walking back a controversial data retention policy that had alarmed enterprise customers for months. And on social media, users are asking a blunter question: does the product actually justify a valuation this large?

The Numbers Behind the Record Attempt

Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan Chase are managing Anthropic's offering, the same banks that ran SpaceX's blockbuster listing earlier this year. SpaceX initially targeted $75 billion but ultimately raised $86.2 billion once its overallotment option was exercised.

Anthropic's financial trajectory is the core of the pitch. Its annualized revenue run rate hit $65 billion by late July, up from $9 billion at the end of 2025. That is more than a sevenfold increase in roughly seven months. Preliminary second-quarter revenue exceeded $11.5 billion, and investors told the Financial Times they expect annualized revenue to land between $100 billion and $120 billion by year-end.

The company also reported its first positive adjusted operating income during Q2. Chief Financial Officer Krishna Rao has led recent investor briefings but has declined to discuss specific valuation targets, according to Bloomberg's sources.

None of this came cheap. Anthropic posted a net loss of nearly $42 billion in 2025, driven by enormous compute costs. It has committed $50 billion to AI infrastructure across data centres in Texas and New York. CEO Dario Amodei has publicly acknowledged the stakes, warning that even a one-year miss on growth could threaten the company's survival.

Some backers have floated a potential $2 trillion listing valuation by October, which would dwarf SpaceX's $1.77 trillion debut. But the IPO raise itself the amount of capital Anthropic actually collects from selling shares is the more immediate benchmark. Getting past $86.2 billion would give Anthropic the outright record.

Anthropic Reverses Course on Data Retention

The IPO news broke alongside a separate Bloomberg report: Anthropic plans to let enterprise customers store data on their own cloud infrastructure rather than Anthropic's servers.

The shift matters because of what came before it. When Anthropic launched Claude Fable 5 in June, it introduced a mandatory 30-day data retention policy for its most powerful models. Every prompt, every output, stored for a month with no opt-out. The policy was designed to help the company detect misuse and monitor for cybersecurity threats, but enterprise customers pushed back hard.

Microsoft reportedly restricted employee use of Anthropic's latest models while reviewing the policy. Salesforce and more than 100 other customers spent months working with Anthropic on alternatives.

The revised approach keeps the 30-day retention requirement but gives businesses the option to host that data within their existing cloud setup. Anthropic says it expects to roll out the new safety system later this year.

The timing is not a coincidence. Palantir CEO Alex Karp had publicly criticized AI companies for what he described as a data grab. OpenAI responded first, previewing its own zero-retention safety processing system for enterprise customers. Anthropic's reversal followed within 24 hours.

For a company about to ask public investors for $86 billion, appearing to cave on data privacy under competitive pressure is a story the S-1 roadshow would rather not have running in the background.

Users Aren't All Buying It

While investors prepare for the biggest AI IPO ever, some of Anthropic's own users are greeting the news with scepticism.

One widely shared post on X from user @jumperz summed up the frustration in a list: expensive flagship model, rate limits that cut users off mid-workflow, an invisible text watermark embedded in outputs, and a product they described as "out of touch with what users actually want."

The replies leaned into it. One user said their first move would be to short the stock. Another compared the company unfavourably to SpaceXAI, pointing out that Elon Musk's combined entity launches reusable rockets and runs a global satellite internet service on top of building AI. "Why would you ever invest in Anthropic over SpaceX?" they asked.

These are social media reactions, not institutional analysis. But they reflect a gap that Anthropic will need to address once it becomes a public company: the distance between what growth-stage investors see in the revenue numbers and what daily users experience in the product.

Anthropic has dealt with product controversies before. Its export control clash with the White House in June forced it to disable its most capable models worldwide for weeks. Its multi-agent testing revealed AI coordination failures that made headlines. Each incident chipped at the narrative of a company that moves carefully and gets things right.

An IPO prospectus will lay bare the financials. What it won't resolve is whether the product experience matches the price tag.

What Happens Next

Anthropic is running financial analyses ahead of a potential public filing by the end of August. If the company does file, the S-1 will contain the first public disclosure of detailed revenue, costs, and operating losses, figures that until now have come only through investor briefings and media leaks.

The IPO is expected to list on the Nasdaq, with an October 2026 debut as the most likely timeline. OpenAI, which filed its own confidential S-1 in June, may delay its listing to 2027, potentially giving Anthropic a clear window to dominate public market attention.

For context, SpaceX's own post-IPO run was anything but smooth. Shares surged 67% in four days, then crashed 49% over the following weeks before stabilising. AI IPO investors should expect similar volatility.

The question is no longer whether Anthropic will go public. It is whether an AI company that lost $42 billion last year, changed its data policy under pressure, and is drawing public complaints about its product can convince both Wall Street and Main Street that the growth curve justifies the record.

FAQs

Will Anthropic's IPO be bigger than SpaceX's?

Bloomberg reports that Anthropic is targeting an IPO raise at or above the $86.2 billion SpaceX collected in June 2026. SpaceX currently holds the record for the largest first-time share sale in history. Clearing that figure would give Anthropic the outright record.

When is Anthropic expected to go public?

Anthropic could file its IPO paperwork publicly as soon as late August 2026, with an October 2026 listing on the Nasdaq as the most likely target. Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan Chase are managing the offering.

What is Anthropic's current revenue?

The company's run rate reached $65 billion by late July 2026, up from $9 billion at the end of 2025. Backers project that figure will land between $100 billion and $120 billion by year-end. Preliminary Q2 revenue exceeded $11.5 billion.

Why did Anthropic change its data retention policy?

Anthropic introduced a mandatory 30-day data retention policy for its most capable AI models in June 2026. Enterprise customers objected, and the company responded in August by offering an alternative: businesses can now retain the required data within their own cloud environments rather than handing it to Anthropic.

Is Anthropic profitable?

Not yet on an annual basis. The company's 2025 financials showed heavy losses driven by compute spending. However, Anthropic posted its first positive adjusted operating income in Q2 2026, and investors project annualized revenue could reach $100 billion or more by year-end, suggesting a path toward sustained profitability is forming.