On October 8, Beijing time, according to CNBC, just as Anthropic is about to list on Nasdaq and pursue a $2 trillion (approximately 13.42 trillion yuan at current exchange rates) valuation, a research firm has instead given the AI company a valuation of only $150 billion (approximately 1.01 trillion yuan at current exchange rates), saying Wall Street is about to face "an unprecedented test of how gullible investors can be."
In a report on Tuesday, the independent financial research firm New Constructs called Anthropic's upcoming IPO the "most ludicrous IPO of 2026."
The firm estimated that for Anthropic to reach its expected valuation, its profits would need to be double the profits of Nvidia, the world's most valuable tech company, over the past year. Nvidia's net profit over the past four quarters exceeded $190 billion (approximately 1.28 trillion yuan at current exchange rates). However, according to Reuters, citing a leaked copy of the company's prospectus, Anthropic's 2025 revenue was $4.6 billion (approximately 30.875 billion yuan at current exchange rates), with a net loss as high as $42 billion (approximately 281.901 billion yuan at current exchange rates).
Anthropic's ever-widening operating losses, combined with new competition from a large number of open-source models, led New Constructs to conclude: "We believe Anthropic has no viable business model."
"Since the emergence of open-source models, it has been clear that closed-source models will struggle to achieve profitability," the firm said.
For a long time, New Constructs founder and CEO David Trainer has been known on Wall Street as an IPO bear, and he has been proven right many times in the past.
Before the coworking company WeWork planned to go public, New Constructs called WeWork the "most ludicrous IPO of 2019." At the time, WeWork's private-market valuation had reached $47 billion (approximately 315.461 billion yuan at current exchange rates), but just six weeks after New Constructs released that report, the company withdrew its IPO due to weak demand and fierce criticism surrounding its financial condition. WeWork filed for bankruptcy in 2023.
"While Anthropic's contribution to society far exceeds that of WeWork, at a $2 trillion (approximately 13.42 trillion yuan at current exchange rates) valuation, its IPO carries far greater risks and will be a much larger plunder of the U.S. capital markets," New Constructs wrote. The firm added that the purpose of Anthropic's IPO is not to create wealth for public-market investors, but to provide liquidity for the company's behind-the-scenes backers on Wall Street.
As of press time, Anthropic had not commented on the matter.