Big Tech earnings sell-off clouds Anthropic IPO path

Anthropic made its IPO prospectus public on October 26. Within days, Microsoft ↘ 1.55%, Google and Amazon Amazon.com, Inc. ↘ 1.41% reported quarterly results that deepened investor worries about the cost of the AI buildout. CNBC Comcast Corporation ↗ 4.27% reported that the sell-off made the company's path to market "a lot bumpier." The three cloud providers are some of Anthropic's most important partners, and they are also among its biggest investors. That ties their spending and cash positions directly to the AI lab's prospects as it heads toward what could be the largest IPO on record.cnbc.com

A rough week for tech

Alphabet ↘ 1.45% reported negative free cash flow of $9.1 billion, and its stock dropped almost 13% on October 29, its worst day ever. Amazon posted negative free cash flow for a second quarter in a row. Microsoft's free cash flow stayed positive but fell, and the company announced plans for a $25 billion bond sale. On October 30, the Nasdaq Composite fell 2.9%, its first three-week losing streak since March, as Nvidia ↘ 4.22% and chip stocks slid after Intel ↘ 28.58% gave a weak forecast. Reuters Thomson Reuters Corporation ↗ 1.63% reported that the Nasdaq was on track to lose about $2 trillion in value in October.reuters.com+1

"It's been an ugly reporting season for tech thus far," BTIG's Jonathan Krinsky wrote, according to CNBC. There was some good news too. All three companies reported cloud growth above analysts' estimates. Futurum Group CEO Daniel Newman said the main new concern was "more doubt on capital structure."cnbc.com

Before the earnings, investors were already worried about neoclouds such as CoreWeave ↘ 9.66% and Nebius ↘ 10.38%, which face rising borrowing costs. Anthropic buys some of its computing capacity from them.

What the prospectus shows

Anthropic plans to list on the Nasdaq Global Select Market under the ticker "ANT". Goldman Sachs ↘ 3.58% and Morgan Stanley ↘ 3.00% are leading the offering. According to the filing, revenue for the first half of 2026 was about $16.3 billion and the net loss was $80.7 billion. Reuters reported that some investors value the company at about $1.5 trillion, down from roughly $2 trillion a week earlier. Its last private funding round valued it at $965 billion.anthropic.com+3

Reuters Breakingviews described the IPO as seeking a valuation "north of $1.5 trillion." The column added that the 300-plus-page filing gives "only the vaguest answers" about Anthropic's business model, even though it lists about $800 billion in compute leases and purchase commitments. Breakingviews estimated that to keep compute spending at 55% of revenue, Anthropic would need $177 billion in sales next year.reuters.com

A thin IPO market

CNBC noted that the IPO market has been mostly frozen since SpaceX's offering in June, and several companies have recently postponed or abandoned their listings. Newman still called the prospectus "very impressive." "Anthropic is the IPO market at this point," he said.cnbc.com