American billionaire Dario Amodei’s Anthropic may have to accept a sharply lower valuation in its upcoming stock market listing, after a selloff in artificial intelligence stocks cooled investor appetite for the AI company.
Prospective buyers of Anthropic’s shares are now discussing a valuation of $1.2 trillion to $1.3 trillion, and some are considering as little as $1.1 trillion, according to Bloomberg. That is well below the $1.4 trillion to $1.5 trillion investors had signaled to bankers, and far below the roughly $2 trillion some floated in early October.
The shift came after a brutal session on Wall Street. On Thursday, the Nasdaq-100 fell 6.4%, erasing about $2.3 trillion in market value, as investors dumped AI-linked stocks after Democrats won control of Congress and pledged tighter restrictions on data centers.
Analysts said a lower price could still attract strong demand. “If they set a valuation toward the bottom of the range, say $1.2 trillion, they shouldn’t have a problem finding investors,” said David Rainville of Sycomore.
Others urged more caution. HSBC strategist Max Kettner said a valuation of around $1 trillion “could be a more comfortable level,” while BNP Paribas’s Stephan Kemper said the price may need to sit 10% to 15% below the low end of the rumored range.
Bloomberg said formal marketing of the share sale is expected to begin next week. Anthropic and its selling shareholders may start with a conservative size and valuation target, then raise it if investor demand proves strong.
The repricing matters for Anthropic’s founders. Billionaires.Africa reported in October that Amodei and his fellow co-founders were each worth about $13 billion, based on the company’s private valuation at the time. A listing at a lower price would cut the paper value of their stakes.
Still, the business itself has grown rapidly. Anthropic posted revenue of $16.3 billion in the first half of 2026, according to Billionaires.Africa, as demand surged for its Claude AI models among businesses and software developers.
The listing is also expected to create a large group of newly wealthy employees. Billionaires.Africa reported on Monday that the offering is set to turn many staff into millionaires, and in October that former Google Chief Executive Eric Schmidt’s stake could be worth up to $20 billion at listing.
Meanwhile, rival OpenAI is also adjusting to the new market mood. Sam Altman’s company raised $11 billion at a $1.25 trillion valuation on Friday, below the $1.4 trillion it originally targeted.
Even at the low end of the range being discussed, Anthropic would still rank among the largest companies ever to go public, underscoring how much value investors continue to place on leading AI developers despite the recent selloff.