Anthropic: $1.5 Trillion in Secondary Market, Rare Sellers Ahead of IPO

On the private market, Anthropic is trading at up to $1.5 trillion, a 25% increase over the past month, but very few shares are circulating. Secondary market players describe more buyers than sellers as an IPO is anticipated in the coming months. In this context, investors are becoming more selective about access vehicles, while competition from OpenAI and Moonshot is advancing.

Few offers and many buyers ahead of the IPO

According to Adam Crawley, demand for Anthropic shares far exceeds supply, with many more buyers than sellers. He notes that as an imminent IPO approaches, few holders are willing to sell their shares. On the OpenAI side, interest from secondary buyers increased this summer, but according to Crawley, prices in the secondary market have remained close to the $852 billion valuation from the March funding round, due to a larger supply.

Secondary price pushed to $1.5 trillion and rare shares

According to three secondary market players, Anthropic's valuation in the private market recently climbed to $1.5 trillion, representing a 25% increase in just one month. Transactions in the secondary market are occurring at these valuations, but acquiring shares remains difficult. Glen Anderson, CEO of Rainmaker Securities, indicates that the few identified sellers are positioned around $1.5 trillion, and there are few even at that price.

Buying Anthropic: from secondary to SPVs, with more caution

As Anthropic is still a private company, access to its shares primarily goes through the secondary market, where employees or early investors can sell their shares. Some transactions involve high fees and complex structures through special purpose vehicles (SPVs), which allow pooling of funds for a single transaction. Anthropic has declined to comment but warns on its website against unauthorized sales and scams. According to Aman Verjee, this vigilance has led many buyers to prefer direct exposure to the capitalization table and to avoid nested SPVs, which offer fewer rights or exposure to older rounds and common stock. Even at $1.5 trillion, demand for these vehicles exists but remains limited. The company is led by its co-founder and CEO, Dario Amodei.

Active competition and heading towards listing

Anthropic's valuation continues to rise as competition strengthens. OpenAI has launched Codex, which reached 5 million monthly active users in June, and its GPT-5.6 Terra and GPT-5.6 Luna models, the latter being less expensive, have received a positive reception. In China, Moonshot is gaining ground with its Kimi models, offered at a lower price. Anthropic was estimated at $965 billion during a funding round announced in May, and then filed documents in June for an IPO. A listing is expected in the coming months, and it could be among the largest ever recorded, while shares are already trading at valuations of up to $1.5 trillion in the secondary market.