From Claude to the Stock Market: Anthropic’s IPO Filing, Explained.

August 26, 2026

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Anthropic, the AI company behind the Claude chatbot that millions of people now lean on for work, has taken its first formal step toward going public. For a name this widely used, and this closely tied to the AI boom, the eventual stock market listing could become one of the most heavily traded debuts in years. But what sits behind the headline?

On June 1, 2026, Anthropic filed a draft registration statement with the SEC, the standard opening move for a large technology IPO.¹ The company's most recent private valuation was roughly $965 billion, set by a $65 billion funding round that closed days earlier, and press reports have floated a $1 trillion-plus base case if the company lists this fall.²

The Company Behind Claude

Anthropic was founded in 2021 by siblings Dario and Daniela Amodei, both former OpenAI researchers, and now employs roughly 3,500 people.³ Its business runs wider than the Claude chatbot most consumers know. The Claude model family spans multiple tiers built for different jobs, from lightweight assistants to frontier-scale models, and Claude Code, the company's developer tool, has become a fixture inside engineering teams writing and reviewing software. Anthropic also popularized the Model Context Protocol, a connector standard now used across the industry to plug AI models into outside tools and data. That enterprise footprint shows up in the numbers: the company reports about 80% of its revenue comes from business customers, not consumer subscriptions.⁴

A Near-Vertical Growth Curve

Anthropic's annualized revenue run-rate climbed from about $9 billion at the end of 2025 to roughly $30 billion in April 2026, and past $47 billion by May.⁴ The company also told investors it expected its first operating profit, around $559 million, in the second quarter of 2026.⁵ The other side of that story is cost. Anthropic cut its 2025 gross-margin projection to about 40% from 50% as AI inference expenses ran higher than planned, and it has committed tens of billions of dollars to future computing capacity, so cash burn and compute dependence remain real questions heading into the listing.⁶

An Unusual Governance Structure

Anthropic is a public benefit corporation paired with a Long-Term Benefit Trust. A special class of shares gives the Trust's trustees the power to elect a growing share of the board over time, ultimately a majority.⁷ Supporters see a safeguard for the company's safety mission, while a public-market buyer may see a board not fully accountable to shareholders. It is a genuine two-sided consideration.

Big Backers and a Rival in the Wings

Amazon (Ticker: AMZN) and Alphabet's Google (Ticker: GOOGL) are both investors in and cloud partners to Anthropic, and Salesforce (Ticker: CRM) holds a reported stake as well.⁸ The competitive backdrop adds intrigue: OpenAI filed its own confidential paperwork just one week later, on June 8, but has since signaled it may wait until 2027 to list, meaning Anthropic could reach the public market first.⁹

What to Watch Next

The path runs through SEC review, a public version of the S-1, a roadshow, and, market conditions permitting, a listing targeted for this fall.⁹ To stay abreast of Anthropic's anticipated IPO and other market developments, you can register for Direxion Updates right to your email inbox.

Direxion, a leading provider of ETFs for tactical traders, has filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission to launch the Direxion Daily Anthropic Bull 2X ETF (CLAU) and the Direxion Daily Anthropic Bear 2X ETF (CLAD). Once effective, CLAU will seek daily investment results, before fees and expenses, of 200% of the daily performance of the common stock of Anthropic, and CLAD will seek daily investment results, before fees and expenses, of 200% of the inverse (-200%) of that performance. Both are expected to begin trading shortly after Anthropic completes its initial public offering, and its shares begin trading, subject to SEC effectiveness. For more information, go here.

* Definitions & Index Descriptions

To read the Pre-Effective Prospectus, click here.

The information in this Prospectus is not complete and may be changed. We may not sell these securities until the registration statement filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission is effective. This Prospectus is not an offer to sell these securities and is not soliciting an offer to buy these securities in any state where the offer or sale is not permitted.

Investing in the Funds involves a high degree of risk. Anthropic has not yet completed an initial public offering, and the Funds will not commence operations until Anthropic's common stock is publicly listed. As a newly public company, Anthropic may experience heightened volatility. Unlike traditional ETFs, or even other leveraged and/or inverse ETFs, these leveraged single-stock ETF tracks the price of a single stock rather than an index, eliminating the benefits of diversification. Leveraged ETFs pursue daily leveraged investment objectives, which means they are riskier than alternatives which do not use leverage. They seek daily goals and should not be expected to track the underlying stock’s performance over periods longer than one day. They are not suitable for all investors and should be utilized only by investors who understand leverage risk and who actively manage their investments. The Funds will lose money if the underlying stock’s performance is flat, and it is possible that the Funds will lose money even if the underlying stock’s performance increases, over a period longer than a single day. Investing in the Funds is not equivalent to investing directly in Anthropic.

Direxion Shares Risks – An investment in the ETFs involves risk, including the possible loss of principal. The ETFs are non-diversified and include risks associated with concentration that results from an ETF’s investments in a particular industry, sector or company, which can increase volatility. The leveraged and inverse ETFs utilize derivatives, such as futures contracts and swaps which are subject to market risks that may cause their price to fluctuate both intra-day and over time. The leveraged and inverse ETFs do not attempt to, and should not be expected to, provide returns which are a multiple of (or inverse of) the return of their respective index or underlying security for periods other than a single day. The leveraged and leveraged inverse ETFs may also be subject to leverage, correlation, daily compounding, market volatility and risks specific to an industry, sector or company. The ETFs are subject to certain risks, including imperfect index correlation and secondary market price variance, which may decrease performance. The ETFs may invest in a relatively small number of issuers and, as a result, be subject to greater risk of loss with respect to their portfolio securities than that of a fully diversified portfolio of securities. Due to the non-diversified nature of the ETFs, they may experience greater fluctuation in their net asset value as compared to other, more diversified investments. The non-leveraged ETFs may be appropriate for investors with a long-term investment time horizon, who primarily seek capital growth, and who are able to tolerate periods of prolonged price declines. Please read each ETF’s prospectus for a more complete description of the investment risks. There is no guarantee that an ETF will achieve its investment objective.