Forget SpaceX. Here's the $2 Trillion IPO I'm Waiting For.

Anthropic is expected to go public the week of Nov. 6; Reuters-obtained IPO materials reportedly show 2025 revenue of $4.6 billion, 12 times 2024, and an estimated 2026 annual run rate of $65 billion. The article compares that with analysts’ $44.7 billion 2026 revenue estimate for SpaceX and argues Anthropic may have greater growth potential. Anthropic estimates it will spend $518 billion on cloud computing, internal computing and other infrastructure in the next few years, and the company is not yet profitable, creating substantial funding and execution risks.

Analysis

The key underwriting issue is not headline growth but whether reported demand converts into durable gross profit after compute. A $65B annual run rate is not comparable to a full-year revenue figure; until the filing defines the measure, customer concentration, committed capacity, and cash burn, extrapolating that figure into a valuation is fragile. If a $2T valuation is discussed, it would imply roughly 31x that estimated run rate—before resolving whether it is recurring, realized revenue.

The spending plan has two opposing spillovers: it could support cloud and data-center demand, but also transfer much of Anthropic’s revenue to infrastructure providers and make returns sensitive to utilization, energy, and model-efficiency gains. More efficient inference could improve Anthropic’s economics while reducing compute growth; weaker model differentiation could instead pressure pricing before infrastructure commitments can be scaled back. The article does not establish which providers capture the spend or the contract economics.

Near term, IPO documentation and pricing are the catalysts; over 1–3 months, watch realized revenue, gross margin, cash consumption, and capacity commitments. Over 6–18 months, the test is whether growth survives competition without infrastructure spending rising as fast. The comparison does not by itself justify a bearish SPCX position: the businesses, maturity, and reported revenue measures differ. The thesis weakens if filings substantiate durable, high-margin recurring revenue and manageable cash burn; it fails if run-rate conversion disappoints or infrastructure obligations outpace monetization.

Key Decisions for Investors

• Do not trade SPCX directionally on this comparison alone. The article provides no comparable valuation, cash-flow, or revenue definitions sufficient to establish relative mispricing.
• Treat any Anthropic IPO participation as a filing-and-price dependent watch item, not a pre-commitment: verify audited revenue, definition of the $65B run rate, gross margins, customer concentration, cash burn, and the scope and timing of the $518B spending estimate.
• Track cloud and data-center beneficiaries only after Anthropic’s filings identify counterparties and commitments; absent that disclosure, a broad long based on anticipated spend has weak attribution and may miss the margin captured by infrastructure suppliers.
• Reassess after listing disclosures and initial results: a rising revenue run rate alongside improving gross margin and contained cash use supports the growth thesis; missed conversion, worsening unit economics, or expanding infrastructure obligations falsify it.