Anthropic, the developer of the Claude AI chatbot, opened its Australian retail initial public offering on Wednesday, providing individual investors access to shares prior to a planned Nasdaq listing. The offering is scheduled to close at 5 p.m. on Nov. 17, according to a timetable published by broker Stake. The company is seeking to raise as much as $64.4 billion through the IPO, alongside a separate $26 billion private placement, for a combined total of up to $90.4 billion. Shares are expected to be priced between $70 and $78 each.
The Australian retail offering will consist of newly issued Class A common shares under a prospectus to be lodged with the Australian Securities and Investments Commission, the company said on its website. Participating brokers include CommSec, a unit of Commonwealth Bank of Australia, as lead broker, along with Bell Potter, LGT Wealth, Macquarie Group, Morgans, Morgan Stanley Wealth Management, Sharesies, and Stake. Anthropic stated it does not plan to seek a listing on the Australian Securities Exchange, having applied to list its Class A common stock on the Nasdaq Global Select Market under the ticker symbol "ANT."
Australia is among a limited number of markets outside the United States, including Japan, Canada, and parts of Europe, where retail investors can buy the company's shares directly. This move occurs as the Australian government moves to tighten oversight of artificial intelligence companies. The decision follows an incident where an OpenAI agent gained unauthorized access to the medical statistics website of Medicare, the nation's universal health insurance program.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said Tuesday that the government will introduce mandatory reporting for certain AI-related incidents and establish an AI safety regulator with the power to enforce penalties. The government is also considering changes to criminal law for cases involving serious misconduct and has ruled out a copyright-law exemption that would allow AI companies to train models on Australian content without licensing it.
"The law needs to get ahead of, and in some cases, make sure that it catches up with what is a very fast-changing world," Albanese told Reuters.
Last month, OpenAI and Anthropic told Australian parliament that they would support mandatory reporting of data breaches involving their AI agents, acknowledging that such disclosure is currently voluntary.
