Anthropic S-1 pitches IPO buyers on miracles and extinction risk
Original title: Silicon Valley wants you to invest in miracles
The 335-page prospectus filed Monday has 94 pages of risk factors and omits third-quarter results.
The Verge examines Anthropic’s S-1, whose founders’ letter asks investors to join a mission to bring forth “an age of miracles” while warning of catastrophic or existential risk. Anthropic plans to list as a public benefit corporation and describes “powerful AI” as inevitable. The filing leaves out third-quarter results that would help assess profitability.
Unconfirmed: Third-quarter results are missing, and the extinction figure is Amodei’s stated estimate, not a measured risk.
- Jay Ritter contrasts the filing with Apple’s 47-page 1980 prospectus and Meta’s later S-1.
- The letter says Anthropic may make investments that seem irresponsibly large.
- CEO Dario Amodei has put the chance of human extinction from further AI development at up to 25 percent.
- Safety work may lead Anthropic to delay retiring older models.
From the original article
5 min read at theverge.com
Investing in any stock is kind of like gambling in the sense that you're betting your money on a company's future performance. But how do you bet on a technology that could, in the worst-case scenario, "pose catastrophic or existential risks to humanity," or best case, "bring forth an age of miracles"? To some extent, Anthropic suggests in a letter at the top of its S-1 filing, you have to just believe.
By Ellen Thomas · theverge.com
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