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Abu Dhabi’s MGX was back in for the USD 65 bn Series H Anthropic just closed — a round that vaulted the maker of Claude at roughly USD 965 bn, or nearly triple its valuation in February. Critically, that’s comfortably past the USD 852 bn valuation that pundits think OpenAI last raised at. The transaction gives MGX additional exposure to what some pundits think could wind up being this year’s most desirable IPO.
Why it matters: It’s likely Anthropic’s last private round as it races to market — potentially ahead of arch rival OpenAI, which is prepping a confidential filing to list as soon as September. Anthropic’s prospects got a boost from what is believed to be a USD 47 bn run-rate that has probably pulled its revenue ahead of OpenAI’s thanks to a product strategy focused tightly on the enterprise market.
Background: MGX is already a shareholder of OpenAI and xAI and aims to deploy up to USD 100 bn a year.
And speaking of AI-related IPOs… SpaceX fever drove shares of Alwaleed bin Talal’s Kingdom Holding to a 10-year high, with the stock up nearly 10% on Sunday and c. 54% year-to-date against a flat TASI.
The catalyst: KHC disclosed a combined 0.63% stake in Elon Musk’s rocket company, held with Alwaleed’s private office and worth some USD 8.32 bn at a USD 1.25 tn valuation. That could surge to c. USD 10.6 bn if SpaceX prices at USD 1.75 tn. SpaceX has filed to list on the Nasdaq as SPCX, with pricing expected as soon as 11 June. Musk merged xAI, his artificial intelligence startup, with Space X earlier this year. The transaction valued the AI unit at USD 250 bn and the rocket maker at USD 1 bn.
The question starting to preoccupy the global investing press: How risky are these IPOs going to be, anyway? With some USD 3 tn in market cap becoming available to investors — possibly in just a matter of months — some pundits are warning that retail investors should proceed with caution. “Market history contains many lessons. It tells us that at the jaw-dropping valuations being discussed for shares of SpaceX, as well as OpenAI and Anthropic, the probability is exceedingly small that these companies will make money for ordinary people over the next few years,” writes the NYT’s strategies columnist, Jeff Sommer.
