Anthropic’s IPO scored 1.4/5 on one thing

Today’s Big Picture

Anthropic, the AI company behind the Claude models, has filed to go public on the Nasdaq under the ticker ANT.

Its sales grew about twelvefold in a year, to almost $17 billion last quarter. Reports put its valuation somewhere between $1.5 trillion and $2 trillion.

One professional research desk ran it through the scorecard it uses on every deal. The business scored 4.1 out of 5. Governance, meaning who controls the company, scored 1.4.

Both numbers are about the same company, in the same filing.

The more exciting the company, the more you need a scorecard you wrote before you saw it.

Below, Maxwell Nee, who co-leads the Inflection Club, walks through that scorecard and the four lessons he takes from it. The club’s second day starts this morning at the Bellagio.

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Featured Contributor

Today’s guest is Maxwell Nee, Chairman and Founder of Family Office Insider and a co-lead of the Inflection Club, a private investment club for Decentralized Masters members. He spent years in risk and corporate finance at Commonwealth Bank of Australia and has spoken at SuperReturn in London, Sydney and Las Vegas. Nothing in this section is an offer, a solicitation, or a recommendation to buy or sell any security.

Anthropic’s IPO, Scored: 4.1 for the Business, 1.4 for Governance

In September, I told you about the deal I turn down about twice a month: shares in a famous AI company, offered at a price I couldn’t defend.

This fall, the public gets its own version of that decision. Anthropic has filed to go public, and when it lists, anyone with a brokerage account will be able to buy in.

I’m not going to tell you whether to. I want to show you how a disciplined investor decides, because the method works on any exciting investment.

The best example I’ve seen is a note from Venture Science, a Palo Alto research desk that scores every deal the same way before its fund will commit. It first published its Anthropic scorecard on Oct. 26 and updated it after the company’s amended filing on Nov. 2.

The scorecard

The desk asks four questions and decides how much each one counts before it looks at the answers.

The business (35% of the score): 4.1 out of 5. Revenue reached $16.96 billion last quarter, about 12 times a year earlier. The desk calls growth at that size without precedent.

The shares (25%): 2.7. How many shares trade, and how many more are coming. That includes a planned issue of new shares for public-benefit purposes worth about 5% of the company, which shrinks everyone else’s slice.

Governance (25%): 1.4. A trust elects most of the company’s directors, and one share held by the founders carries 50.1% of the vote. Anthropic built that structure to keep its mission in charge. For an outside shareholder, it also means very little say over who runs the company.

The balance sheet (15%): 1.8. The filing lists $895.4 billion of committed spending, mostly on computing power, about 13 times last quarter’s revenue at an annual pace. The company holds $146.6 billion of cash and credit.

Put together, the desk says it clears its own pass mark in the base case, though by less than it did two weeks earlier. In a bad case, where the price of using its AI falls another 40% and customers don’t use more of it, it falls below the line.

Its verdict is “conditionally allocatable”: only at a price that pays for the risks, and sized with care.

What I take from it

1. The business and the deal get separate scores. Revenue growth like this is extraordinary, and governance scored 1.4. Both are true at the same time. Most investors only look at the first one.
2. The weights come first. The desk decided the business counts for 35% before it looked at a single number. If you set your weights after you’ve fallen for a company, you’ll weight whatever you like about it.
3. The bad case is the most useful number on the page. It tells you how much has to go wrong before the deal fails your own test. The latest quarter showed why it matters: quarterly growth slowed to 47%, from 144% in the quarter before, and a $974 million operating profit turned into a $567 million loss as the company bought extra computing power at short notice.
4. Price is one of the criteria. The same company can be a yes at one price and a no at another. Anthropic hasn’t set a price range yet, so nobody knows which this one will be.

A great company and a good investment are two separate questions, and the price you pay connects them.

Score your next exciting idea

Before your next investment that you can’t stop thinking about, try this.

First, write four questions that matter to you, and give each a weight that adds up to 100.

Second, score the investment from 1 to 5 on each, as fairly as you can.

Third, pick a pass mark before you add it up.

Fourth, rescore it in a bad case. If it only passes when things go well, you’ve learned how much you’re betting on things going well.

Yesterday, I showed you how 12 good companies can add up to one bet. This is the step before that: making sure each company is good at the price you’re paying.

Write the scorecard before you meet the company.

- Maxwell Nee

Chairman & Founder, Family Office Insider | Inflection Club

This is not a recommendation to buy, sell or avoid Anthropic or any other security, and the Inflection Club is not offering it. Scores and conclusions are Venture Science’s. Financial figures come from Anthropic’s amended S-1 filing; valuation figures are press reports, and no price range has been set. Nothing here is advice.

Want More From Max and the Inflection Club?

The club’s two days in Vegas are for members. Its podcast is for everyone.

On YouTube, the Inflection Club shares conversations about investing at the inflection point, including an episode with Decentralized Masters co-founder Salim Elhila. It’s free, and it’s the closest you can get to the room without being in it.

Watch the Inflection Club on YouTube →

The Inflection Club is a private club for accredited Decentralized Masters members. Nothing here is an offer, a solicitation, or a recommendation.

Final Thought

The Inflection Club wraps up this afternoon. Tomorrow evening, Ocean’s DM opens at the Bellagio.

In markets, the Treasury sells $25 billion of 30-year bonds at 1 p.m. ET today, the bond market’s first big test after its Veterans Day break.

Every day this week has come back to one habit: decide what counts before the moment arrives.

The scorecard Max walked through does that for a single company. Tomorrow, we’ll show you how a room full of investors does it for a whole portfolio.

See you then.

- Rami Al-Sabeq

Editor in Chief | Future Finance

Want a Seat at the Table Next Time?

Ocean’s DM opens tomorrow evening at the Bellagio. It’s for Decentralized Masters members, and so is every live event we run.

Membership starts with the ABN Incubator, where new members learn the system our members use to build their portfolios, with a written plan for what to do before the market forces a decision.

If this week’s idea of practicing decisions before you need them made sense to you, this is where that practice starts.

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Disclaimer: This content is not financial advice, it is for informational purposes only. All investments involve inherent risk. Any financial decisions you make are solely your responsibility.