Private valuation swings
- Anthropic’s private shares changed hands this week at prices implying roughly a $1 trillion valuation on secondary platforms, overtaking OpenAI’s private-market mark without a new funding round or public listing. - The move repriced Anthropic from its February 2026 primary-round valuation of about $380 billion to nearly 2.6 times that level, while OpenAI traded around $880 billion on Forge Global. - Secondary markets can swing sharply because few shares trade and supply is thin, so small deals can reset headline values fast. (qz.com)
Anthropic’s private shares are trading at prices that imply a roughly $1 trillion valuation, ahead of OpenAI on the secondary market. (qz.com) That price did not come from a new fundraising round or an initial public offering. It came from secondary platforms, where existing shareholders sell stock to other private investors. (qz.com) (economictimes.indiatimes.com) Anthropic’s last primary financing valued the company at about $380 billion in February 2026. On Forge Global this week, OpenAI was trading closer to $880 billion, leaving Anthropic with the higher implied private-market mark. (qz.com) (officechai.com) Secondary markets are not the same as a priced funding round. A handful of trades in a thin market can move the quoted value because there are few willing sellers and buyers are competing for scarce stock. (decrypt.co) (qz.com) That helps explain why the gap with OpenAI flipped so quickly. OpenAI’s last major financing pegged it at about $852 billion, but recent secondary trading has been only modestly above that level. (officechai.com) (economictimes.indiatimes.com) Investors are tying Anthropic’s surge to revenue growth. Decrypt, citing recent market reporting, said Anthropic’s annualized revenue rose from about $9 billion at the end of 2025 to about $30 billion by March 2026. (decrypt.co) That revenue jump has been linked to Claude Code, Anthropic’s coding product, and to stronger demand from enterprise customers. Those figures have circulated in market reports even though Anthropic has not publicly filed audited financial statements. (decrypt.co) (economictimes.indiatimes.com)) The caution is that a secondary-market price is a signal, not a settled companywide value. Buyers in these deals are purchasing minority stakes with limited rights, and the next primary round could price the business very differently. (decrypt.co) (europesays.com) For now, the cleanest takeaway is narrower than the headline. Investors are paying more for scarce Anthropic shares this week than for scarce OpenAI shares, and that alone has been enough to redraw the private leaderboard. (qz.com)
