Anthropic, the developer of Claude, reported $17.0 billion in third-quarter revenue and an operating loss of $567 million, after an operating profit of $974 million in the second quarter. Its amended IPO filing with the US Securities and Exchange Commission, submitted on Nov. 2, attributes the loss primarily to $5.0 billion of compute bought on short-term commitments and $2.0 billion of non-cash charges tied to its donation-matching program. The filing says the short-term capacity costs significantly more than comparable multi-year compute, and it does not say how much more.
What the Amended Filing Shows
Revenue reached $16.96 billion, up 46.7% from $11.56 billion in the second quarter and 1,127% from a year earlier. Quarterly growth slowed from 144% in the second quarter. Operating expenses rose to $17.5 billion from $10.6 billion, and compute and infrastructure costs climbed to $9.86 billion, or 58% of revenue, from 48% in the second quarter.
Adjusted operating income, which excludes stock-based compensation and non-cash charitable charges, rose to $2.5 billion from $2.2 billion. Adjusted operating margin still fell to 15% from 19%, and the filing attributes that decline primarily to the short-term compute. The $23.3 billion net loss sits almost entirely below the operating line, and CNBC reported that changes in the fair value of convertible notes drove most of Anthropic’s $104 billion nine-month net loss.
Why Short-Term Compute Costs More
Anthropic says it typically procures compute 12 to 18 months before it becomes available. When demand from customers or researchers runs ahead of what those contracts deliver, it buys short-term capacity. The filing says efficiency improvements in the quarter were partially offset by the delivery of additional compute, including $5.0 billion under short-term commitments that “currently costs significantly more than comparable compute procured under our multi-year commitments.” The $5.0 billion is the total spent on that capacity, not the premium over long-term rates, which the filing does not disclose.
Management expects the pressure to continue. The filing says Anthropic expects “our use of short-term compute to continue to increase in the near term and to in turn compress our operating margin and Adjusted Operating Margin.” It calls the cycle, in which compute arrives before the revenue it supports, “an inherent aspect of our business.” Enterprise IT teams know the trade from their cloud bills: reserved capacity costs less per unit than on-demand, and the buyer pays for it whether or not demand arrives.
The planned fix is a hybrid sourcing model the filing calls Anthropic Direct, which adds leased chips hosted in dedicated facilities operated on Anthropic’s behalf to its fixed-term cloud agreements. Anthropic says the flexibility lets it replace short-term compute bought during periods of high demand with more cost-effective long-term compute as that dedicated infrastructure comes online.
What the $895.4 Billion Commitment Total Shows
The filing puts Anthropic’s aggregate committed spend on purchase commitments and leases at approximately $895.4 billion, substantially all of it for compute and infrastructure. Roughly $447.5 billion falls due through 2030, including about $69.8 billion in the 12 months after Sept. 30. The filing says a significant portion of the total relates to Anthropic Direct, and that it expects Anthropic Direct to become a growing share of its compute investments. Annualizing third-quarter revenue gives roughly $68 billion, so the next 12 months of commitments roughly match a year of current revenue, and the full total is about 13 times that run rate.
Two qualifications cut in opposite directions. About $213.8 billion of the total relates to arrangements subject to exercisable termination rights or contingent conditions, such as a counterparty securing financing, facilities or regulatory approvals. Separately, the total leaves out agreements with no fixed dollar commitment, which Anthropic estimates at approximately $150 billion to $175 billion.
Cash is the cushion. Anthropic held about $131.8 billion in cash and short-term investments at Sept. 30, and the filing says it intends to fund these investments “through the revenue we generate and the capital that we raise.” It also says the build-out will be “a significant use of net cash in operating and investing activities for the foreseeable future.” Customer revenue is mostly usage-based: consumption fees made up 79% of nine-month revenue, and remaining performance obligations, the contracted revenue not yet recognized, were $13.8 billion.
Price Cuts and Supplier Financing
The filing also quantifies what price reductions cost. Between the second and third quarters, higher usage was partly offset by a decrease of approximately $600 million from price reductions introduced with new model versions and contractual discounts, against about $70 million between the third and fourth quarters of 2025. The $600 million equals about 3.5% of third-quarter revenue. The implication for buyers is that a supplier paying more for short-term capacity while cutting prices on new models may have less room to keep cutting.
The filing adds a new risk factor: some of Anthropic’s compute partners depend on third-party financing or credit support, and if that financing tightens, contracted capacity “may be delayed, repriced, reduced, or not delivered.” The commitments show where that applies. Under the largest Lambda agreement, either party may terminate if Lambda does not timely secure a facility lease. Anthropic is not alone in the squeeze: Microsoft’s CFO told investors last week that customer demand continues to exceed available supply, and Alphabet said it started using third-party compute capacity at the end of the third quarter.
The filing leaves the price range, share count and run-rate revenue as of Oct. 31 blank, so what investors will pay is still open. The fourth quarter will show whether short-term compute shrinks as dedicated capacity comes online, as Anthropic’s plan intends, or grows, as management expects in the near term.
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