Anthropic's slowing growth could be the AI trade's latest red flag

By Christine Ji

Anthropic's revenue growth appears to be cooling as the company prepares for its public debut, further stoking investors' AI jitters

Anthropic generated $16.8 billion in third-quarter revenue, according to the Financial Times.

The artificial-intelligence trade, already under pressure from the threat of rising inflation and interest rates, may have just received another blow.

Reported new details about Anthropic's financial status ahead of its public listing are adding to the growing skepticism of the AI trade's economics. During an invite-only investor day on Wednesday, the artificial-intelligence company behind Claude shared that it generated $16.8 billion in revenue in the quarter that ended Sept. 30, up 50% from the previous quarter, according to a Financial Times report that cited people familiar with the matter.

Anthropic also reportedly said that it's been profitable on an adjusted basis for the past two quarters, and cash-flow positive for the past quarter. The company did not immediately respond to a MarketWatch request for comment.

While the numbers might seem impressive, they might not be enough to satisfy the sky-high expectations investors have priced into the AI boom. Between the first and second quarter, Anthropic's revenue grew roughly 140% - which means that the company's growth has decelerated since the beginning of the year.

In a Tuesday note prior to the investor day, Jefferies desk-based analyst Jeffrey Favuzza wrote that Wall Street was likely anticipating an annual revenue run rate of least $80 billion, with the hope that it would surpass $105 billion by year-end. In August, Reuters reported that Anthropic's annual revenue run rate topped $65 billion.

Anthropic's reported growth deceleration comes as the company plans to spend over $500 billion on chips and infrastructure over the next decade, according to a Reuters story from last month.

Meanwhile, shares of memory-chip makers like Samsung (KR:005930) and SK Hynix (SKHY) are experiencing a sharp downturn, weighing down South Korea's KOSPI Composite Index KR:180721. The KOSPI index has fallen over 16% in the past five trading sessions.

Samsung and SK Hynix shares are both sharply lower in Korean trading early Thursday morning.

Memory stocks saw an aggressive run-up in May and June as soaring demand for high-bandwidth memory in data centers boosted chip makers' pricing power.

However, the "Big Three" chip makers - Samsung, SK Hynix and Micron (MU) - are facing a threat from Chinese memory provider ChangXin Memory Technologies CXMT (CN:688825), which announced plans earlier this week to roll out next-generation memory architecture by year-end. The new 4F(2) technology would allow CXMT to pack 30% to 50% more memory cells per wafer, lowering costs and threatening to undercut rivals.

While concerns over CXMT could definitely play a part in this week's tech selloff, Favuzza said that Anthropic's investor day was likely the biggest source of uncertainty in the market.

Also: Chip stocks suffer worst stretch in 16 months as AI fatigue grips the market

-Christine Ji

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10-14-26 2107ET