Anthropic made $16.8 billion last quarter and turned a profit ahead of its IPO

At a private investor meeting in San Francisco, Anthropic reportedly said its revenue reached $16.8 billion in the third quarter, up about 45% from the second quarter. That single quarter is more than 3.6 times what the company brought in for all of 2025.

The bigger news is the bottom line. Anthropic told investors it posted an adjusted operating profit for the second quarter in a row, with an adjusted operating margin of about 11% before stock-based compensation. It earned $1.70 in revenue for every $1 it spent on computing power. Annualized revenue is estimated at around $74 billion, up from about $65 billion in July.

There is a softer side. Growth slowed from more than doubling in the second quarter, when demand for Claude Code surged, and some attendees left expecting the company to keep its valuation target in check. Talk of the IPO valuation has since drifted lower. A listing could come as soon as next month. All of these are unaudited figures from an investor presentation, not a public filing.

Our take

The story that AI labs burn cash forever just took a real hit. If a frontier lab can be profitable at this scale, pricing pressure on rivals is coming, and the IPO will set the valuation bar for everyone else.