Traders bet on Anthropic’s IPO with leveraged crypto contracts

Anthropic hasn’t commented, but warns anyone selling forward contracts or tokenized shares pre-IPO is likely offering something worthless. It hasn’t said if that covers perpetuals.

The hit

Anthropic’s IPO is still weeks away, but traders are already betting on it with borrowed money, according to CoinDesk. Two perpetual contracts on the decentralised exchange Hyperliquid, Entropy’s ANTH & trade.xyz’s ANT, let traders speculate on the company’s valuation & share price. ANT carries up to 10-times leverage & fell about 20% in its first hour of trading. Neither contract delivers shares or any claim on Anthropic.

Why it matters

These are side bets, not ownership. Winners get paid by losers on the other side of the trade, not by Anthropic. Thin liquidity can lead to volatile pricing, according to CoinDesk, & the operator sets the starting price & can halt trading. The leverage on ANT means a 10% move against a position wipes out the collateral behind it.

The record

ANT contract debut	Opened near $138, fell to around $110 within hours (Hyperliquid data)
Open interest on ANT	$2.2m on $8.7m of volume (Hyperliquid)
Anthropic valuation implied by ANTH	Around $1.9 trillion at a reading near 1,880 (CoinDesk)
Last confirmed valuation	$965 billion post-money, Anthropic’s May private round
Expected IPO pricing	19-20 November, per Fox Business; trade.xyz’s own listing estimate is 20 November

What happens next

Trade.xyz’s ANT contract is due to convert into a standard perpetual tracking Anthropic’s listed stock after the IPO. If the listing slips, a 60-day grace period runs to 19 January 2027.

Sources: Traders are already placing leveraged bets on Anthropic’s IPO using crypto contracts

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