Episode summary
Anthropic will end up being a very speculative investment, says D.A. Davidson's Gil Luria
Summary
Gil Luria argues that Anthropic’s slowing revenue growth does not by itself signal a collapse in the broader AI trade. He says the key question is whether people are still using AI more, paying more for it, and likely to pay even more next year. If that remains true, he expects AI investment to continue, with Microsoft, Amazon, Google, NVIDIA, Broadcom, Micron, and AMD capturing the biggest profit pools rather than the model makers themselves.
Luria says Anthropic is “a very speculative investment” because its growth earlier this year reflected having nearly the entire enterprise market, while OpenAI later caught up and companies began mixing in open-weight models. He argues that token growth still looks strong and that the model winner matters less than the infrastructure and chip providers. He also says a successful Anthropic IPO would matter in the short term because it could sustain investment sentiment, while a weak one could pause financing.
On CoreWeave and other neoclouds, Luria says they are highly leveraged to AI demand and could go to zero if the boom disappears. He characterizes CoreWeave as the “subprime tranche” of the trade, but says the market may still be giving these firms windfall profits in the short run because compute demand remains far above supply.
Key takeaways
- Luria says Anthropic’s slowing revenue growth is not, by itself, a bearish signal for the AI industry because usage and willingness to pay are still rising.
- He expects the main AI profit pools to stay with Microsoft, Amazon, Google, NVIDIA, Broadcom, Micron, and AMD, not with model builders.
- Luria says Anthropic is “a very speculative investment” because its earlier enterprise dominance has faded as OpenAI caught up and customers added open-weight models.
- He says a disappointing Anthropic IPO could briefly disrupt AI investing, but the outcome depends heavily on pricing.
- Luria calls CoreWeave and similar neoclouds highly leveraged bets that could go to zero if AI demand rolls over.
- He says CoreWeave may still benefit near term from spot-market pricing as long as demand far exceeds supply.
Notable quotes
“ANTHROPIC WILL END UP BEING A VERY SPECULATIVE INVESTMENT. THEY MAY DO WELL, THEY MAY NOT”
How the episode opens
Even hear that. I slipped that in to try and explode your head. — I know, I know, I can't do it. — Every time. Let's start over again. — I can't. — Do it every time. I'm just trying to annoy him. — Going forward. Absolutely.
Reports last week said that Anthropic revealed slowing revenue growth when it briefed investors. But our next guest says that that slowdown doesn't necessarily signal trouble for the broader ai industry. Joining us right now is Gil Luria.
He is d.a. Davidson's head of technology research. And gil, let's just lay this out for anybody who wasn't paying attention last week.
If you look at the revenue numbers for Anthropic, in the first quarter of this year, they had $4.7 billion that grew to $11.5 billion in the second quarter. That grew to $16.8 billion in the third quarter that we just saw these numbers. That sounds like really phenomenal growth to keep seeing those billions.
But what spooked people last week is that the rate of growth is slowing and pretty drastically. You say that this is not spell the end of days for the ai trade. Why don't you lay out your thesis?
Yeah. Go back to basics. At a time of great volatility like this.
First principles. Am I using ai models more than I've ever used them before? Am I paying more than I've paid for them before?
Are people in my professional personal circles using the models more? Are they paying more for them? Are we likely to pay even more next year?
If that's all right, that means ai investments are going to continue, and that's good for your microsoft, your amazon and google, because they're going to be the ones serving it. And they're going to be buying chips primarily from nvidia, broadcom, micron.
From the episode’s captions: roughly the first two minutes, lightly cleaned. Keep watching on YouTube →
Topics
- anthropic revenue growth
- ai trade
- speculative investment
- technology research
- ai market outlook
Companies and tickers mentioned
- Anthropic
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Summary, takeaways and quote selection by Octagon. Quotes are short excerpts; the full conversation is in the episode.
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