Report: Seven Anthropic Founders to Hold 50.1 Percent of Votes Ahead of IPO
According to a report from The Information, Anthropic is seeking shareholder approval for a dual-class structure that gives the seven co-founders a majority of the votes – without the company having confirmed the proposal, and with no SEC documents filed yet.
According to The Information, Anthropic is asking shareholders to approve a two-class share structure in which the seven co-founders – including CEO Dario Amodei – collectively hold 50.1% of the votes on most company matters (Yahoo Finance). The report is dated September 24, 2026, in the middle of the run-up to an IPO that, per current reporting, is expected in late October or November. It has also been reported that the planned listing has been delayed from October to November, and that the company is said to be targeting a valuation of around $2 trillion – this, too, is media reporting, not confirmed facts from the company.
For now, everything rests on anonymous sources to The Information. Anthropic has not confirmed the proposal – the company reportedly did not respond to Reuters' requests for comment, and it is unclear whether shareholders have actually approved or rejected the arrangement (24ai.no). No proxy or prospectus documents filed with the SEC confirm the structure so far.
How the arrangement is constructed
The core is supervoting shares: a separate share class with far stronger voting rights than common shares, allowing the founders to retain majority control even if their economic ownership is diluted at listing.
According to the reporting, as relayed by Yahoo Finance, the special shares are to be held through a separate limited liability company (LLC), and voting control is to apply as long as at least three of the seven founders retain a threshold stake in the shares (Yahoo Finance). The size of this threshold stake has not been disclosed – neither The Information nor Reuters has provided concrete figures (24ai.no).
Another important detail in the reporting: the founder shares are not to carry any additional economic interest in the company. They are pure voting shares. The account connects this to the founders' individual pledges to donate 80% of their personal wealth – which, if so, would make it possible to retain strategic control while not accumulating a greater financial gain from a sale. This, too, is an account from The Information's sources, not confirmed facts (Yahoo Finance).
The interplay with the Long-Term Benefit Trust
The arrangement is not being constructed in a vacuum. Anthropic is a Delaware public benefit corporation and already has an unusual governance structure, with a Long-Term Benefit Trust that holds special Class T shares and has the right to appoint part of the board (Crypto Briefing).
According to the reporting, this system is to remain in place but be redistributed: the Trust retains the authority to appoint a majority of the seven-seat board, while the founders' appointment rights increase from two to three seats (Yahoo Finance). The account further states that employees are to receive a separate share class that can function as a tie-breaker – that is, deciding matters where the other groups are evenly split.
The picture, then, is not a classic founder power grab, but a redistribution in which three constituencies – the founders, the Trust, and the employees – together hold the strongest position, while ordinary shareholders get limited influence beyond the economic side. The comparison with Palantir, which The Information draws in the title of its article, points to the same tradition: companies engineered so that founders retain control deep into their life as publicly traded firms.
What is confirmed – and what is not
The verification status is important to keep clear:
- The original source is The Information, with the article "Anthropic Seeks Palantir-Style Voting Control for Seven Co-Founders Ahead of IPO" by Cory Weinberg, Valida Pau and Julia Hornstein (The Information). The article is behind a paywall, so the details can only be verified through secondary sources' accounts.
- Anthropic has not commented. The company reportedly did not respond to Reuters, and has not confirmed whether shareholders have approved or rejected the proposal (24ai.no).
- No SEC documentation has so far been made public confirming the structure.
- The source material also gives slightly different timelines: the listing is expected in late October or November, while it has separately been reported that the planned listing has been delayed from October to November.
The source material also states a NASDAQ listing under the ticker ANTP, and a valuation of $965 billion in May – figures that indicate how quickly the valuation discussion has reportedly moved toward the target of around $2 trillion (Yahoo Finance).
Why this matters
If approved, the arrangement would place Anthropic's listing among the most extensive founder-control arrangements in an IPO of this size. For investor protection, dual-class structures mean that those buying shares on listing day pay full price for an ownership stake without corresponding voting power – a trade-off that is especially fraught when it involves a company developing technology with societal consequences and that already has an unusual trust-based governance model.
The arrangement also illustrates a broader trend in the AI sector: founders who want to keep not only the profit motive but also the company's direction outside the market's usual influence – while using the market to raise capital. The question is how much of this balancing act the stock market will accept in practice, and on what terms.
What must happen next
Several things must be resolved before this can be treated as fact:
- The shareholder vote. It is unclear whether and when shareholders will vote, and what the outcome will be.
- SEC documents. Any proxy materials or a prospectus would provide the formal and complete description of the share classes, the threshold requirement, and the board appointments.
- The threshold requirement. As long as the stake the founders must retain is unknown, neither investors nor observers know how fragile the control requirement actually is.
- Timing. Per the reporting, the IPO is expected in late October or November, with no set date.
Until Anthropic itself confirms the proposal or documents it with the SEC, the entire matter stands as well-sourced but unconfirmed reporting.