Analysed 3k+ AI thought leaders posts for Q2

Anthropic surpassed OpenAI as the most valuable AI company at $965 billion, while three major AI conglomerates—Anthropic, OpenAI, and SpaceX—filed for IPOs within weeks. The quarter saw circular financing among AI firms, with Anthropic paying xAI $1.25 billion monthly for compute and committing $200 billion to Google Cloud, raising concerns about unsustainable capex and unproven returns.

AI Became a Capital Event Anthropic passed OpenAI at $965 billion. Three of the largest IPOs in history filed within weeks. And the same handful of companies started paying each other in circles. Anthropic spent the quarter winning. In April, Claude Opus 4.7 https://venturebeat.com/technology/anthropic-releases-claude-opus-4-7-narrowly-retaking-lead-for-most-powerful-generally-available-llm retook the crown for the most powerful model anyone could use. In early May, Dario Amodei revealed revenue had grown 80-fold in a single quarter https://www.cnbc.com/2026/05/06/anthropic-ceo-dario-amodei-says-company-crew-80-fold-in-first-quarter.html to a $44 billion run-rate. On May 28 it raised $65 billion at a $965 billion valuation https://www.reuters.com/business/anthropic-raises-65-billion-now-valued-965-billion-2026-05-28/ — passing OpenAI as the most valuable AI company on earth — and three days later filed confidentially to go public https://www.axios.com/2026/06/01/anthropic-ipo-openai . It wasn't alone at the door. Within weeks, OpenAI filed at $852 billion https://www.cbsnews.com/news/openai-files-confidential-initial-public-offering/ and SpaceX — parent of xAI — priced what analysts called the biggest IPO ever https://www.tradingkey.com/analysis/stocks/us-stocks/261957856-spacex-ipo-at-135-what-the-s-1-financials-actually-say-tradingkey . SpaceX listed June 12 at $135 a share https://techcrunch.com/2026/06/16/spacex-to-acquire-cursor-for-60b-in-stock-days-after-blockbuster-ipo/ , raced past $200, and added close to $1 trillion in value over a long weekend — on the strength of a pitch claiming a $28 trillion total addressable market , including $22.7 trillion in “enterprise applications,” a single line item larger than the GDP of any country on Earth. Days later it used the inflated stock to buy Cursor for $60 billion. “The floodgates for the IPO market are officially open — with three major AI conglomerates set to go public.” Wedbush Securities https://www.cbsnews.com/news/openai-files-confidential-initial-public-offering/ , on the Anthropic / OpenAI / SpaceX filings The strangest part was the shape of the money: the same companies had begun financing one another in loops. SpaceX's own S-1 revealed that Anthropic had agreed to pay xAI $1.25 billion a month https://techcrunch.com/2026/05/20/anthropic-will-pay-xai-1-25-billion-per-month-for-compute/ — over $40 billion through 2029 — to rent compute that existed only because Grok's usage had fallen, freeing servers xAI now sells to its rival. Anthropic separately committed $200 billion to Google Cloud https://www.usnews.com/news/top-news/articles/2026-05-05/anthropic-commits-to-spending-200-billion-on-googles-cloud-and-chips-the-information-reports while Google invested up to $40 billion back into Anthropic https://techcrunch.com/2026/04/24/google-to-invest-up-to-40b-in-anthropic-in-cash-and-compute/ ; Amazon added $25 billion https://www.cnbc.com/2026/04/20/amazon-invest-up-to-25-billion-in-anthropic-part-of-ai-infrastructure.html . Money left one frontier lab, arrived at another, and came home as a customer. Not everyone was buying it. Our expert community kept circulating the bear case from four directions: Why it matters The capex is real and booked; the returns still aren't. Why it matters The core ROI pitch — automation as savings — may be backwards. Why it matters Demand built on FOMO unwinds fast when budgets tighten. Why it matters When the most-watched macro investor says it out loud, allocators listen. Then, on one Friday in early June, the market asked the question out loud. After Broadcom's outlook disappointed and a hot jobs report stoked rate fears, Nvidia fell about 6% and dipped below a $5 trillion valuation https://aiweekly.co/issues/wall-street-cant-agree-if-the-ai-bubble-just-burst , dragging Micron, AMD, and Marvell with it. We argued it was as much about bonds as about AI — but the bears' case had stopped sounding rhetorical. Q3 Watch How these IPOs price once public investors — not private ones — get to vote on $22.7-trillion slides and revenue that arrives from your own compute customers. We covered this Anthropic files for an IPO. NVIDIA ships its stack. https://aiweekly.co/issues/anthropic-files-for-an-ipo-nvidia-ships-its-stack · SpaceX wants $80 billion. OpenAI wants a trillion. https://aiweekly.co/issues/spacex-wants-80-billion-openai-wants-a-trillion