Talk about return on investment. Amazon’s bet on Anthropic looks like a big win, at least on paper.
The cloud giant disclosed Friday that it holds $45.8 billion in convertible debt and $14.8 billion in non-voting preferred stock from the AI startup. Putting these numbers together shows that Amazon’s Anthropic stock is currently worth $60.6 billion.
Amazon has invested $8 billion in Anthropic since the end of 2023, representing a 7x increase in value. If proven, this would rank among the most profitable strategic technology investments the company has disclosed to date.
The two companies have a deep commercial partnership. Anthropic has committed to purchasing 1 million of Amazon’s Trainium chips, bringing one of its leading AI labs closer to Amazon Web Services.
Anthropic last raised $13 billion in September at a post-money valuation of $183 billion, following a $3.5 billion round in March that valued the company at $61.5 billion. The AI startup is negotiating a new funding round that would raise its valuation to $350 billion.
Once Anthropic raises additional capital, Amazon’s convertible debt will be converted into preferred stock. So every time a startup closes a round, Amazon gains valuable new shares from one of the most popular AI companies on the planet.
Some of the upside is already trickling down to Amazon’s bottom line. Amazon recorded an additional $7.2 billion upward adjustment to other income in the third quarter as the 2025 conversion recognized an approximately $5.6 billion gain and increased Anthropic’s valuation.
An Amazon spokesperson told Business Insider that the value of the company’s Anthropic stock increased from $38.5 billion in the third quarter to $60.6 billion in the fourth quarter. The company expects to record an additional $15 billion in “other income” in the first quarter as some of the bonds will be converted into non-voting preferred stock, the spokesperson added.
Amazon also clarified that these ratings are based on “significant judgment.” The company classifies the convertible debt as a “Level 3” asset, which means its value is based on unobservable inputs and Amazon’s own assumptions rather than market prices, the company disclosed.
This is common among stocks of emerging companies that don’t have securities that regularly trade on liquid public markets. That’s the purpose of the IPO, and Anthropic is reportedly aiming to go public this year.
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