Why does Scott Galloway say Anthropic's $81 billion loss is misleading?

Scott Galloway told Pivot listeners to look past the roughly $81 billion net loss in Anthropic's filing, because about $72 billion of it is an accounting charge. When convertible bonds turn into shares, the company must book that conversion as a loss even though the debt disappears from its balance sheet. He argues that a business growing four or five times a year at high margins should reach real profitability.

• Convertible bonds pay below-market interest but let lenders swap their debt for equity if the stock rises.
• Computing infrastructure cost Anthropic $9 billion in the first half of 2026, more than the $7.3 billion it spent in all of 2025.

▸In their words

“$72 billion of that loss was the accounting loss you have to take when you take a convertible bond and convert it to equity.” Scott Galloway · at 31:07 — open in the transcript →

Source: our own transcription of the episode. The full conversation is on Pivot (2026-10-27). Read the whole episode summary →

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