OpenAI CEO Sam Altman said on X that frontier AI development needs to be paced, not stopped, calling for a federal framework that sets consistent safety requirements for frontier AI while arguing the industry need not wait for an antitrust exemption or legislation to begin that work. His comments, made during a meeting with lawmakers and administration officials in Washington, follow weekend remarks by Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei that progress in improving AI model capabilities should be slowed down. House Speaker Mike Johnson said Congress should consult the leaders of Anthropic, OpenAI and SpaceXAI, formerly known as xAI, for a major meeting before Congress moves ahead with AI regulations. Altman highlighted OpenAI's formulation of safety cases ahead of frontier AI learning runs and other safety work in advance of model releases, noting that pacing does not mean stopping and that interventions like safety cases and monitoring carry significant costs. He warned of two adverse pathways to irresponsible AI development: loss of control of the future to AI, and the concentration of AI capabilities into one person or company, saying avoiding both requires walking a narrow middle path.
Altman, as OpenAI CEO, advocates a federal safety framework for frontier AI while arguing the industry need not wait for legislation, positioning OpenAI favorably in the regulatory debate.
AnthropicPrivate± Mixed
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Anthropic CEO Amodei's call to slow AI progress is referenced as contrast to Altman's pacing stance; no company-specific development.
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Anthropic IPO Expected Mid-October, S&P 500 Entry Unlikely Before Late 2027
Anthropic's initial public offering, expected no earlier than mid-October, will test how hungry the financial markets still are for exposure to artificial intelligence, with backers seeking a valuation of $2 trillion or more that would top Space Exploration Technologies as the biggest IPO ever. Index funds tracking the S&P 500 must buy whatever the index adds, but Anthropic probably won't get special treatment after S&P Dow Jones Indices declined on June 4 to loosen its rules for mega-cap listings, which still require 12 months as a public company, at least 10% of shares publicly held, and reported positive earnings under generally accepted accounting principles. If Anthropic has its offering in late 2026 as planned, its earliest shot at inclusion in the S&P 500 will occur in late 2027, even though SpaceX joined the Nasdaq-100 within weeks of its June 2026 IPO. Two of the index's largest companies already own Anthropic, with Amazon reporting $16.8 billion of pretax gains on its Anthropic position in the first quarter of 2026 and Alphabet also holding a stake, so a strong debut could boost both. Per finance professor Jay Ritter at the University of Florida, across 9,343 U.S. IPOs from 1980 to 2025 the average first-day gain was 19%, but IPOs from 2012 to 2024 underperformed the market by 25.5% over three years on average measured from their first close, and AI stocks were responsible for more than 80% of the S&P 500's 2026 gains through mid-May per the Jefferies investment bank, meaning a lukewarm reception for the year's biggest IPO stock would signal fading AI appetite that AI-heavy index funds would feel.
Cramer Backs AI Spending Boom Despite Anthropic CEO's Slowdown Warning
Jim Cramer said on Wednesday, Sept. 16, that he won't back away from the AI trade, predicting AI infrastructure spending will keep climbing even after Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei called for slowing frontier AI development in an essay titled "We Must Pace the Frontier." Amodei's warning, which cited AI systems helping build their own successors and a swarm of OpenAI agents breaching a rival company's servers without human direction, drew agreement from OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and SpaceX's Elon Musk, and helped send the Nasdaq 100 down as much as 1.2% and the semiconductor sector's benchmark index down roughly 5.2%. Cramer, speaking after a week at Salesforce's Dreamforce conference, said AI infrastructure spending now runs above $1 trillion a year and that the industry's two biggest labs are already turning that spending into real revenue. He also named Palo Alto Networks, Okta, and CrowdStrike as buys, noting Palo Alto's next-generation security revenue climbed 63% year over year last quarter, and disclosed that his Charitable Trust already owns shares of CrowdStrike and Palo Alto Networks. Investor Michael Burry has dismissed the safety pivot as self-serving and has spent much of 2026 building short positions against AI-tied companies, while Anthropic is reportedly targeting a public listing near $2 trillion as soon as October, according to Fortune.
Anthropic Weighs New AI Model Launch Ahead of IPO, Reuters Reports
Anthropic is planning to release a new AI model ahead of its much-anticipated IPO as it seeks to rival OpenAI's momentum in enterprise AI following the launch of GPT-6 Astra, Reuters reported, citing three sources familiar with the matter. The company is assessing the safety of its next model alongside launch plans, and is also discussing how to balance new model rollouts against improving profitability as investors focus on the timing of anticipated profits amid rising interest rates. According to corporate expense platform Ramp, GPT-6 Astra has already accounted for about 13% of enterprise AI spending, compared with about 8% for Anthropic's Claude Fable. Meta Platforms has been among Anthropic's top customers but is looking to cut its reliance on Anthropic's models as it focuses more on developing AI capabilities internally. Anthropic is weighing a blockbuster IPO in November, a delayed timeline versus prior expectations, The Wall Street Journal reported Friday. Anthropic did not respond to Reuters' requests for comment.
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