Anthropic says it has entered into purchase commitments and leases with an aggregate committed spend of approximately $895.4 billion, according to the amended Form S-1 it filed with the SEC on Monday, 2 November. By our tally of each company’s latest SEC filing, that is more than the $810.3 billion of fixed commitments Meta reports and less than Alphabet’s $1,076.8 billion.
The comparison was posted on X on Monday by ZeroHedge, whose chart is titled “A $33bn-revenue startup now has more off-balance-sheet commitments than META”. We rebuilt it from the filings. For the six companies we checked, counting guarantees and venture exposure the way the chart appears to, our totals land within about 5% of its labels. We did not check its Nvidia, Broadcom and SpaceX bars. The ranking, though, depends on a date difference the chart’s source line notes: Anthropic’s figure includes commitments signed after 30 September.
Fixed commitments not recorded on the balance sheet in each company’s latest SEC filing, in billions of dollars. Anthropic’s figure is its stated aggregate and includes commitments signed after 30 September; counted only to 30 September it is $788.6 billion. Totals are our arithmetic from Anthropic’s Form S-1/A and the companies’ 10-Q and 10-K filings. Chart: FourWeekMBA.
The key insight: Anthropic’s amended S-1 puts its aggregate committed spend at approximately $895.4 billion, more than the $810.25 billion of fixed commitments in Meta’s latest 10-Q and less than Alphabet’s $1,076.8 billion, by our arithmetic; counted only to 30 September, Anthropic’s figure is $788.6 billion.
Anthropic’s S-1/A says that “as of and subsequent to September 30, 2026, we have entered into purchase commitments and lease agreements, including short-term commitments, as well as leases not yet commenced, with an aggregate committed spend of approximately $895.4 billion”.
Alphabet’s 10-Q for the quarter to 30 September lists $924.4 billion of material purchase commitments, of which $802.1 billion relates to multi-year commitments, plus $130.5 billion for leases not yet commenced and $21.9 billion of future funding commitments for equity investments. That is $1,076.8 billion by our arithmetic. Alphabet also lists $75.7 billion of backstop obligations and $22.8 billion of financial guarantees as contingent commitments, which we leave out.
Meta’s 10-Q lists $454.52 billion of non-cancelable contractual commitments and approximately $355.73 billion of leases not yet commenced, or $810.25 billion. Its unconsolidated data center ventures add a maximum exposure that includes $41.49 billion of residual value guarantees, $18.48 billion of lease commitments and $3.70 billion of future funding commitments, which we show separately as contingent.
Microsoft’s 10-Q puts its leases not yet commenced at $364.6 billion. Its purchase and construction commitments, $194.06 billion and $34.57 billion, come from its annual report for the year to 30 June, the latest figures we found for them. Together that is $593.2 billion. Amazon’s 10-Q table gives $164.92 billion of leases not yet commenced, $159.64 billion for property and equipment, $94.76 billion of unconditional purchase obligations and $18.99 billion of other commitments, or $438.3 billion.
Oracle’s 10-Q for the quarter to 31 August lists $288 billion of additional lease commitments and $34.15 billion of unconditional purchase and certain other obligations, or $322.2 billion.
Commitments not recorded on the balance sheet in each company’s latest SEC filing, in billions of dollars: purchase and other fixed commitments, leases not yet commenced, Anthropic’s commitments signed after 30 September, and contingent items shown separately and excluded from the labels. Totals are our arithmetic. Sources: Anthropic Form S-1/A (2 Nov 2026); Alphabet, Meta, Microsoft, Amazon and Oracle 10-Qs; Microsoft FY2026 10-K.
Business Pill · A Cost Test
A Business Pill on testing what a cost commitment really obliges a company to pay.
What Was Posted on X
Anthropic off-balance sheet liabilities vs Hyperscalers
ZeroHedge posted this chart on Monday, titled โA $33bn-revenue startup now has more off-balance-sheet commitments than METAโ, with labels of $1,059 billion for Alphabet, $901 billion for Anthropic and $866 billion for Meta. The chart is ZeroHedge’s; this piece rebuilds the six company totals we checked from the filings and notes that Anthropic’s figure includes commitments signed after 30 September.
Where the Date Difference Matters
Anthropic’s contractual obligations table, as of 30 September, lists $313.8 billion of purchase commitments and $6.2 billion of commenced leases. The filing adds approximately $17.4 billion of short-term commitments, approximately $451.2 billion of leases executed and not yet commenced, and commitments entered into after 30 September “with aggregate future minimum payment obligations of approximately $100.2 billion”.
Those components add up to $888.8 billion, close to the filing’s approximate $895.4 billion. Without the $100.2 billion signed after 30 September, Anthropic’s figure is $788.6 billion, which would sit just below Meta’s $810.25 billion, by our arithmetic. The S-1/A also leaves out arrangements without a fixed dollar commitment that it estimates at “approximately $150 billion to $175 billion”.
How Our Numbers Compare With the Chart
ZeroHedge’s chart labels Alphabet at $1,059 billion, Anthropic $901 billion, Meta $866 billion, Microsoft $594 billion, Amazon $453 billion and Oracle $322 billion, and also shows Nvidia, Broadcom and SpaceX, which we did not check. Its source line reads “Anthropic incl. post-9/30 commitments and commenced leases”. The chart appears to count Alphabet’s $802.1 billion of multi-year commitments rather than its $924.4 billion total, and to add guarantees and backstops that we list as contingent.
Rebuilding Alphabet that way gives $1,053.0 billion, about 0.6% below the chart. Adding Meta’s data center venture exposure to its fixed commitments gives $873.9 billion, about 0.9% above the chart’s $866 billion. Our Microsoft and Oracle totals match the chart within $1 billion; Amazon is about 3.2% below it.
As we read the filings, the ranking turns on dates: Anthropic’s $895.4 billion includes about $100.2 billion of commitments entered into after 30 September, while the other companies’ totals stop at their quarter-end.
As we read the ZeroHedge chart, its labels can be rebuilt from the same filings to within about 5% for the six companies we checked, once guarantees and venture exposure are counted the way the chart appears to count them.
Anthropic’s amended Form S-1
“we have entered into purchase commitments and lease agreements, including short-term commitments, as well as leases not yet commenced, with an aggregate committed spend of approximately $895.4 billion”
Three Implications
FOR IPO INVESTORS The S-1/A says approximately $213.8 billion of Anthropic’s contractual obligations relates to arrangements subject to exercisable termination rights or contingent conditions.
FOR META AND ALPHABET Their latest 10-Qs list $810.25 billion and $1,076.8 billion of fixed commitments respectively, by our arithmetic, with further contingent items listed separately.
FOR DATA CENTRE LANDLORDS Leases not yet commenced make up approximately $451.2 billion of Anthropic’s total, against $364.6 billion at Microsoft and $355.73 billion at Meta, per their filings.
The framework says: “The $1T capex cycle is being underwritten by a $1T concentrated demand commitment from two counterparties whose combined free cash flow is deeply negative.”
As we read it, Anthropic’s amended filing puts one of those counterparties’ own commitments, approximately $895.4 billion, within range of Meta’s and Alphabet’s. The framework is the owner’s argument and does not discuss this filing.
The companies define and date these figures differently. Microsoft’s purchase commitments are as of 30 June and Oracle’s figures as of 31 August; the others are as of 30 September, and Anthropic’s aggregate also covers later commitments. Alphabet’s and Meta’s purchase figures include short-term items, while Amazon’s excludes cancellable open orders. Approximately $213.8 billion of Anthropic’s contractual obligations, per its filing, relates to arrangements subject to termination rights or contingent conditions. Apart from Anthropic’s own $895.4 billion, every summed total in this piece is our arithmetic from the filings.
This Week In The AI Supercycle
Anthropic’s Reality Check, The Capital Squeeze, & The New World Order
This week’s issue: for two years the AI build-out was priced as a growthstory. This week it started being priced as a credit story.
By its own count, Anthropic now carries approximately $895.4 billion of compute and infrastructure commitments, more than Meta’s $810.25 billion and less than Alphabet’s $1,076.8 billion in their latest filings. Counted only to 30 September, Anthropic’s figure is $788.6 billion, just below Meta’s.
A note on sourcing. Anthropic figures and quotations are from its Form S-1/A filed with the SEC on 2 November 2026; Alphabet, Meta, Microsoft, Amazon and Oracle figures are from their latest 10-Q filings and Microsoft’s fiscal 2026 10-K on SEC EDGAR; the chart labels quoted are from a ZeroHedge post on X. All totals, the $888.8 billion, $788.6 billion and $1,053.0 billion figures and the percentage gaps are our arithmetic.
Gennaro Cuofano is a CRO and tech executive who has worked in AI since late 2015, starting with bringing NLP, natural-language generation, voice and chatbot products to the marketing industry. His background is in law and finance: he holds a Master's degree in Law and an International MBA with an emphasis on corporate finance (LUISS Business School and the University of San Diego, 2012), and worked as a financial analyst at a real-estate investment firm in San Diego and as an assistant controller. His work focuses on business model strategy, business engineering and, more broadly, structural analysis: how companies make money, read from their own filings. He created FourWeekMBA and leads research there and at The Business Engineer, his newsletter on AI and business strategy, with over 95,000 subscribers and more than 1,000 published analyses. His writing has also appeared on Entrepreneur (for example, How to Digitize a Family Business in Europe) and HackerNoon. Find him on LinkedIn and Substack. See how we source.
