Anthropic’s possible $2T IPO puts its Long-Term Benefit Trust under the microscope

On 4 Sep 2026 Ars Technica relayed Financial Times reporting that Anthropic’s planned IPO — which could value the Claude maker at as much as $2 trillion — will force public-market scrutiny of its Long-Term Benefit Trust (LTBT). The trust holds no equity but can appoint or dismiss a majority of the board; it has seated four of seven directors (including Netflix co-founder Reed Hastings and Novartis CEO Vas Narasimhan). Current trustees include Neil Buddy Shah (chair), Ben Bernanke, and Richard Fontaine. The LTBT gets advance notice of major model launches and has weighed in on Mythos/Glasswing and automated-weapons disputes, yet has mostly acted advisory so far. Governance scholars flag a built-in tension between profit-seeking investors and mission guardians; Anthropic’s structure includes an 85% shareholder “kill switch” to fire trustees, seen as less brittle than OpenAI’s 2023 board crisis.