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Happy Wednesday to everyone except Nvidia, which is certainly nursing a hangover. The company dropped 5.47% on Tuesday following more revelations about Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang and his mistress Alice Huang, who has been accused of being a Chinese spy.

One of those revelations included a report stating that Alice Huang's relationship with Jensen Huang helped facilitate at least $7.5 billion worth of chip sales to Megaspeed, where Alice Huang worked as an executive. The US Commerce Department was investigating allegations that Megaspeed was smuggling banned Nvidia chips into China late last year before Nvidia intervened, halting the investigation.

Not everything is doom and gloom in AI land, though. All you have to do is look over at Anthropic, which launched its IPO roadshow on Tuesday. The company plans to sell 825 million shares of Class A common stock at between $70 and $78 per share.

Anthropic's founders are expected to cash out at about $250 million each from selling a part of their shares. Oh happy days!

Let's get started.

— Jody Serrano

/ In today’s Brief
/ The Big Story

The news: There's something very strange about the Nvidia Chinese spy sex scandal (I can't believe I actually wrote that). When a CEO or high-level executive is accused of possible misconduct, they are usually put on leave while an investigation takes place.

This did not happen with Jensen Huang, who remains CEO of Nvidia. In fact, after Huang admitted to cheating on his wife with an alleged Chinese spy, there was a chorus of high-profile voices, from Bill Ackman and Shaun Maguire to Elon Musk and President Trump, who said there was no problem with him continuing to lead the company.

On Tuesday, analyst Dan Ives literally put a number on Huang's value to Nvidia, saying the company would be worth about 25-30% less if he were removed as CEO. Given that Nvidia currently has a market cap of over $4 trillion, that means a potential ouster of Huang could cost the company about $1.2 trillion.

The takeaway: It's easy to see why these powerful figures would essentially say "nothing to see here." Nvidia is the linchpin of the US AI industry and the key to the country's global AI dominance. As such, a blow to Nvidia via the removal of Huang would be felt across the industry and, indeed, across the world.

/ The Under-the-Radar Story

The news: Anthropic is ramping up its effort to make itself ubiquitous in the workplace. On Tuesday, the company announced the release of new AI-focused work software: Claude Sheets, Claude Whiteboards, and Claude Meetings.

Claude Sheets appears to be Anthropic's version of Microsoft Excel and Google Sheets, while Claude Whiteboards is like Google Docs. Besides providing a collaborative digital whiteboard for team members to use together for tasks like brainstorming, Claude Whiteboards also summarizes the contents. Lastly, Claude Meetings is a video call assistant that takes notes and updates company documents during calls.

Anthropic released the suite of office tools days before its anticipated IPO, which is already seeing heavy demand, the Financial Times reports. According to the FT, the company's bankers are considering increasing Anthropic's IPO price after strong interest from investors, possibly raising its IPO valuation to $1.5 trillion or more.

The company is aiming to raise as much as $64.4 billion in its IPO.

The takeaway: Nothing sets up an IPO quite like releasing products aimed at industry heavyweights like Microsoft and Google. The launch shows investors that Anthropic still has several ideas up its sleeve and more room to grow. With the success of Claude Code among developers, Anthropic also has the track record to back up this new incursion into productivity software in the workplace.

/ The OpenAI Story

The news: OpenAI reported lackluster results in the third quarter, providing a stark contrast to rival Anthropic as the latter prepares to rake in money in an IPO expected to debut on Nov. 19.

According to the Wall Street Journal, which obtained access to OpenAI's Q3 financials, the Sam Altman-led company grew revenue by roughly 50% to $10 billion compared to the second quarter. While OpenAI's operating margin purportedly improved from -150% to -109% in the period, it reported adjusted operating losses of $10.9 billion, a slight increase from $10.1 billion in Q2.

Comparatively, Anthropic's revenue rose about 47% to $17 billion in the third quarter with an operating loss of $567 million for the period.

The takeaway: OpenAI has always suffered from a lack of focus compared to Anthropic. Anyone remember Sora? Dead. What about OpenAI's app store? Meh. Meanwhile, Anthropic has always been laser-focused on enterprise customers and prioritized building products for that audience first instead of the general public.

/ Chart of the Day
Quote of the Day

“If the C.E.O. doesn’t do his job according to 12 or 15 board members, the C.E.O. is let go... there will never be one like me, and the reason for that is because I was raised by the company.”

— Jensen Huang in an interview in January 2026

The New York Times examines the relationship Nvidia’s board has with Jensen Huang, the company’s CEO. Some experts believe it wouldn’t be easy to pick someone inside Nvidia to replace Huang, even temporarily.
Read more →

/ What We’re Reading

The AI Safety Debate Has Lost the Plot. We Asked 10 Experts What the Real Nightmares Are

All 7 Anthropic founders will each cash out about $250M in IPO

Student Game Development Competition Shut Down Because Kids Kept Submitting AI Slop

Grok Build coding agent leaks oodles of confidential info, some belonging to SpaceXSI

Nvidia loses ground in Washington chip fight after CEO spy scandal

Anthropic sets IPO price range of $70 to $78, looks to start trading Nov. 19, sources say

Scoop: Commerce's Lutnick was sent warning on Nvidia CEO affair

OpenAI Continues to Suffer Heavy Losses as Revenue Rises to $10 Billion

Prepare for the AI Apocalypse Like You’d Prepare for a Snowstorm

AI has made it ‘close to impossible’ to assess university coursework, regulator says

/ The AI Trade

▼ Nasdaq

25,065.87

-0.74%

▼ S&P 500

7,520.93

-0.38%

▼ Nvidia

168.89

-5.47%

▼ Alphabet (A)

287.38

-0.27%

▼ Microsoft

533.16

-2.20%

▲ SpaceX

143.09

+0.72%

— Meta

641.39

+0.00%

▲ Amazon

270.87

+1.48%

▼ Micron

725.11

-1.10%

*Stock data as of yesterday’s market close. For informational purposes only, not investment advice.

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That’s it for today, folks! Have a good one.

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