Anthropic's international retail offering leaves out India as the AI company seeks a valuation of up to $1.4 trillion

Anthropic set a price range of $70 to $78 a share for its initial public offering (IPO), and people familiar with the plans told CNBC that trading is expected to start on November 19. At the top of the range, the sale of 825 million shares would raise about $64.35 billion. The implied valuation is about $1 trillion on shares outstanding and $1.4 trillion fully diluted. The final price has not been set.

The deal gives individual investors an unusually large share. Up to 20% of the shares may go to retail buyers in the US and other countries, depending on demand, and European and UK subscriptions run through local banks and brokers until November 18. According to Anthropic's disclosure, reported by the Economic Times, the international retail offering covers Australia, Canada, certain European Economic Area countries, Japan, Switzerland and the UK. India is not on the list. Indian retail investors would have to buy after listing, through overseas brokerage accounts under India's limits on remitting money abroad.

The exclusion matters to an Indian government that wants its own AI capacity. The Financial Times reported that New Delhi is backing the start-up Sarvam to build native models so that the world's most populous country avoids becoming a "digital colony". For Indian policymakers, the pattern is the same at both ends: US companies own the leading models, and Indian savers get access to their equity only on terms set elsewhere.

The timing is difficult. The offering is scheduled for the same week as Nvidia's first earnings without Jensen Huang and comes as Treasury yields are rising. A crypto analyst quoted in market coverage said bitcoin's next move depends partly on the IPO.