Key Insights:
- A new report has revealed that the US government seized Anthropic shares from former FTX executives and sold them off early.
- The shares are reportedly worth between $2.6 billion and $5 billion at the current value.
- The government has yet to account for the proceeds of the seized assets or return the funds to creditors.
The US government sold shares of Anthropic after seizing them from former FTX executives. A new report by Business Insider disclosed this, noting two executives of the bankrupt crypto exchange forfeited their shares as part of their guilty plea.
The executives, FTX co-founder Nishad Singh and Alameda Research CEO Caroline Ellison, reportedly invested in the AI company.
The report does not specify how much they invested. At the same time, an FTX Historian on X claimed they had invested $50 million in exchange for a stake in the AI startup. That could be worth close to $5 billion at its current valuation.
With the disclosure, the two joined FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried, who invested $500 million in the company in 2022. Bankman-Fried’s stake was liquidated by the FTX bankruptcy estate for $1.3 billion in 2024. It’s a move that was later criticized as Anthropic’s valuation exploded.
US Government Dumped the FTX Shares Early; Missed Out on Anthropic Growth
Similar to the FTX bankruptcy estate, the US government also quickly sold off the Anthropic shares seized from the FTX executives. According to the report, the government took control of Ellisson’s stake in February 2025 and Singh’s by April of the same year.
Those shares were later sold off in the same year to existing Anthropic investors, shortly after the government took control. It is unclear how much the US Marshals sold the stake, but experts believe it would have been in the range of $250 million to $1.1 billion at the time.
While this is a sizable gain compared to the reported investment, many believe the government would have made more if it had held it. According to experts, the stake could now be worth between $2.6 billion and $5.03 billion.
This is not surprising given how the AI company has grown in valuation over the past two years. It was valued at around $965 billion during its last fundraising in May and had set a $2 trillion valuation target for its IPO.
Proceeds of Anthropic Share Sale Still With the US Government
Unsurprisingly, FTX creditors and victims have criticized the Department of Justice’s handling of the seized assets. According to the FTX Historian, there was zero transparency about the sales. The government has not disclosed anything about the sale price or the buyers.
Meanwhile, it is unclear how the US government is handling the proceeds from the sale of Anthropic shares. The DOJ usually uses forfeiture proceeds as compensation for victims.
Last year, it transferred $638 million to the FTX estate. The majority of that is coming from the sale of Bankman-Fried’s Robinhood shares. The FTX estate report also stated that it expects to receive around $400 million from the DOJ.
However, Business Insider reported that there is no indication that proceeds from Anthropic’s share sales have been sent to the estate. According to experts, the government has discretion over how to use such funds.
FTX estate has already distributed around $10 billion in repayments to creditors across five distribution rounds. However, several creditors, especially those in restricted countries, remain unpaid.
Oluwapelumi Adejumo is an experienced cryptocurrency journalist who has contributed to leading blockchain news platforms, including CryptoSlate and BeInCrypto.
