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This fund emerged a few days after Anthropic submitted a draft AI security bill to legislators. According to this draft, the government would be able to prevent models that pose risks and could lead to over 50 deaths or injuries, or cause losses exceeding $1 billion.

Anthropic indicates that: “Anthropic Public Benefit Fund will have greater flexibility and scale, allowing us to advance our mission in new ways: for example, we may explore making large donations to traditional non-profit organizations or distributing funds directly to specific groups of people.” The company stated that it has committed $200 million to researching this matter.

Americans are uneasy about the development speed of AI: A poll conducted by AP-NORC at the end of September found that 64% of American adults believe this technology is developing too fast, while 8% think it is developing too slowly.

The fund is established as a wholly-owned LLC, rather than a non-profit organization. Anthropic indicates that this gives it more flexibility when switching between different types of donations. The board of directors may increase the shareholding by another 2% when the company's valuation rises by 50% above an undisclosed benchmark, and none of the fund's equity may be used for lobbying or political donations.

Elon Musk clearly doesn't want to share the spotlight with others. He advocates for "high incomes for all" ( Universal High Income , not Universal Basic Income ) and wrote on X that he would give a portion of his SpaceX shares to every child in the United States. "These will be among the first batch," he added.

This move by Anthropic comes from the background of a company whose CEO wrote in January, "By 2026, we will be quite close to real danger." This company is also known for promoting AI doomsday theories while simultaneously advancing technological development at full speed, and has launched the most powerful AI model on the market.

Two days before the announcement of this fund, Anthropic quietly submitted their own AI security bill draft to legislators. The draft states that if a model becomes uncontrollable by humans through biological weapons, AI, or through cyberattacks, posing a foreseeable and imminent risk that could lead to more than 50 deaths or serious injuries, or cause losses exceeding 1 billion US dollars, the government may prevent its release.

Any prohibitions must be mandated by orders from the Department of Commerce and federal courts, and developers are also required to release security frameworks and transparency reports for the new models. Anthropic indicates that this bill reflects their Advanced AI Framework; since June, this framework has been promoted to legislators. June is also the month when CEO Dario Amodei called for the establishment of binding rules for cutting-edge models—i.e., the most powerful AI systems.

Critics of Anthropic include investors, former White House AI tsar David Sacks. On X, when recalling the company's promises, he wrote: "You put 20% of the equity into a LCC. Whether it truly serves the public interest remains to be seen."

Anthropic indicates that the fund's governance structure and valuation threshold will be announced in the coming months, while IPO may arrive as early as November.