Reuters reports that Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei earned $18 million last year as the company prepares for an IPO potentially valuing it at over $2 trillion. This compensation places him above some major tech CEOs like those at Amazon and Alphabet but below others such as Oracle’s co-CEO, who made $627.5 million. The article highlights Amodei's compensation primarily coming from stock and options awards rather than base salary, reflecting a common trend among tech founders.
Written locally by qwen2.5:14b on 2026-10-06,
using this article's own text rather than the other coverage of the
same event (that is the story summary below).
Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei made $18M last year: IPO filing
By
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Amodei → make → M
Published Oct. 6, 2026, 11:17 a.m. ET
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Dario Amodei made $18 million last year as CEO of Claude AI developer Anthropic, the company’s IPO filing shows, putting him in the middle ranks of top executives at major technology firms in terms of compensation.
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filing → publish → compensation
Anthropic is preparing for an IPO as early as this fall that could value it at more than $2 trillion, according to its IPO prospectus seen by Reuters.
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that → prepare → Reuters
Amodei’s pay last year puts him above CEOs at Alphabet and Amazon, but behind those at Oracle and Nvidia.
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pay → put → Oracle
Amodei’s pay leans heavily towards stock and other sorts of compensation, suggesting that like many other tech founders, his yearly salary will account for just a fraction of his wealth.
Stock and options awards made up the bulk of their packages in 2025, with Daniela Amodei receiving a total of $16.4 million last year.
Anthropic’s board this year granted the pair the promise of further equity in the form of restricted stock units, which promise a future payout if certain conditions are met.
Some of that is tied to their remaining at the company, and some of it is tied to the IPO.
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some → lean → IPO
Chief Financial Officer Krishna Rao earned $720,250 last year.
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Rao → earn → 720,250
He was granted options to buy 1.4 million shares when he was hired in 2024, and exercised options worth $385,285 in 2025.
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he → grant → 2025
An Anthropic spokesperson declined to comment on the figures.
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spokesperson → decline → figures
The rise in US CEO pay in recent years has far outpaced the gains for the average worker, a dynamic critics worry could be exacerbated by AI’s widespread adoption.
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critics → outpace → adoption
S&P 500 CEO average annual compensation rose 21% to $22.8 million last year, and that does not include the extraordinary case of Tesla’s Elon Musk and his $158 billion restricted stock plan, according to the AFL-CIO.
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that → rise → CIO
Courtney Yu, director of research for executive compensation data firm Equilar, said Amodei’s $18 million haul “seems on the lower end for a company valued at $2 trillion, but it will be interesting to see how that changes once the company goes public” and his full ownership stake is shown.
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stake → say → trillion
With six other co-founders, Amodei may wind up getting a lesser share of the wealth created by the IPO compared with other major tech CEOs, Yu added.
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Yu → wind → CEOs
Top executives at AI-focused tech firms earned amounts that varied widely in 2025, based on SEC filings.
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that → focus → filings
At the high end, Oracle co-CEO Clayton Magouyrk earned $627.5 million, while the lowest was the $54,080 paid to Musk as CEO of SpaceX, before it went public.
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it → earn → SpaceX
SpaceX has also promised super-voting restricted shares to Musk, already the world’s richest person, if the company’s market value grows to $7.5 trillion and the firm puts 1 million people on Mars.
Other giant companies pay less on a year-by-year basis, with executives benefiting from enormous stock ownership while having only salary and security costs reflected in annual filings.
For instance, Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai made $10.9 million in 2025, including $8.8 million for personal security “due to Sundar’s significant public profile.
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Pichai → promise → profile
By “compensation actually paid,” Pichai earned $213.9 million last year, which among other things reflects the change in value of his unvested shares.
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which → pay → shares
Amazon CEO Andrew Jassy made $2.1 million in 2025, a disclosure said, mainly reflecting travel and security.
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disclosure → make → travel
On an “actually paid” basis, Jassy received $13.2 million.
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Jassy → pay → million
Living off the stock
Equilar’s Yu said the disclosures show how these executives don’t need to worry about year-by-year pay.
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executives → live → pay
“Founder CEOs typically own enough equity that when the company does well and the stock prices increases they can just live off the wealth of the equity they already own, and typically don’t take in a lot in annual compensation,” Yu said.
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Yu → own → compensation
Anthropic said in the filing it offered a mix of salary, equity awards and other benefits.
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it → say → salary
The S-1 statement seen by Reuters does not describe the founders’ share of ownership in the company, which could be worth billions of dollars, depending on the final terms and valuation of the IPO.
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which → see → IPO
The Amodei siblings and their fellow co-founders pledged in the IPO filing to dedicate 80% of their personal Anthropic equity to charitable causes.
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siblings → pledge → causes
Asked about the 80% figure Monday, an Anthropic spokesperson noted an essay Dario Amodei posted earlier this year, where he wrote that wealthy individuals have an obligation to help address problems stemming from AI adoption, and decried that many wealthy people, particularly in the tech industry, “have recently adopted a cynical and nihilistic attitude that philanthropy is inevitably fraudulent or useless.”
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philanthropy → ask → attitude
The Aporia
