Thrive Raises New $10B Fund | OpenAI Buys OpenClaw | Stripe at $140B: Is Adyen Wildly Undervalued?

Quick Overview

Wall Street and capital markets have overwhelmingly prioritized investments in Artificial Intelligence, exemplified by Anthropic's massive $30 billion funding round at a $380 billion post-money valuation and Thrive's new $10 billion fund, causing a significant negative sentiment and valuation depression for traditional Software as a Service (SaaS) companies.

Key Points: Anthropic raised $30 billion at a $380 billion post-money valuation, upscaling from an initial $10 billion target, which speakers noted makes any fund without an allocation to Anthropic uninteresting to 98% of venture capital. The current investment climate shows massive capital supply chasing a small, concentrated number of AI companies, as Rory noted, "This is the only play in venture" when public software stocks are down significantly. Anthropic demonstrates unprecedented growth, with one speaker stating, "You've never seen a company grow 10x in gap revenue and run rate year on year for 3 years" at this scale, achieving what is described as "escape velocity." The gravitational pull of AI investment has caused a collapse in sentiment for older SaaS companies, with one speaker observing that even 70% growth is not enough for some, leading to valuations where some trade at eight or nine times cash flow. Corporate America has decided to "will this into existence" by making large AI bets, leading to one to two years of mega AI budgets regardless of immediate ROI, driven by the current corporate agenda item of making a big AI play. Figma, despite strong current numbers (valued around 10 times revenues), is critically vulnerable because AI tools like Replet and Lovable have already stolen $300-$400 million in potential bookings from their core product prototyping use case since July/September. The pace of AI disruption is not uniform; areas closer to coding and customer support see faster eating, whereas sectors like accounting software (debits/credits/UI) are considered less adjacent to immediate AI overthrow.