CMC Markets has started selling UK clients options tied to Anthropic’s expected share price before the artificial intelligence company lists, it said today (Saturday). CMC described itself as the first UK-regulated broker to offer options on pre-IPO grey markets.
Clients can buy calls and puts, and the premium paid is the most they can lose, according to CMC. The pre-IPO contracts other brokers opened on Anthropic in recent weeks are leveraged contracts for difference, priced two different ways at ThinkMarkets and Pepperstone.
Anthropic filed for a Nasdaq listing on October 26. Since then, the race to sell UK retail investors some form of exposure has drawn brokers, a crypto exchange and the company’s own share offer.
London’s trading industry is coming home!
How the Options Settle
The options are European-style and cash-settled. If Anthropic lists before an option expires, the contract settles against the official closing price of the listed shares, CMC said. If it has not listed, settlement uses the grey market price.
The product builds on the grey market spread bets and CFDs CMC first offered on SpaceX in May, which are leveraged and roll into ordinary share positions once a company trades. CMC clients traded an estimated $451 billion a month over the two quarters to September, FM Intelligence’s broker volumes data show.
Laurence Booth, global head of markets at CMC Markets, presented the options as a way into companies that retail clients usually cannot reach before a listing.Laurence Booth, Global Head of Markets at CMC Markets
“It significantly broadens the range of opportunities available,” Booth said.
When it launched SpaceX trading, CMC had not said how it would set the grey market price. Its website now says CMC sets it from its own view of the expected listing price, using the indicative price range where one exists, valuations of comparable listed companies and market sentiment.
The price is not based on trades in private shares, and with no exchange-traded reference before a listing, the product cannot be hedged in the open market, according to the same page. Option prices add an estimate of future volatility on top.
What Each Route Gives a Retail Client
Brokers and exchanges now sell UK retail investors at least four kinds of exposure to the same listing, and they differ in what the client ends up holding.
ThinkMarkets quotes Anthropic’s value at the end of its first trading day, while Pepperstone tracks the expected opening share price. Both are leveraged CFDs, the category in which European regulators have also placed perpetual futures.
Kraken lets eligible clients request share-backed ANTx tokens, The Defiant reported this week, with no allocation guaranteed. For the shares themselves, Anthropic has named six UK platforms for a retail offer coordinated by RetailBook, a list that does not include Robinhood.
Of the four, the share offer and the tokens give the client a claim on stock. CMC’s options are the only one of the derivatives where the maximum loss is known when the trade opens.
CMC said the options are available to UK clients from Saturday, with a broader global rollout planned. Clients must pass an appropriateness assessment for both OTC options and grey market products, according to its website.