Anthropic on Thursday appointed Ben Bernanke, the former chair of the Federal Reserve and a Nobel laureate in economics, to its Long-Term Benefit Trust, the company's independent oversight body.
The Long-Term Benefit Trust exists to hold Anthropic to its stated mission of developing AI for the long-term benefit of humanity. Compensation is limited to time and service; no trust member holds an equity stake in the company, and all are selected independently of Anthropic's management and investors. The trust has the authority to appoint members to Anthropic's board of directors. Bernanke is the fourth member of the body, joining Chair Neil Buddy Shah, national security expert Richard Fontaine, and international affairs expert Mariano-Florentino Cuéllar.
Ben Bernanke led the Federal Reserve from 2006 to 2014, guiding the central bank through the 2008 financial crisis. Before entering government, he spent more than two decades as an academic economist; his academic career included leading the economics department at Princeton, where he developed influential research into the causes of the Great Depression and how bank failures amplify economic downturns. The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences awarded him the Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences in 2022 in recognition of that scholarship. He is currently a Distinguished Fellow at the Brookings Institution.
Anthropic said economic analysis will be Bernanke's primary contribution to the trust, particularly helping the company track and interpret AI's effects on the broader economy.
"The potential of artificial intelligence is enormous, and so is the range of outcomes," Bernanke said in a statement. "Anthropic has created a unique governance structure to try to ensure that the long-run benefits of AI for humanity far outweigh the risks. I am honored to have this opportunity, and I will try to contribute in any way I can to this critical mission."
Anthropic Co-Founder and President Daniela Amodei said Bernanke's career — from studying how economies react to disruption to steering the world's largest economy through crisis — would help the company anticipate and respond to how advanced AI affects workforces and economies around the world.
Neil Buddy Shah, the trust's chair, said Bernanke's eight years leading the Federal Reserve and his handling of the financial crisis demonstrated "expertise, independence, and sound judgment" — the standard the trust looks for in new members.
As a Public Benefit Corporation, Anthropic is legally organized around obligations to both profitable operation and broader societal welfare. The company filed a confidential IPO prospectus with the Securities and Exchange Commission in early June, a step that could lead to one of the largest public listings in market history. Its last primary fundraising round, a Series H completed in late May, set its valuation at $965 billion.