The 'Claude Effect': How Anthropic's AI Triggered a Selloff in British Tech Giants

# The 'Claude Effect': How Anthropic's AI Triggered a Selloff in British Tech Giants

When the FTSE 100 is steadily heading toward record highs, it is easy to miss a quiet disaster unfolding in one corner of the British stock market. It has been dubbed the "Claude crash", after Anthropic's AI assistant, which recently gained specialised legal tools. At first glance this looks like a routine update to an AI product, but for investors it has become a symbol of an existential crisis: the moment when artificial intelligence starts eating into the profits of some of Britain's most successful companies. At the centre of the panic are corporations that have long dominated data and information services: Relx, London Stock Exchange Group, Experian, Sage and Informa.

To grasp the scale of what is happening, remember that these companies built their businesses on a simple but powerful idea: they control access to specialised data and analytics that lawyers, financiers and analysts are willing to pay tens of thousands of dollars a year for. Relx, for example, owns LexisNexis, a platform that no serious lawyer in the English-speaking world can do without. That position generated enviable margins of 40-50 percent.

But now Claude has gained tools that can analyse case law, prepare legal memoranda and draft statements of claim. For free. Or almost free.

The market's fear is justified: if AI can replicate this functionality in other fields, a whole industry of information services will be under threat.

Investors reacted swiftly and ruthlessly. Relx shares fell, as did those of its competitors. Analysts began recalculating their financial models, shaving several points off margin forecasts. It seemed the era of easy profits for companies sitting on a goldmine of specialised information was over. Yet Relx management did something interesting: instead of panicking or taking a defensive tone, the company continued its share buyback programme. The decision shows top management's confidence in the long-term resilience of the business, despite short-term market jitters.

In fact, the situation is more nuanced than it looks. Yes, Claude and other LLMs can handle basic analytical tasks, but most of the value Relx's clients pay for lies not in raw data but in how it is structured, verified and kept up to date, and in the expertise built into the platform. Replacing a human lawyer with ChatGPT or Claude for critical work is an idea that serious clients will not entertain. But some of the work that junior staff used to do really may disappear or become much simpler.

Nevertheless, the "Claude crash" reflects real tension between the traditional data economy and the fast-developing world of large language models. Companies like Relx cannot simply ignore the threat and count on the stability of their old business models. They will have to adapt: either integrate their own LLMs into their platforms or take a hard look at where the unique value of their services actually lies. Relx's decision to keep buying back its own shares is not just a financial manoeuvre but a show of faith that adaptation is possible. The future will show how well-founded that confidence is.