I disagree that it only matters if the subsidy results in selling at a loss. Yes, some revenue is better than no revenue. But clearly the demand exists for consumption-based tokens. At its current growth rate, Anthropic could end all of its subscription offerings tomorrow and still be profitable as an enterprise by early next year. Every day that it doesn't do that, it's leaving money on the table, because it has to divert resources to less profitable subscription tokens.

Now, the reason they won't do that is because subscriptions provide a stable floor of revenue. The floor is lower than it could be because of the subsidies, and that's why they matter even if they do not bring prices down to below cost: if the growth of consumption-based spending ever slows or - heaven forbid - DROPS, Anthropic will need to cut into those subsidies to avoid a revenue slowdown, which risks sending away reliable recurring revenues (i.e., customers quitting).

Anthropic is kind of like the bus in Speed: if it stops moving it'll blow up. At least over the next 5 years, massive revenues won't be enough - it needs to sustain massive revenue GROWTH. They can pull two levers to do this: increase uptake or increase prices. So far, the "increase uptake" lever works like an infinite money glitch. But at some point, they'll need to look at the "increase prices" lever. When that happens, we will find out just how big the subsidies are.