Cramer Backs Akamai After $11.6 Billion Anthropic Deal as AI Traffic Lifts Internet Infrastructure
Updated
Updated · CNBC · Oct 1
Cramer Backs Akamai After $11.6 Billion Anthropic Deal as AI Traffic Lifts Internet Infrastructure
1 articles · Updated · CNBC · Oct 1
Summary
$11.6 billion in Anthropic capacity commitments over seven years is the key reason Jim Cramer says Akamai is a buy now, arguing the stock gave back too much of its initial post-deal jump.
Akamai trades at less than 16 times expected 2026 earnings, making it the cheapest of Cramer's three AI-traffic plays and, in his view, leaving investors effectively getting the Anthropic partnership for free.
AI agents are driving a surge in web traffic that benefits content-delivery and edge-network operators such as Akamai, Cloudflare and Fastly, whose systems keep sites fast and reliable.
Cloudflare shares are up 78% this year and Fastly 159%, but Cramer says both are too expensive for fresh buying now—about 279 times and 50 times expected earnings, respectively—despite strong AI-related momentum.