Advancing Claude for Financial Services (www.anthropic.com)

Anthropic unveiled a major Financial Services push for Claude: a beta "Claude for Excel" add‑in plus new real‑time data connectors and six pre‑built Agent Skills tailored to finance workflows. Claude for Excel (beta, Max/Enterprise/Teams) runs in an Excel sidebar where the model can read, create, edit and debug workbooks while preserving formula dependencies, tracking and explaining its cell‑level changes, and linking explanations to specific cells. New connectors extend live access (Aiera with Third Bridge transcripts/insights, Chronograph for PE portfolio metrics, Egnyte for governed document search, LSEG for market and macro data, Moody’s for credit and company data, MT Newswires for market news) and join prior feeds (S&P Capital IQ, Morningstar, PitchBook). Agent Skills—usable across Claude.ai, Claude Code and the API—include Comparable Company Analysis, Discounted Cash Flow (full FCF projections, WACC, scenario toggles, sensitivity tables), Due Diligence Packs (convert data room docs to Excel), earnings analysis, company teasers/profiles, and initiating coverage reports. For AI/ML practitioners and financial engineers this matters because Claude is coupling state‑of‑the‑art finance reasoning (Sonnet 4.5 topped Vals AI’s Finance Agent benchmark at 55.3% accuracy) with enterprise integrations, governed data access (MCP/Smart APIs), and automation of repetitive, error‑prone tasks. The combination of provenance‑aware Excel editing, live market and research feeds, and reusable skill folders enables faster model‑assisted valuation, diligence, and reporting pipelines while preserving auditability, security, and compliance—factors cited by customers (Citi, Coinbase, BCI, Visa, LSEG, Moody’s). Early preview rollouts will gather real‑world feedback before wider release.