OpenAI leans toward 2027 IPO as SpaceX volatility and valuation concerns reshape public listing timeline

OpenAI hasn't held pre-IPO investor meetings or set timeline yet, sources say

OpenAI is reportedly delaying its IPO: Here's what you need to know OpenAI hasn't yet held pre-IPO meetings to discuss potential pricing and demand, or outlined an official timeline for the listing, according to sources familiar with the company's plans. Those meetings to test the waters with investors will likely start once the artificial intelligence company has a better sense of timing, said the people, who asked not to be named because the details are not public. OpenAI said it confidentially filed its prospectus with the Securities and Exchange Commission earlier this month, a promising signal for investors who are eager to jump into AI. But the company has repeatedly tried to temper expectations about when it will hit the public markets, writing in a post on X that it "may be a while." The New York Times reported on Thursday that OpenAI is leaning towards a 2027 IPO. The company did not immediately respond to CNBC's request for comment. The speculation over OpenAI's plans come after Elon Musk's SpaceX made a historic debut earlier this month, minting him as the world's first trillionaire. The stock has had a volatile first two weeks, and shares were mostly flat during intraday trading on Friday. OpenAI's chief rival, Anthropic, has also confidentially filed its prospectus with regulators, but it has not disclosed an official timeline. The company's CEO, Sam Altman, told CNBC earlier this month that OpenAI will IPO when it makes sense. "I think there is a race to deliver the best technology and build the best business, but, you know, going public is a financing event, and I don't think that's one that we're focused on the timing of," Altman said. CNBC's David Faber contributed to this report.

OpenAI Leans Toward Holding Up I.P.O. Until Next Year

Rob Copeland reported from New York, and Mike Isaac from San Francisco. OpenAI is leaning toward holding off its initial public offering until next year, three people involved in the company's deliberations said, a turnabout that punctuates the uncertain future for fast-rising artificial intelligence giants. The maker of ChatGPT hired bankers and lawyers with an eye toward a public offering as soon as the third or fourth quarter of this year, the people said. Sam Altman, the company's chief executive, pushed those advisers to find a way for the start-up to be valued at $1 trillion, up from the company's last private valuation of $730 million, according to the people involved, who did not want to be named because they were not permitted to speak publicly about internal deliberations. But a cascade of recent developments has caused OpenAI's executives to shift away from their most aggressive aspirations. Top of mind is what has happened to Elon Musk's SpaceX after its I.P.O. this month. It was the largest ever, raising more than $85 billion and reaching a valuation of $1.77 trillion on its debut. But since then, SpaceX's stock has been on a downward slide, as shares slumped to $153 at the end of the trading day on Thursday after reaching a high of $202 last week. Global markets have also been choppy in recent weeks, with tech stocks dragging down indexes as investors question whether A.I. companies will live up to their sky-high promises. That has caused OpenAI's advisers, in conversations with the company over the past week, to caution that it may not find much enthusiasm from retail investors for its own shares, two of the people involved said. OpenAI's tapping the brakes on its I.P.O. plans could disappoint Wall Street and Silicon Valley. Public offerings from OpenAI and its rival Anthropic, which also said it was making plans for a Wall Street debut, could unleash a wave of generational wealth. OpenAI said this month that it had filed confidential paperwork with securities regulators to kick off the process for going public, but it did not commit publicly to any time frame. A $1 trillion valuation in the public market, which would exceed the market capitalization of Walmart, would be staggering for OpenAI, a start-up that is not believed to have turned a profit and is aggressively spending on new data centers. An OpenAI spokesperson declined to comment further beyond the company's earlier statement. OpenAI's advisers presented company executives with the option of waiting until 2027 to go public with a $1 trillion valuation, or lower the targeted valuation for a quicker I.P.O. Mr. Altman, said one person in contact with him on the topic, responded that any change to the trillion-dollar valuation was a nonstarter. OpenAI is also grappling with other issues. Late last year, Sarah Friar, the company's chief financial officer, said it was not pursuing an I.P.O. at the time and was focusing on shoring up its finances. Since then, it has continued to pour money into data centers and computing power, with no indications of slowing down. The company is also spending heavily on marketing and recruiting high-profile engineering talent from companies like Meta and Google. It is searching for other lines of revenue, including dabbling with placing ads inside ChatGPT and striking e-commerce deals with companies like Shopify and Stripe that would allow people to buy things from online stores directly inside ChatGPT. Those initiatives are still in early experimental phases, two OpenAI employees said. OpenAI reported roughly $13 billion in revenue in 2025, one of the people said, a number the company hopes to triple this year. OpenAI said this year that it was generating $2 billion in revenue each month. But some OpenAI executives appeared to have changed their minds about an I.P.O. just a few months after Ms. Friar said the company was not looking to go public. The Wall Street Journal reported that the company planned to go public by the end of 2026. That surprised some employees because they thought the company was not on a strong enough financial footing, two people familiar with the company's plans said. OpenAI faces acute pressures. Anthropic, which offers a Claude Code tool for creating sophisticated software code, has had success selling its service to businesses. At the same time, Google's Gemini, the tech giant's flagship consumer A.I. product, has become popular with users. After years of surging downloads of ChatGPT's consumer app, those numbers have slowed and continue to hover around 900 million users, surprising investors who believed the company would easily hit one billion. Over the past six months, OpenAI has undergone a near-complete overhaul. Under Fidji Simo, the chief executive of artificial general intelligence deployment, OpenAI has started dropping "side quests" -- a term describing nonessential tasks in a role-playing game -- including money-losing divisions like its video generator app called Sora. And to match Anthropic, OpenAI is building a sales team to push Codex, its coding product, to larger business customers. Despite hesitation around an I.P.O., OpenAI executives believe the company is moving in the right direction, according to two employees. More than five million people use Codex on a weekly basis, the company said in a blog post this month. The company also recently announced it had more than two million business customers. And last week, the company recruited Noam Shazeer, away from Google, a hire that was widely seen as a coup across the insular A.I. research community. Mr. Shazeer was one of the authors of a 2017 paper introducing the "transformer architecture" in A.I. (or the "T" in ChatGPT). (The New York Times has sued OpenAI and Microsoft, claiming copyright infringement of news content related to A.I. systems. The two companies have denied those claims.)

OpenAI staggers GPT-5.6 rollout for government vetting, eyes 2027 IPO

OpenAI staggers GPT-5.6 rollout for government vetting, eyes 2027 IPO OpenAI Group PBC will roll out its next model, GPT-5.6, to a small group of partners rather than the public at the request of the Trump administration, the latest sign that Washington now wants to review frontier artificial intelligence models before they ship widely. The plan was disclosed by Chief Executive Sam Altman during a staff question-and-answer session on Wednesday, as detailed in a report from The Information. Altman reportedly told employees the federal government had asked the company to take the staggered approach and that it was the fastest path to a broad release. In a memo, he said the government would be "approving access customer by customer during this preview period," according to the report, adding that he hoped a wider rollout would follow "a couple of weeks later" if the preview went well. The arrangement mirrors how rival Anthropic PBC handled Mythos, a model with advanced cybersecurity capabilities that it shared with select partners in April rather than releasing it publicly. The Trump administration later forced Anthropic to pull Mythos and a companion model offline earlier this month under an emergency export control directive citing national security, a confrontation that appears to have set the template for how the government now approaches cutting-edge releases. Reuters also reported the GPT-5.6 review and said the request grew out of talks with two agencies, the Office of the National Cyber Director and the Office of Science and Technology Policy. What the customer-by-customer vetting involves and how long it runs, remains unclear. OpenAI and the White House have not commented on the reports publicly as of the time of writing. The episode points to a shift in who decides when powerful models reach the market. AI developers have spent years arguing over how openly to release their systems. Increasingly that call is being shaped in Washington, where officials worry that models capable of finding software vulnerabilities or breaking into hardened systems could spread to adversaries before safeguards are in place. OpenAI is navigating the new scrutiny as it weighs the timing of a stock market debut that would rank as one of the largest in history. The company is leaning toward waiting until 2027 to go public rather than filing this year, the New York Times reported. Recent market turbulence is a factor. SpaceX raised $75 billion in an initial public offering on June 11 that jumped on its debut before surrendering most of those gains, a wobble that has made OpenAI wary of weak demand from retail investors. Chief Financial Officer Sarah Friar has pushed for the later date, pointing to the company's heavy cash burn, its compute commitments and the demands of public reporting, the Times said. Friar has favored a 2027 listing since at least last year, while Altman has leaned toward moving sooner. OpenAI completed the corporate restructuring needed to go public in October, converting its for-profit arm into the public benefit corporation now known as OpenAI Group PBC. It was reported at the time that the company was weighing a filing as soon as the second half of 2026 at a valuation of up to $1 trillion. The company closed a $122 billion funding round at an $852 billion valuation on March 31. A spokesperson previously told Reuters that "an IPO is not our focus, so we could not possibly have set a date."

NYT: OpenAI mulls delaying IPO over valuation concerns

Sam Altman reportedly does not want OpenAI to be valued at less than $1trn at IPO. OpenAI is reportedly mulling over delaying its initial public offering (IPO) to 2027, after a strong SpaceX debut was followed by a drop in share value. The ChatGPT-parent filed to go public earlier this month, but said that it could be a "while" before it ceases to be a private company. Sources told The New York Times (NYT) that the company was aiming for a debut in the third or the fourth quarter of this year. SpaceX - which raised a record-breaking $75bn in its IPO listing this month - is considered to be a litmus test for the giant AI business, as both industry and individual consumers continue to drive up demand for its services. AI search start-up Perplexity's CEO warned of "ripple effects" if these blockbuster IPOs fail to meet expectations. The SpaceX IPO "will definitely be like a leading indicator to how Anthropic or OpenAI will go out," he said. Anthropic is expected to be valuated at more than $1trn following its debut, and OpenAI CEO Sam Altman wants the same for his AI start-up. Advisors, however, have told Altman that an IPO in 2026 could value the company at less than $1trn, and instead offered the option of waiting until 2027, NYT reported yesterday (25 June). One source said that any changes to the $1trn valuation was a nonstarter for the CEO. OpenAI was last valued at $825bn following a $122bn raise in late March. Concerns arose for OpenAI after a stellar SpaceX debut, which raised the company to a valuation of more than $1.7trn, was followed by a slump in shares. At its peak, SpaceX shares were valued at nearly $202 a piece, which has now dropped to $153 a share as of market close yesterday. Prices have further dropped marginally in after-hours trading, but remain higher than its debut price of $135 a share. Technology stocks are also tumbling over doubts around whether AI would make its promised returns. Chip stocks, meanwhile, are gaining as businesses spend hundreds of billions on their AI stack to meet demand. Despite hopes to be valued at more than $1trn, OpenAI is far from being profitable. The AI start-up made around $13bn in revenue last year and plans to spend about $600bn on computing capacity by 2030. It generates around $2bn in revenue a month. Sources told CNBC earlier this year that the company projects its total revenue for 2030 to be more than $280bn - around 20-times its 2025 earnings. Meanwhile, after years of sharp growth in ChatGPT users, OpenAI finds its user base hovering around 900m. Don't miss out on the knowledge you need to succeed. Sign up for the Daily Brief, Silicon Republic's digest of need-to-know sci-tech news.

OpenAI Considers Delaying Its IPO -- And SpaceX's Volatility Is a Big Reason Why

Get personalized, AI-powered answers built on 27+ years of trusted expertise. Investors who'd been looking forward to OpenAI's hotly anticipated IPO this year might just have to wait. The AI startup behind ChatGPT is considering postponing its public debut plans to next year, after watching SpaceX's (SPCX) stock hit the skids just weeks after its record IPO, according to a report from The New York Times. The startup had been expected to list in the second half of the year, after filing paperwork confidentially with the Securities and Exchange Commission earlier this month. OpenAI did not respond to an Investopedia request for comment in time for publication. Private companies tend to go public when market vibes are good, hoping to see strong demand for their offerings and debut trading -- but sentiment appears to have shifted in the wake of SpaceX's launch, with a tech rout that pressured shares of several chipmakers and hyperscalers this week. SpaceX recently traded around $157, just above its opening price of $150, and about 30% off its intraday peak around $225. That price action has also stripped founder and CEO Elon Musk of his trillionaire superlative. (For more reporting from Investopedia on today's market moves, click here.) Shares of AI chipmaker Cerebras (CBRS), which held the title of this year's largest IPO prior to SpaceX's debut, have taken a dive too, after its first-quarter results as a public company appeared to disappoint. The stock, which recently traded at around $173, has dropped 50% from its opening price roughly one month after its May debut. OpenAI delaying its IPO could also have a chilling effect on other new listings expected this year, including rival AI startup Anthropic, which confidentially filed to go public earlier this month.

OpenAI weighs IPO in 2027 after expected Anthropic public debut

AI giant OpenAI is reportedly eyeing a 2027 initial public offering, potentially after rival Anthropic. Both companies have confidentially filed for an IPO, with Anthropic possibly listing as early as October. Recent tech market volatility has influenced OpenAI's timing, though deliberations are ongoing. This move aims to secure public market funding for substantial AI infrastructure investments. OpenAI is considering an initial public offering as soon as in 2027, according to people familiar with the matter, a timeline that would potentially see it go public after its artificial intelligence rival Anthropic PBC. The ChatGPT maker's leadership expect that Anthropic will likely go public first, the people said, even though both companies have already filed confidentially with the US Securities and Exchange Commission. OpenAI had been targeting a fall listing, and Anthropic is considering an IPO as soon as in October, Bloomberg News has reported. Recent volatility in tech stocks has influenced OpenAI's potential timing, some of the people said, asking not to be identified as the information isn't public. Deliberations are ongoing and details of OpenAI's IPO plans could change, the people said. The New York Times first reported the expected IPO timing. A spokesperson for OpenAI didn't respond to a request for comment. OpenAI and Anthropic have been racing to make their Wall Street debuts as soon as this year, in a bid to attract public market investors and support their heavy spending on chips and data centers for AI. OpenAI is working with Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and Morgan Stanley on its potential listing, Bloomberg News reported. OpenAI added a note of caution to its expected IPO timeline in its statement announcing the confidential filing. "We have not decided on timing yet; it may be a while because there are things we want to do that are likely easier as a private company," OpenAI said. "But it's a complicated set of tradeoffs and this gives us the option to go public sooner if that ends up being best." Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley stock fell as much as 4.9% and 4.2% respectively Friday in New York. Shares of SoftBank Group Corp., a large OpenAI backer, and Oracle Corp., a major data center partner, both fell following the news of the revised IPO timeline. Anthropic, once viewed as an underdog relative to OpenAI, has seen revenue soar this year thanks to the success of its AI software, including products that help streamline the process of writing and debugging code. The Claude maker filed confidentially to go public shortly before OpenAI. OpenAI raised $122 billion in a funding round from investors earlier this year to support its spending spree on AI infrastructure. The financing valued the ChatGPT maker at $852 billion, including the money raised.

OpenAI IPO Reportedly Delayed To 2027: 'There's No Rational Argument' For $1 Trillion Valuation, Says Gar

Sam Altman's OpenAI is chasing a trillion-dollar IPO, but new reporting suggests the listing may now slip to 2027 as the company burns through cash at a record pace. The artificial intelligence firm is leaning toward holding off until next year, according to a New York Times report citing three people involved in the deliberations. Advisers reportedly presented Altman with two options: wait until 2027 for the trillion-dollar tag, or settle for a smaller number and list in 2026. Altman reportedly called any reduction a "non-starter." CFO Sarah Friar is said to be pushing internally for the delay, citing roughly $600 billion in compute infrastructure commitments through 2030 as a reason the company needs more runway before facing public-company reporting obligations. Gary Marcus Sees 'No Rational Argument' NYU professor and AI skeptic Gary Marcus told the Prof G Markets podcast this week that the math simply does not work. "There is no rational argument for buying a share of OpenAI at a trillion-dollar valuation. There just isn't," Marcus said, noting the company is losing roughly $2 billion a month on operations. Marcus, who testified before the U.S. Senate in 2023 alongside Altman, has previously likened OpenAI to telecom-era flameout WorldCom. He suggested the company may now sit in fourth place behind Anthropic, Google, and others. Polymarket traders place OpenAI third in the race to have the best model by the end of 2026, at 11%, far behind Anthropic at 67%, but ahead of Elon Musk's troubled xAI. Google is in second with 13%. The Wall Street Journal reported earlier this week that OpenAI has missed recent internal revenue targets, lending weight to skepticism about the company's financial trajectory. Polymarket Traders Bet On A Delay Polymarket's "OpenAI IPO by..." market currently assigns a 78% probability that the company will not list before December 31, 2026. A separate market gives Anthropic a 77% probability of beating OpenAI to the public markets, following its own confidential S-1 filing on June 1. SpaceX Slump Casts A Shadow The advisers' caution may also be tied to the rocky debut of SpaceX Inc. (NASDAQ:SPCX), whose shares have tumbled from above $225 to around $153 since its record IPO earlier this month. The stock still trades comfortably above its $135 offer price, meaning early IPO buyers are in the green, but the roughly 30% retracement from its peak may have spooked the executives weighing OpenAI's listing window. Image: Shutterstock Market News and Data brought to you by Benzinga APIs To add Benzinga News as your preferred source on Google, click here.

OpenAI leans toward waiting until next year for IPO, NYT reports

OpenAI may postpone its highly anticipated public launch until 2027, setting its sights on an ambitious $1 trillion valuation that CEO Sam Altman deems non-negotiable. Additionally, the US government has mandated a phased rollout of the new AI model, GPT 5.6, addressing security concerns with access granted selectively during a limited preview period. OpenAI is considering holding off on its public debut until next year, the New York Times reported on Thursday, citing three people involved in the company's deliberations. The AI startup, which has confidentially filed for a U.S. initial public ⁠offering, ⁠is targeting a valuation of up to $1 trillion, Reuters has reported, adding Chief Financial Officer Sarah Friar has told some associates the company is aiming for a 2027 listing. OpenAI's advisers presented company executives with the option of waiting until 2027 to ⁠go public with a $1 trillion valuation, or lower the targeted valuation for a quicker listing, ⁠NYT said. CEO Sam Altman responded that any change to the trillion-dollar valuation was a non-starter. Separately, U.S. President Donald Trump's administration has asked OpenAI to stagger the release of its new model over security concerns, a source familiar with the matter told Reuters. Altman told staff the company would release its latest model, GPT 5.6, in a limited preview to select partners, with the ⁠government "approving access customer by customer during this preview period," according to The Information, which had reported the development earlier. The staggered rollout came at the request of the Office of the National Cyber Director and the Office of Science and Technology Policy, according to The Information.

OpenAI Weighs Delay of IPO as Tech Stock Volatility Rattles Advisers | PYMNTS.com

The artificial intelligence startup's advisers have told it that this volatility could reduce retail investors' enthusiasm for its IPO, according to the report. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman is pushing the firm's advisers to seek a $1 trillion valuation for the company, per the report. OpenAI announced June 8 that it had recently submitted a confidential S-1, a registration statement required for an IPO, to the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The company said in its announcement: "We have not decided on timing yet; it may be a while because there are things we want to do that are likely easier as a private company. But it's a complicated set of tradeoffs and this gives us the option to go public sooner if that ends up being best." Rival AI startup Anthropic said a week earlier, on June 1, that it had confidentially submitted a draft registration statement to the SEC about its IPO. Anthropic said in its announcement: "This gives us the option to go public after the SEC completes its review. The proposed initial public offering will depend on market conditions and other factors." OpenAI was valued at $852 billion in a March funding round in which it raised $122 billion. The company said at the time that it was generating $2 billion in revenue per month, up from $1 billion per quarter at the end of 2024. The Wall Street Journal reported Tuesday (June 23) that tech stocks, and particularly those of AI and chip companies, "fell hard" amid investor concerns about the cost of data centers and the uncertain future revenue prospects of AI. CNBC reported Tuesday that tech stocks suffered "deep losses" and that the sector's decline was driving a selloff of stocks around the world. Reuters reported Tuesday that sharp losses in semiconductor stocks drove the Nasdaq and the S&P 500 to more than one-week lows as investors questioned the growing amount of debt-funded spending on AI. For all PYMNTS AI coverage, subscribe to the daily AI Newsletter.

OpenAI's IPO Delay Could Be Bullish, Says Shareholder - SuRo Capital (NASDAQ:SSSS)

OpenAI may not be delaying its initial public offering (IPO) because the market isn't ready -- it may be waiting because investors can't seem to stop raising the price tag. "I think the valuation is much higher than that," Lee said in a prepared statement, referring to OpenAI's last funding-round valuation. OpenAI's Employee Tender May Hold The Answer According to Lee, the clearest indication of OpenAI's current valuation may come from its ongoing employee tender offer rather than an IPO filing. "OpenAI is actually testing that right now with their employee tender, and I'm not sure if all the employees at OpenAI want to sell shares at last round valuation," Lee said. Lee believes the tender could reveal that private investors are willing to pay substantially more than OpenAI's previous valuation, reducing the urgency for the ChatGPT maker to tap public markets. If private capital continues to value OpenAI at higher levels, waiting until 2027 could allow the company to command an even larger valuation when it eventually lists. Private AI Companies Are Seeing Rapid Revenue Growth Lee also argued that the public market has yet to fully appreciate how quickly leading private AI companies are growing. "In the private markets, we are seeing massive revenue increases year over year for some of these companies," he said. "Meanwhile, we're seeing massive valuation increases because we have that line of sight and people in the public markets haven't had that opportunity yet," Lee said. For Lee, the reported IPO delay should not necessarily be viewed as a warning sign. Instead, he believes it reflects the strength of the private AI market, where surging revenue growth and rising valuations continue to give companies like OpenAI flexibility over when -- and at what valuation -- they eventually choose to go public. Image via Shutterstock Market News and Data brought to you by Benzinga APIs To add Benzinga News as your preferred source on Google, click here.

OpenAI Holds Back GPT-5.6 Rollout, Could Hold off IPO Until Next Year

We aren't sure whether the two incidents are connected or not, but it might just make better sense for Sam Altman to cool things off In response to the Trump administration's order, OpenAI has said it will limit the release of its smartest GPT-5.6 rollout only to government-approved customers, in what is seen as a replay of the Claude Mythoswithdrawal. This proves yet again that the G7 nations were right about United States' planned AI hegemony moves after first claiming that the review was voluntary. In the aftermath of this decision, a report claimed that OpenAI was now leaning towards postponing its public offering of shares till 2027. Readers would recall that Sam Altman had initiated early paperwork for an IPObarely a week after arch rival Anthropic did the same. Both these reports came after Elon Musk's SpaceX debuted on the stock markets. A report in The New York Times OpenAI wants to hold off its IPO given that SpaceX shares have fallen since their public debut earlier this month. Altman had hired bankers and lawyers for the IPO with a possible IPO in Q3 or Q4 of 2026 at a $1 trillion valuation. However, now these same folks seem concerned over the tanking of SpaceX shares. Makes one wonder which daft advisor would actually imagine that SpaceX would go public at an inflated valuation and then keep going steadily upwards? Even Musk's rockets do not always do that, do they? The stock, priced at $135 rose 56% to a high of $211 immediately after the offering leading to euphoric trillionaire claims from Musk fanboys. Since then it has fallen 27% and closed yesterday at $153 still above its offer price. So, SpaceX is still a success but if OpenAI was expecting share prices to be a one-way street, they need to change advisors. Maybe there are other issues that is keeping OpenAI from the markets right now. Is their decision to hold off ChatGPT-5.6 and possibly every single model they launch in the future. When Donald Trump signed an executive order on June 2 asking AI companies to participate in a voluntary federal review of their more powerful models, the AI industry may not have, in their wildest dreams, imagined that it was actually a gag order of sorts. The Information reports that OpenAI will stagger its new AI model release and that the first users will only be those approved by the federal government. The report quotes a staff memo from Sam Altman saying federal leaders will be "approving access customer by customer during their preview period" with a general release "a couple of weeks later." The Trump regime has completely reversed its policy from November to now. Trump had signed an executive order to "remove barriers to United States AI leadership" while revoking his predecessor's "attempt to paralyse the industry" through a "minimally burdensome national standard for AI regulation." We do agree that AI models deserve more attention given its potential to wreak havoc, but imposing export controls over Anthropic's Fable 5 model and now releasing a foundational model "customer-by-customer" isn't exactly "minimally burdensome", is it? The days of free enterprise seem over and globalisation is dead as Sridhar Vembu said. While Musk managed to get on the right side of this President, seems like Altman has some work to do. In his note to employees, he sought to smudge the real issue saying "We've made clear to the US government that this is not our preferred long term model, and will work with them and others in industry to achieve a more sustainable approach for future releases." Reports in the US media suggest that several agencies have joint hands to direct this change of course with OpenAI. The National Cyber Director's office and the Science and Technology department were involved as was the Department of Commerce under Howard Lutnick, who had some sour words to say about Anthropic from time to time. Given this scenario, it is hardly surprising that AI companies that have thus far hyped up their foundational models, would feel confident about how prospective investors see this attempt by a government to shackle free trade. The global markets have already been more than choppy in recent weeks with tech stocks dragging down indices as investors are increasingly concerned about whether AI companies actually living up to their promises. What we cannot fathom though is that these issues persisted even when OpenAI began paperwork, so what's new now? The NYT report says the company's advisors gave the option of waiting till 2027 if they wanted a trillion dollar valuation or reduce this number in case they wanted a quicker IPO. It seems Sam Altman had no intention of reducing the valuation, which left them no option other than to push things by a few months. Which brings us to the moot question of why OpenAI is in a hurry? Remember, CFO Sarah Friar had warned them to not pursue an IPO so soon and focus instead on shoring up their finances. However, since then the company has continued to pour money into datacentres seeking computing power, without actually bolstering revenues. If those spends were well-known, OpenAI has also enhanced its marketing spends as well as recruitment expenditure to poach talent from competing rivals like Google and Meta. On the revenue front it has made tall claims of placing ads inside ChatGPT and striking e-commerce deals but the results are yet to show up in the financial statements. For now, OpenAI has reported revenues of around $13 billion in 2025 and is hoping to triple that by the end of 2026. Given this scenario, it is still not clear why the top executives decided to go for an earlier IPO in the first place. The company had revealed its attempt to differentiate from Anthropic by joining hands with Broadcom to design a custom AI chip. In any case, if OpenAI does postpone its IPO, it would be a good move that Sam Altman is taking as it would not only give the company some breathing time to shore up its numbers, but also provide it with a better assessment of how AI is being perceived by investors. So what if arch rival Dario Amodei launches Anthropic's IPO before? Entrepreneurship is never about letting egos forcing one's mind, right?

OpenAI may delay blockbuster IPO to 2027 By Investing.com

Investing.com -- OpenAI is considering postponing its highly anticipated initial public offering (IPO) until 2027, according to a report Thursday from the New York Times, citing three people involved in the company's internal deliberations. The artificial intelligence heavyweight, which recently formalized its intentions by submitting a confidential S-1 filing with the SEC, had originally positioned itself for a public debut as early as the third or fourth quarter of this year. The potential delay highlights an internal tug-of-war over timing, market conditions, and a historic valuation target. The report said Chief Executive Sam Altman has fiercely pushed advisers to achieve a $1 trillion valuation for the ChatGPT maker -- a steep climb from its last private funding round, which pinned the company's valuation between $730 billion and $852 billion. For months, the momentum behind an OpenAI debut felt unstoppable. The company cleared a massive hurdle when Elon Musk's restrictive lawsuit was dismissed, and its core metrics have been explosive, with revenue hitting a historic $2 billion per month. Furthermore, the public markets have proven they have an appetite for mega-scale debuts. Just weeks ago, SpaceX shattered records with its June 2026 IPO, raising over $85 billion and capturing a staggering $1.77 trillion valuation at its debut. Many viewed SpaceX's blockbuster entry as a green light for OpenAI and rival Anthropic to execute a trifecta of trillion-dollar tech listings this year. For OpenAI to put on the brakes now signals a abrupt shift from aggressive expansion to defensive posturing. Despite eye-popping revenue growth, recent disclosures have given Wall Street a sobering reality check. OpenAI's audited financial documents recently revealed a staggering $38.5 billion net loss for last year, driven by a massive $34 billion spending spree on computing power, R&D, and structural corporate shifts. While SpaceX's IPO was a historical milestone, its immediate aftermath exposed a fickle market: SpaceX shares have since declined to $153 from a peak of $202 last week. That retreat, combined with broader tech sector volatility, has investors asking tough questions about whether the commercial returns of generative AI can keep pace with the astronomical infrastructure costs required to build it. Advisers have warned OpenAI executives that retail enthusiasm may be limited given the current market jitters. According to The Times, they presented Altman with two stark choices: According to a source in direct contact with Altman, the Chief Executive firmly rejected any compromise on the trillion-dollar figure. For now, OpenAI appears willing to wait out the storm to ensure it debuts on its own terms -- and at its own price tag.

OpenAI may delay IPO until next year: NYT

STORY: OpenAI may wait until next year to do its much-anticipated stock listing. That's according to a report Thursday by the New York Times. The AI startup has already filed for an IPO, and Reuters has reported that it's targeting a $1 trillion valuation. Now the Times says executives have set out two options: wait until next year and aim for that value, or go sooner at a lower figure. However, boss Sam Altman has reportedly said anything less than one trillion is a non-starter. Separately, Washington is said to have asked OpenAI to stagger the release of its latest models over security concerns. That's according to a Reuters source. An earlier report by tech news site The Information says Altman has told staff the firm will release the new GPT 5.6 in a limited preview to select partners. The U.S. government will reportedly approve access customer by customer during the preview period. Earlier this month, Washington ordered OpenAI rival Anthropic to suspend exports of its latest models over national security concerns.

OpenAI IPO: Everything You Need to Know

OpenAI has reportedly filed confidentially for a US IPO. Here is the latest on its valuation, leaked financials, Microsoft relationship, ownership structure and potential listing timing. OpenAI, the company behind ChatGPT, has moved from IPO speculation to a much more active public-market watchlist. As of writing in June, OpenAI has not publicly released an IPO prospectus, ticker, price range or confirmed listing date. However, Reuters reported on 8 June 2026 that the company had confidentially filed for a US IPO, joining rival Anthropic in a race to bring major AI labs to public markets. A confidential filing means the paperwork is submitted to regulators before the full S-1 is made public, so investors still do not have official audited IPO disclosures, risk factors or share-count details. The OpenAI IPO story now turns on three questions: how much the company is really worth, whether its huge AI spending can produce sustainable margins, and whether public investors are ready to value a frontier AI lab like a mega-cap technology platform. What Does OpenAI Do? OpenAI develops and sells advanced artificial intelligence systems. Its best-known product is ChatGPT, the consumer and workplace AI assistant used for writing, coding, research, data analysis and workflow automation. The company also sells access to its AI models through developer APIs, allowing businesses to build OpenAI models into their own applications. OpenAI's commercial model includes paid ChatGPT plans, business and enterprise subscriptions, and usage-based API pricing. OpenAI states that its API access is billed separately from ChatGPT subscriptions, which matters because the company is monetising both end users and developers. In simple terms, OpenAI is trying to become both an AI product company and an AI infrastructure platform. Is OpenAI Going Public? OpenAI has not made a public IPO announcement with a confirmed timetable. There is still no public S-1 filing, no exchange, no ticker and no official price range. That said, the latest reporting is much stronger than earlier IPO speculation. Reuters reported that OpenAI confidentially filed for a US initial public offering on 8 June 2026. That is a significant update from late 2025, when OpenAI pushed back on reports of firm IPO timing and said an IPO was not its focus. The confidential filing suggests IPO preparation is underway, but it does not automatically guarantee that OpenAI will list in 2026. Market conditions, regulatory review, valuation negotiations, legal issues and internal financial readiness could still delay or change the offering. When Could the OpenAI IPO Happen? The most common reported window is late 2026 or early 2027, with some reports discussing a possible listing as early as the third quarter of 2026. Earlier Reuters-linked reporting said advisers had discussed a valuation of up to $1 trillion, with some people pointing to 2027 and others saying late 2026 could be possible. OpenAI's public response at the time was cautious: the company said an IPO was not its focus and that it could not have set a date. Now that Reuters has reported a confidential IPO filing, the timing debate has shifted. The base case is no longer "will OpenAI consider an IPO?" but "how soon can OpenAI make the numbers, structure and market conditions work?" Why Would OpenAI Do An IPO? OpenAI's reason to go public would be unusually straightforward: capital. Frontier AI is expensive. Training models, serving user queries, building data-centre capacity, buying chips, hiring researchers and funding enterprise distribution all require very large sums. Public markets could give OpenAI access to a deeper pool of capital than private rounds alone. An IPO could also help OpenAI: * create liquidity for employees and early investors * establish a public valuation benchmark for frontier AI companies * increase transparency for enterprise, government and infrastructure partners * compete more directly with public mega-cap AI platforms such as Microsoft, Alphabet and Meta * fund long-term compute commitments without relying solely on private investors The counterargument is equally important. OpenAI has already been able to raise enormous sums privately. If private capital remains available, the company may not need to rush into public-market scrutiny. OpenAI Valuation: How Much is OpenAI Worth? OpenAI's valuation has moved quickly and remains difficult to pin down because it is still private. The clearest recent benchmark came in October 2025, when current and former employees sold about $6.6 billion of shares in a secondary transaction that valued OpenAI at roughly $500 billion, according to Reuters-linked reporting. That deal included investors such as SoftBank, Thrive Capital, Dragoneer, Abu Dhabi's MGX and T. Rowe Price. A second valuation reference comes from the Microsoft-OpenAI restructuring. OpenAI said Microsoft's investment in OpenAI Group PBC was valued at about $135 billion, representing roughly 27% on an as-converted diluted basis after recapitalisation. That also points to an implied valuation around the $500 billion area at that stage. More recent reporting has cited higher valuation expectations, including potential IPO targets around or above $1 trillion. These figures should be treated as reported targets or market expectations, not confirmed IPO pricing. Final valuation would depend on public financials, revenue growth, margins, governance terms and demand for AI listings. Is OpenAI Profitable? OpenAI does not publish full financial statements as a public company would. However, recent leaked and reported figures give investors a much clearer view of the company's operations. The Financial Times reported, based on audited financial figures and documents first shared by independent journalist Ed Zitron, that OpenAI generated about $13 billion of revenue in 2025, up sharply from 2024. The same reporting said OpenAI spent about $34 billion in 2025, including around $19 billion on research and development and nearly $6 billion on sales and marketing. The reported loss figure is more complicated. The FT said OpenAI's net loss attributable to the company rose to around $39 billion in 2025, but that a large part reflected a non-cash charge tied to its prior investor structure. Stripping out that charge and other non-cash items, the report said operational losses were closer to $8 billion. The Information separately reported that OpenAI generated $5.7 billion of revenue in Q1 2026 and burned about $3.7 billion of cash during the quarter, based on documents shared with shareholders. For IPO investors, this creates the central OpenAI debate: the company may be one of the fastest-growing technology businesses ever, but its compute and R&D costs are still enormous. The more important question for an IPO is whether losses are temporary growth investment or a structural feature of frontier AI economics. Public investors will want to see: * gross margin after inference costs * how much revenue comes from consumers, enterprises and API usage * whether model-serving costs fall over time * how much Microsoft, Oracle, Nvidia and other infrastructure partners affect unit economics * whether OpenAI can reduce cash burn while maintaining model leadership A traditional software company can often scale revenue faster than costs. OpenAI's challenge is different because every model response requires compute, and the most advanced models may remain expensive to train and serve. OpenAI's Microsoft Partnership Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) remains one of the most important pieces of the OpenAI IPO story. In October 2025, OpenAI and Microsoft announced a new phase of their partnership. OpenAI said Microsoft supported the creation of a public benefit corporation structure and that Microsoft held an investment in OpenAI Group PBC valued at about $135 billion, representing around 27% on an as-converted diluted basis. OpenAI later said the partnership remained "strong and central" and clarified that revenue-share payments from OpenAI to Microsoft continue through 2030, at the same percentage but subject to a total cap. For IPO investors, Microsoft matters for three reasons. First, Microsoft has been a major capital and cloud infrastructure partner. Second, the partnership affects OpenAI's cost base and distribution. Third, Microsoft's ownership and revenue-sharing rights will influence how much of OpenAI's future economics flow to new public shareholders. Who Owns OpenAI? OpenAI is not a standard venture-backed software company. The company began as a nonprofit and later created a capped-profit structure. OpenAI has described its model as a partnership between its original nonprofit and a capped-profit arm, designed to support its mission of building artificial general intelligence that benefits humanity. In 2025, OpenAI said its planned structure would involve the nonprofit controlling a Public Benefit Corporation and sharing directly in its success. That means an OpenAI IPO may include governance terms that look different from a normal Silicon Valley listing. Investors should watch closely for: * voting rights * nonprofit control provisions * investor profit-participation rules * employee equity treatment * Microsoft's rights * limits or caps attached to earlier investment agreements Until the public S-1 is released, the exact ownership and governance structure remains uncertain. OpenAI's Tender Offers and Secondary Sales OpenAI has already provided liquidity through private secondary transactions. The most important recent transaction was the reported $6.6 billion employee share sale in October 2025, which valued the company at about $500 billion. Secondary sales are not the same as IPOs because they usually involve existing shareholders selling stock to approved private investors, rather than the company raising new public capital. Repeated tender offers can reduce pressure for an immediate IPO because employees and early holders can sell some shares privately. But they can also prepare the market for a listing by establishing valuation benchmarks and investor demand. Who Are OpenAI's Competitors? OpenAI competes in one of the most expensive and strategically important markets in technology, AI development and infrastructure. Its main competitors include: Anthropic Anthropic, maker of Claude, is OpenAI's closest pure-play frontier model rival. Reuters reported that Anthropic also confidentially filed for an IPO, intensifying the public-market race among AI labs. Google DeepMind Google has Gemini, world-class AI research, massive data-centre infrastructure and distribution through Search, Android, Workspace and Google Cloud. Meta Meta competes through open and semi-open AI models, consumer AI features and large-scale infrastructure spending. xAI Elon Musk's xAI is another well-funded model developer and has the strategic advantage of links to X and Musk's broader technology ecosystem. Enterprise AI and cloud platforms OpenAI also competes indirectly with Microsoft, Amazon, Oracle, Salesforce, Databricks, Snowflake and other enterprise software or cloud companies embedding AI into their platforms. The competitive question is not only who has the best model. It is who can deliver the best combination of model quality, speed, safety, enterprise controls, price and distribution. OpenAI IPO: Leadership Team OpenAI's most visible leader is Sam Altman, its CEO. He remains the public face of the company and a central figure in fundraising, strategy and AI policy. The leadership bench has also become more important as OpenAI prepares for a potential public listing. In 2025, OpenAI announced that Fidji Simo, then CEO of Instacart and an OpenAI board member, would join as CEO of Applications, reporting directly to Altman. OpenAI said Altman would remain CEO and continue overseeing research, compute and applications at the company level. What Would an OpenAI IPO Mean for Investors? An OpenAI IPO would give public-market investors direct exposure to one of the most important companies in artificial intelligence. The potential bull case is clear: OpenAI has a globally recognized consumer product in ChatGPT, a growing enterprise business, a developer platform, strong brand awareness and a central role in the AI infrastructure boom. If revenue continues to scale and compute costs become more efficient, OpenAI could become one of the defining technology platforms of the next decade. The risk case is just as clear: The company is spending at extraordinary levels, faces fierce competition, depends heavily on infrastructure partners and operates under a complex governance model. Recent reported financials suggest that OpenAI's growth is real, but so is its cash burn. Key Risks Before the OpenAI IPO The public S-1, when released, will be critical. Investors should look especially closely at: * revenue growth versus cash burn * gross margin after compute costs * customer concentration * Microsoft revenue-share and infrastructure obligations * legal and regulatory investigations * AI safety and governance disclosures * share structure and voting control * employee equity dilution * capital expenditure and long-term compute commitments OpenAI may be an exceptional company, but an exceptional company is not automatically an attractive IPO at any price. OpenAI IPO: The Bottom Line The OpenAI IPO story has changed meaningfully since the start of the year. Previously, OpenAI had no confirmed IPO date and was only the subject of intense market speculation. Now, Reuters has reported that OpenAI has confidentially filed for a US IPO, although the company still has not publicly released its prospectus, confirmed a listing date or announced a ticker. The latest reported financials make the investment case more complex. OpenAI appears to be growing revenue at extraordinary speed, with reported 2025 revenue around $13 billion and Q1 2026 revenue around $5.7 billion. But reported spending, losses and cash burn show how costly it is to compete at the frontier of AI. For now, the OpenAI IPO remains one of the most important potential listings in global technology. The decisive moment will come when investors can finally read the public S-1 and compare the company's growth, costs, governance and valuation side by side.