OpenAI nears up to $30B raise at $1.25T valuation — cut from $1.4T amid investor 'indigestion'; Coatue and UAE funds lead, signatures sought by Oct 30 ahead of Anthropic's mid-November IPO
What happened
OpenAI told investors this week it is close to finalizing a funding round of up to $30 billion at a $1.25 trillion pre-money valuation (~$1.28 trillion post-money), led by Coatue and investors from the United Arab Emirates, with the UAE funding possibly coupled with a deal giving OpenAI more compute capacity from the UAE, CNBC reported. Per the Financial Times, OpenAI cut the target from the $1.4 trillion it pitched earlier in October after investor pushback — sources described 'indigestion' among backers, and Morgan Stanley and Dragoneer had shown the higher $1.4 trillion figure to private-wealth clients. OpenAI wants signatures by Oct 30. Reuters reported OpenAI is rushing to lock in commitments before Anthropic's expected mid-November IPO, which is targeting a $1.5-2 trillion valuation, since both draw on the same investor pool; SoftBank and MGX are negotiating to join the round.
Why it matters & what’s next are part of Pro, along with the audio summary.
Start your free 14-day trialWho’s affected
- AMZN (committed up to $50B to OpenAI in the March round; reports earnings next week)
- MSFT (major OpenAI backer, reports next week)
- NVDA (chip supplier to the AI buildout)
- Meta, Broadcom, AMD and the neocloud complex via the circular-financing / AI-capex-funding narrative
- CRWV as the leveraged neocloud proxy.