OpenAI Races to Lock In ~$30 Billion Round at Over $1.4 Trillion Valuation Ahead of Anthropic's Expected November IPO

OpenAI is moving quickly to lock in roughly $30 billion in new financing at a valuation of more than $1.4 trillion, according to Reuters, citing two people familiar with the matter. The talks are described as fast-moving and not yet finalized, and the ChatGPT maker is trying to get investor commitments in place before rival Anthropic's expected public market debut in mid-November.

A compressed timeline aimed at Anthropic's IPO window

Reuters, in reporting carried by The Straits Times and Calcalistech, says the rapid timetable partly reflects a desire by OpenAI to get ahead of Anthropic, since the two frontier labs increasingly draw on a similar investor base. Sources told Reuters that OpenAI held meetings with long-only funds and sovereign wealth funds last week, the same week Anthropic was hosting its own investor day. Some investors view the financing push, per those sources, as an attempt to lock in capital that might otherwise flow toward Anthropic's listing. OpenAI is also said to want the round closed before Anthropic's financial disclosures give investors a fuller picture of its business, disclosures that could in turn prompt investors to press OpenAI's chief financial officer, Sarah Friar, for more detail on revenue growth and outlook.

From $852 billion to $1.4 trillion: the valuation math

OpenAI was last valued at $852 billion in March following a record $122 billion round that included a commitment from Amazon to invest up to $50 billion, Reuters reported. A summary of Bloomberg reporting published on LinkedIn describes the new $1.4 trillion figure as a pre-money valuation and frames it as a 64% step-up from the March round's $852 billion post-money mark. That arithmetic is consistent with the reported operands: ($1,400bn − $852bn) ÷ $852bn ≈ 64.3%. The same summary says Bloomberg had previously reported a lower $1.2 trillion target before the figure moved upward during negotiations, and that OpenAI's valuation has compounded across three successive rounds from $300 billion to $852 billion to $1.4 trillion in roughly 18 months.

The revenue pitch and the accounting dispute

Reuters reports that OpenAI is pitching investors on annualized revenue of $50 billion, which it says accelerated after the launch of its GPT-6 Astra model, with an expectation of reaching $70 billion by year-end, according to one person familiar with the matter. The same Bloomberg-sourced LinkedIn summary sets a $1.4 trillion pre-money figure against an annualized run rate reported to be approaching $70 billion and puts the implied revenue multiple at roughly 20x, consistent with the underlying arithmetic ($1,400bn ÷ $70bn ≈ 20). Reuters also reports that OpenAI has cut prices on its cheaper models, saying this has boosted usage, and has told investors it can lower AI model prices further.

Notably, Reuters reports that OpenAI records revenue on a net basis, subtracting partner shares upfront, and has accused Anthropic of inflating its revenue by counting the full gross value of contracts sold through third-party cloud providers. Anthropic has told Reuters it follows established accounting practices. The dispute underscores why direct revenue comparisons between the two labs are contentious, and why OpenAI may prefer to set its own valuation terms before such comparisons become unavoidable.

Who is in the room

According to Reuters, SoftBank Group, Abu Dhabi-based MGX and other existing OpenAI backers are in talks to join the roughly $30 billion round, per one source. None of this has been confirmed publicly: OpenAI and SoftBank declined to comment, while Anthropic and MGX did not immediately respond to Reuters' requests for comment.

Why OpenAI says it needs the cash

Investors familiar with the company told Reuters that OpenAI needs capital both to fund substantial infrastructure commitments and to bolster its balance sheet in case weaker IPO markets further delay its planned 2027 listing. OpenAI has already ruled out a 2026 listing, citing unresolved safety and alignment concerns. Speaking to Fortune, as reported in late September by Yahoo Finance, CEO Sam Altman said: "Right now would be an ill-advised moment to go public, and we don't feel pressure on that." That same late-September report says both OpenAI and Anthropic have filed the confidential paperwork needed to go public, with Anthropic expected to debut this fall.

Anthropic's own valuation debate

Reuters reports that some existing and prospective Anthropic investors have argued for a debut valuation closer to $1.5 trillion rather than the company's desired $2 trillion, after third-quarter results fell short of expectations. Edward Best, co-chair of capital markets at Willkie Farr & Gallagher, who is not working on the deal and commented on a hypothetical basis, told Reuters: "OpenAI could want to set its own valuation and not have to worry about a comp (comparison). It's really a two-horse race in terms of being public."

The market backdrop investors are watching

Reuters notes that the fundraising push is unfolding against a jittery backdrop for AI infrastructure financing. Cloud provider CoreWeave has been at the center of recent concerns, with its shares and debt tumbling last week as investors scrutinized nearly $50 billion in borrowings used to fund its expansion. Separately, companies in the Philadelphia Semiconductor Index, viewed as a proxy for AI-related chip demand, have shed $1.6 trillion in market value in less than two weeks, per Reuters. Several planned listings, including Blackstone-backed AirTrunk REIT, Nvidia-backed Firmus and SoftBank-backed SB Energy, have been pulled or paused, and nuclear services company Holtec withdrew its U.S. listing last month, citing what it called a "perfect storm" driven mainly by uncertainty around data-center demand.

Bottom Line

The reported terms, a roughly $30 billion raise at a pre-money valuation above $1.4 trillion, would be the latest in a sequence of three successive rounds that Bloomberg-sourced reporting says has carried OpenAI's valuation from $300 billion to $852 billion to $1.4 trillion in roughly 18 months, and would arrive just as Anthropic's own valuation ambitions are reportedly being pared back by some investors. None of the figures, participants or final terms have been confirmed by OpenAI, SoftBank, MGX or Anthropic, and the deal, as Reuters makes clear, is not yet final. What is established in the reporting is the backdrop: a compressed fundraising timetable, competing revenue claims, and a broader AI infrastructure market where financing strains at firms like CoreWeave and a $1.6 trillion drawdown in semiconductor valuations are already testing investor appetite.