Sam Altman’s OpenAI might be burning $1 billion a month. That is a lot of cash gone. Conversion rates? Barely above 5%. ChatGPT users refuse to pay. Rivals are closing in. Anthropic’s Claude Mythos has all the hype. Google just refreshed Gemini. It feels like a losing battle on the surface.
But investors still see a golden ticket. Maybe worth $1 trillion.
The window just cracked open. Why? Because Elon Musk’s lawsuit got dismissed. Not on merit. A technicality.
Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley sources told the Wall Street Journal that paperwork could hit regulators by this Friday. Plans are still “fluid” according to the WSJ, but the NYSE debut is reportedly set for September. Soon. Very soon.
Musing on timing: Why wait when the money is still hot?
Musk won’t stay quiet. He plans to appeal. An IPO for a company nominally run by a nonprofit might actually help his argument about fraud during the for-profit transition. Irony loves irony. Musk is currently busy with his own potential payday anyway. SpaceX is reportedly filing IPO paperwork this week too. After snapping up xAI, they are ready for prime time.
So Altman is stealing some of Musk’s thunder. Their rivalry is personal. But will Altman get rich? That’s unclear.
The CEO admitted in court that he holds investments. Not directly. Through Y Combinator. The Silicon Valley incubator he ran. An open secret confirmed on the record.
Back in 2023. He told the U.S. Senate. Zero financial stake. Per The Atlantic. That’s what he said. Now GOP members of the House Oversight are poking around. They want to know about deals between OpenAI and other companies where Altman holds skin in the game.
Reputation? Always tricky when you tell people what they want to hear. The bandwagon feels like it’s wobbling. Yet the check is writing itself. Size unknown. Speed fast.
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Disclosure: Ziff Davis (Mashable’s parent) sued OpenAI in April 2025. Allegations? Copyright infringement during training. Legal noise never really stops.
