OpenAI Valuation Holds at $1.25 Trillion as $11 Billion Comes In

The OpenAI valuation is holding at $1.25 trillion, but the money is arriving in smaller pieces. OpenAI has closed on roughly $11 billion of new funding, the first part of a round that values the company at $1.25 trillion, Bloomberg reported on Friday, November 6, citing people familiar with the matter. The funds were wired to the company as of Friday, and OpenAI declined to comment.

The rest of the round, which could reach as much as $20 billion in total, is expected to close in the coming weeks, one person told Bloomberg. TechCrunch and Investing.com carried the same figures. That is well short of what OpenAI first set out to raise: $30 billion or more at a $1.4 trillion valuation, according to Bloomberg's earlier reporting.

$11B

Closed so far, per Bloomberg

$1.25T

Valuation for the new round

$20B

Possible total, down from $30B+

$852B

Valuation in the March round

What changed since the target was cut

A week ago the story was a cut. On October 30 the Financial Times reported that OpenAI had trimmed its target to about $20 billion at $1.25 trillion after some investors reduced their allocations, which we covered in OpenAI Funding Round Cut to $20 Billion at a $1.25 Trillion Value. Friday's report is the first sign that money has actually moved at the lower terms.

Two things stand out. The valuation did not slip again, even though public AI stocks fell sharply in between. And the first close, at $11 billion, is a little over half of the reduced $20 billion target and roughly a third of the original ambition. Bloomberg said talks have run for more than a month, since OpenAI delayed plans to go public.

For context, OpenAI raised $122 billion in March at an $852 billion valuation, according to Bloomberg and Investing.com. Measured against that round, $1.25 trillion is still a step up of about 47%. Measured against the $1.4 trillion it wanted, it is $150 billion less.

Who is putting money in

None of the main reports listed the investors in this first close. Gulf News, citing investment sources, reported that SoftBank and MGX, the UAE state-backed investor, took part. Gulf News also gave the valuation OpenAI first sought as $1.5 trillion, which differs from Bloomberg's $1.4 trillion; we use Bloomberg's figure. When the target was cut a week ago, Reuters and Bloomberg had named an MGX-led group from the United Arab Emirates as the expected largest participant, with SoftBank also in the round.

Why the round shrank: the AI selloff

The money landed the day after one of the worst sessions for tech stocks in years. On Thursday, November 5, the Nasdaq Composite fell more than 5% and the S&P 500 more than 4%, both their worst days since April 4, 2025, CNBC reported. The S&P 500 technology sector dropped 7.30%, its worst day since March 16, 2020, and the Magnificent Seven lost more than $1 trillion in market value. Nvidia alone gave up more than $440 billion and wiped out its gains for the year. IBTimes reported the same figures. We covered the session in AI Stocks Crash: Chip Index Falls 12%.

Bloomberg tied OpenAI's scaled-back plans to that public market rout and to worries about data center buildouts after the midterm elections. Private valuations usually trail public ones, but the investors writing these checks watch the same screens. Markets bounced on Friday after losing more than $2.5 trillion in value on Thursday, PBS NewsHour noted, but one good day does not reset the price that late-stage investors are willing to pay.

OpenAI valuation vs Anthropic

The comparison investors now make is with Anthropic, which is preparing an initial public offering. Potential IPO buyers see Anthropic's valuation as low as $1.1 trillion, Bloomberg reported, according to TechCrunch, compared with the roughly $2 trillion investors expected about a month earlier. If that holds, a listed Anthropic could end up priced below a private OpenAI, and the public price will become the yardstick for OpenAI's own listing, which TechCrunch said is expected next year. We looked at the doubts around Anthropic's price in Anthropic Valuation Doubts and at its filing in Anthropic IPO: S-1 Shows a $17B Quarter.

What the AI Bubble Index says

The AI Bubble Index read 63.9 after Friday's close, in its Normal band, up from 62.9 a week earlier and from 62.7 after Thursday's rout. The sentiment and attention family remains the hottest part of the reading at 92.5, while the demand gap is the coolest at 40.1. Fragility, at 69.8, sits slightly above Euphoria at 66.5. A private funding round does not feed into the index directly; it shows up later, if at all, through the market prices and spending data the index tracks. You can follow each family on the dashboard.

Late-stage rounds that shrink while holding their price are a familiar pattern in cooling markets. Our guide to AI investment risks explains why private valuations tend to adjust slowly, and why the size of the check is often the earlier signal.