OpenAI has made a striking offer to the U.S. government, reports the Financial Times. 5 percent of the company behind ChatGPT would be made available, which, at its current valuation, amounts to over $40 billion in shares. CEO Sam Altman says this arrangement would ensure that the public benefits from AI. At the same time, the aim is to have a more positive dialogue with the government about AI models than was recently the case with Anthropic.
The Financial Times cites two sources familiar with the discussions OpenAI is having with the government. Those discussions are still in the early stages.
The idea extends beyond OpenAI alone. Under the proposed arrangement, Washington would acquire a 5 percent stake in every leading U.S. AI company through a government vehicle. Anthropic, Google, and Meta would also cede a comparable stake through a type of sovereign wealth fund similar to those operated by Norway and Saudi Arabia, among others. It is unclear whether these AI companies will cooperate. The White House and the companies involved did not respond to questions from CNBC.
Not without a history
The idea is not new. Altman had already presented the concept to the U.S. government in early 2025. In April, OpenAI explicitly proposed a “public wealth fund” to share the economic benefits of AI with the public. And the government already has experience with this, although it has been on an ad hoc basis so far. For example, Washington acquired a nearly 10 percent stake in Intel last year following an investment of $8.9 billion. In May, Trump even said he should have asked for a larger stake.
The government also invested in nine quantum companies, with IBM as the largest recipient. For Nvidia and AMD, however, Washington opted for a revenue-sharing arrangement based on chip sales to China, rather than an equity stake.
Mounting pressure
That pressure is coming from somewhere. Washington is concerned about the cybersecurity risks posed by AI models and the rise of Chinese open-source models, which are nearly as capable but much cheaper. Last month, Anthropic disabled its advanced Mythos and Fable models to comply with an export restriction. On Tuesday, it was allowed to restore access.
Trump previously described the government’s stake in AI giants as “a wonderful thing” that would make Americans “partners in this revolution.” OpenAI is the most valuable private company, valued at 852 billion dollars, after SpaceX went public with a limited number of shares. On paper, Anthropic is currently worth more than OpenAI, at 965 billion dollars.