OpenAI offers the US government 5%: a $42.6 billion goodwill play
OpenAI has proposed handing about 5% of its equity to a US government-linked public wealth fund — a stake worth roughly $42.6 billion at its $852 billion valuation.
OpenAI has proposed handing roughly 5% of its equity to a vehicle linked to the United States government — a stake worth close to $42.6 billion at the company’s recent $852 billion valuation. The proposal, first reported by the Financial Times in early July, is Sam Altman’s boldest move yet to defuse the political pressure building on the company in Washington.
Why does OpenAI want to give shares to the US government?
Altman’s argument is that giving the public a direct financial interest in the company is the best way to share the upside of artificial intelligence. The stake would sit in a public wealth fund modelled on the Alaska Permanent Fund, the fund that has distributed oil dividends to Alaska residents for decades — with returns potentially flowing straight to American citizens. And the plan doesn’t stop at OpenAI: the idea is for the other leading AI labs to contribute similar stakes.
Will the proposal actually happen?
Not so fast. The talks are preliminary, and any formal step would likely require congressional approval, which complicates the path considerably. Altman first pitched the concept to the Trump administration in early 2025, and in April formally proposed creating the fund. The timing is no accident: the company faces growing political scrutiny, weeks after it opened GPT-5.6 to a restricted group of users.
It is quite the portrait of an era: the most valuable company in AI history offering a piece of itself to the state, before the state decides to help itself. Generosity or political insurance — the $42 billion will tell.
By Oliver Grant
Image: (top)Cezary p(bottom)MattWade / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0)
