On November 6, 2026, Bloomberg reported, citing people familiar with the matter, that OpenAI has closed the first tranche of a new funding round worth about $11 billion, valuing the company at $1.25 trillion. Sources said investors wired the money to OpenAI that day, with the rest expected to arrive in the coming weeks and the round totaling up to $20 billion.
Why $11 billion, not $30 billion?
The round is smaller than OpenAI originally planned. Bloomberg reported in late September that OpenAI was seeking $30 billion at a $1.4 trillion valuation; the target has now been cut to $20 billion, and the valuation to $1.25 trillion. TechCrunch, citing Bloomberg, noted that The Wall Street Journal had previously reported roughly $11 billion in investor commitments — the difference this time is that the money has actually arrived. Bloomberg did not name the investors, and OpenAI declined to comment. Still, $1.25 trillion is about 47% above the $852 billion valuation from March this year.
Where will the money go?
A smaller round does not mean OpenAI is short of cash; it looks more like the market starting to price the pace of AI infrastructure spending. The most likely destination remains data centers and compute: OpenAI CFO Sarah Friar told CNBC on November 6 that the company will keep investing in data centers and keep raising capital. On the same day, Anthropic's IPO was also reported to be running into valuation resistance, a sign that investors are tightening their pricing of leading AI companies in parallel. Why Anthropic's IPO valuation is meeting resistance
Three things to watch next: whether the remaining roughly $9 billion arrives on schedule in the coming weeks, based on the $20 billion ceiling; whether the final investor list is disclosed; and whether OpenAI says how the money will be split between data centers and compute. If any of these disappoint, doubts about AI valuations will flare up again.
