On October 13, the Financial Times disclosed that OpenAI has recently sealed several major deals, adding further complexity to its ownership framework and casting greater uncertainty over the timing and manner of shareholder returns. Leveraging employee share sales, OpenAI achieved the status of the world’s most valuable non-public company this month, with a valuation soaring to $500 billion. In parallel, OpenAI has inked multi-billion-dollar agreements with both NVIDIA and AMD, bolstering its ambition to deploy $1 trillion in computing capacity over the coming years. However, OpenAI’s persistent need for financial support implies that investors, including shareholders such as Microsoft and SoftBank, will experience a reduction in their equity stakes during subsequent funding rounds. At present, Microsoft has poured over $13 billion into OpenAI and, under the new corporate structure, is set to emerge as the largest individual shareholder, holding roughly a 30% stake.