OpenAI completed the receipt of $11 billion on Friday, November 6, as part of a funding round that values the company at $1.25 trillion — significantly below the $1.4 trillion it initially sought and from a fundraising target slashed from over $30 billion. The funds were wired to the company's account, according to Bloomberg, with the remainder of the round, which could total up to $20 billion, expected to close in the coming weeks.
The decline is not merely numerical. It reflects a genuine shift in investor appetite for the artificial intelligence sector, an industry that grew in euphoria and now faces serious questioning about the relationship between astronomical infrastructure spending and the ability to generate returns. The Nasdaq lost 5.5% on Thursday, November 5 — its worst day since April 2025 — and entered correction territory, dropping 10% from its recent high. The selloff spread to Asia and Europe.
Why the cut from $30 billion to $11 billion matters
OpenAI had announced in September 2026 that it was seeking to raise more than $30 billion in its most recent round. In October, the target was already trimmed to $20 billion. Now, with $11 billion closed, the company is raising less than half of what it originally intended, in a round that values the company at $1.25 trillion — $150 billion less than it sought.
The reasons are twofold. On one hand, the results of the US midterm elections, with a sweeping Democratic victory in Congress and across numerous state governorships, created uncertainty about the industry's ability to build data centers — many voters strongly oppose these facilities. On the other hand, institutional investors are starting to ask difficult questions: when will AI infrastructure pay back the investment? The answer, so far, is not clear.
Who paid the $11 billion
According to Bloomberg sources, the first-tranche investors were Coatue Management and T. Rowe Price — technology-specialized funds with a history of investment in high-growth companies. The broader round, which has not yet closed, includes SoftBank Group, Sequoia Capital, Founders Fund, Andreessen Horowitz, and a consortium of investors from the United Arab Emirates.
But the interesting detail is that OpenAI is also working with investment banks to raise capital from high-net-worth individual investors — dentists, lawyers, doctors. This is a rare signal of stress in the institutional market: when a company needs to go after retail investors to complete a round, it means the major funds are hesitant.
The context: Anthropic and valuation pressure
The OpenAI news came hours after Bloomberg reported that investors in Anthropic's planned IPO are valuing a substantially lower valuation than the company sought. Some potential buyers estimate that Anthropic could be valued at around $1.1 trillion, far below the $2 trillion that was expected a month ago. This reflects a broader scenario: even the largest AI companies are facing valuation pressure.
Anthropic, which plans its IPO in November under the ticker "ANT" on the Nasdaq, disclosed third-quarter results showing revenue of $17 billion — a sequential growth of 47%, but a significant slowdown from the 144% in the previous quarter. The company holds $96 billion in cash and $36 billion in short-term investments, which provides some resilience, but it doesn't change the central question: whether the numbers justify the valuation.
OpenAI's response
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and company president Brad Brockman have been consistent in asserting that the company is ready for an IPO in 2027. Brockman told Reuters that the majority of OpenAI's sales now come from the enterprise sector — which is a sign of maturity, but also of the need for more capital to continue competing.
Sarah Friar, OpenAI's CFO, told CNBC that the company will continue to invest in data center infrastructure despite the midterm results. The posture is the same: the money is already being spent, and the company will not slow down. But the question is whether this pace of spending is sustainable in a scenario of pressured valuations and increasingly demanding investors.
OpenAI completed roughly $122 billion in financing in March 2026, when it was valued at about $852 billion. If the current round closes at $20 billion, the total invested in the company will exceed $130 billion — an amount that requires extraordinary returns to justify.
What makes this round especially interesting is not the size of the $11 billion already received, but what it reveals about the capital market for AI: euphoria has given way to caution, and the gap between the valuation founders expect and what the market is willing to pay is wider than ever.
Sources: TechCrunch, The Decoder, Eletsonline CIO
✓ Independent sources cross-checked and verified before publishing
