OpenAI, the company behind ChatGPT, lost about $38.5 billion in 2025, according to audited financial documents that surfaced Tuesday, a staggering figure that lands just as the company prepares to sell shares to the public for the first time.
The documents were first reported by technology writer Ed Zitron and independently verified by the Financial Times. They offer a rare look inside one of the most closely watched private companies in the world and arrive days after OpenAI confidentially filed paperwork with the Securities and Exchange Commission for a stock-market debut expected later this year.
The headline number is the loss. OpenAI reported a net loss of roughly $38.5 billion in 2025, compared with about $5 billion a year earlier. However, most of that increase came from a one-time accounting charge of approximately $41.5 billion related to the company’s conversion from a nonprofit into a for-profit entity. Excluding that and other one-time items, the loss was closer to $8 billion. The company’s operating loss — what it spent beyond revenue to run the business — was approximately $21 billion.
Revenue, by contrast, was the bright spot. Sales reached $13.07 billion in 2025, more than triple the $3.7 billion OpenAI brought in during 2024 and ahead of the company’s own internal target of $10 billion. Few private companies ever reach that size. The problem is what it costs to get there.
OpenAI spent about $34 billion last year, far more than it took in. The biggest line item was research and development at roughly $19 billion, followed by nearly $6 billion on sales and marketing. Running ChatGPT and training newer models requires enormous banks of computer chips, vast data centers, and large amounts of electricity, and those costs climb with every new user and every question answered.
Unlike traditional software businesses, where serving one more customer is almost free, each AI request carries a real and recurring expense.
Much of that money flows to Microsoft, OpenAI’s largest partner and the provider of the cloud computing infrastructure behind its products. The documents show OpenAI paid Microsoft approximately $17.2 billion in 2025, while Microsoft paid roughly $303 million back. That dependence is one reason the two companies remain closely linked, and why OpenAI’s spending affects chipmakers, power companies, and data-center builders across the economy.
Here is why this matters beyond Silicon Valley.
OpenAI is preparing to ask public investors — including retirement accounts, pension funds, and ordinary Americans saving for the future — to buy into a company generating extraordinary revenue growth while still losing billions of dollars annually.
The leaked financials provide the clearest look yet at one of the central questions facing the AI revolution: can the companies leading this race eventually turn explosive growth into sustainable profits?
There are reasons for optimism in the numbers.
The company is becoming more efficient. In 2024, OpenAI spent approximately $2.37 for every dollar of revenue it generated. In 2025, that figure improved to roughly $1.60. If that trend continues, and if OpenAI can either raise prices or reduce the cost of developing new models, a path toward profitability exists.
Chief Executive Officer Sam Altman has told investors he expects revenue to reach $100 billion in the coming years.
OpenAI is also not alone in spending heavily. Rivals including Google, Meta, xAI, and Anthropic are pouring money into the same race, each pushing to release more capable AI systems, often before the economics are fully settled.
That competition can force prices lower while keeping costs elevated, making profitability difficult across the industry.
For now, the leaked documents leave investors with one hard question as the IPO approaches.
The demand for AI is real.
The revenue is real.
What remains unproven is whether any company — OpenAI included — can turn the most expensive technology race in modern business into one that consistently generates profits.
OpenAI declined to comment on the figures.
Wall Street — JBizNews Desk
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