Sam Altman’s OpenAI empire is imploding fast. Ed Zitron’s reports on the financial black hole at its heart have been confirmed by the Financial Times, and key execs are exodusing faster than even Sam can say, “IPO at a trillion-dollar valuation or nothing.”
Tons of news, let’s move fast.
The Mighty FT Confirms Ed Zitron’s Reporting
And if you know the kinds of things Ed Zitron’s been reporting about OpenAI’s finances, you know that’s really really, really bad…for Altman and OpenAI.
And maybe for the whole LLM-based US economy.
Here’s what Ed found, and FT confirmed:
OpenAI spent $34bn last year as the ChatGPT maker poured money into a race to dominate the fast-growing AI market ahead of a planned stock market listing.
Audited financial figures confirmed by people familiar with the matter show the company spent about $19bn on research and development in 2025 and nearly $6bn on sales and marketing, as well as other costs.
The spending figures, up sharply from the previous year, offer a rare glimpse into the economics underpinning the AI boom, particularly OpenAI’s lavish outlay to build models, fund data centres and recruit top researchers.
The numbers, which were first shared with the FT by independent journalist Ed Zitron, suggest OpenAI’s revenues are outstripped by rising costs. OpenAI booked about $13bn in revenue last year. By the end of 2025 it was generating $2bn in monthly revenue, up from $1bn a quarter at the end of 2024, making it one of the fastest-growing businesses in history.
But heavy spending contributed to a nearly eightfold increase in the net loss attributable to OpenAI, which soared from $5bn in 2024 to around $39bn in 2025. A person familiar with the matter said the large majority of that jump reflected a non-cash accounting charge linked to the company’s previous structure rather than its underlying operations.
Before we go back to the FT’s “person familiar with the matter”, let’s also look at some numbers from the WSJ, via Gary Marcus
