Financial documents show that OpenAI expects to rack up massive annual losses before – hopefully – finally pivoting to meaningful profits by 2030. Anthropic, a rival AI startup, is expected to break even much sooner. That’s probably because Sam Altman is betting on worldwide dominance.
The financial numbers, shared with investors this summer and now obtained by The Wall Street Journal (WSJ), are staggering.
OpenAI reportedly expects to lose billions of dollars every year for quite some time, including $74 billion in 2028, and to only finally make “meaningful” money by 2030.
In other words, it’s gonna get worse before it gets better. The company, now valued at $500 billion, already believes it will burn through $9 billion this year, and in 2028, the aforementioned $74 billion in operating losses will equal roughly 75% of OpenAI’s revenue.
Altman wants to keep spending
To many experts, this sort of financial road map simply seems unsustainable, especially because investors are increasingly concerned about wild AI spending and whether there will be enough revenue to pay for expensive AI infrastructure.
Doubts are also rising about an AI bubble because Anthropic, a competing AI firm, is expected to do significantly better.
True, Anthropic burns cash at a similar rate relative to revenue right now, but their paths are projected to split dramatically. Dario Amodei’s company forecasts its cash burn to drop to one-third of revenue in 2026 and 9% by 2027. Profit is envisioned by 2028, according to the WSJ.
Curious what others think about this story? Contribute your thoughts to the debate below.
OpenAI’s CEO Sam Altman – who recently signed off on $1.4 trillion of commitments for new computing deals with Nvidia and other cloud and chip giants – is, of course, not worried at all. To him, massive spending is a strategic necessity.
“We believe the risk to OpenAI of not having enough computing power is more significant and more likely than the risk of having too much,” Altman said last week on X before denying his company is going to ask for a government bailout.
I would like to clarify a few things.
undefined Sam Altman (@sama) November 6, 2025
First, the obvious one: we do not have or want government guarantees for OpenAI datacenters. We believe that governments should not pick winners or losers, and that taxpayers should not bail out companies that make bad business decisions or…
But why is the difference so stark, anyway? Indeed, OpenAI’s aggressive growth strategy seems to hinge on massive upfront investment in computing infrastructure, chips, and data centers. The hope is for all this risky investment to pay off if demand continues to surge.
“Demand for AI exceeds available compute supply today,” an OpenAI spokesman told the WSJ. “Every dollar we invest in AI infrastructure goes to serving the hundreds of millions of consumers, businesses and developers who rely on ChatGPT to get more done.”
Amodei’s cautious approach
Some consultancies estimate that even now, tech companies aren’t investing enough in computing power. Still, Anthropic’s path is much more cautious.
The company is mostly focusing on a growing number of satisfied business users because of the superior capabilities of its Claude chatbot in coding and other areas, and costs are growing at a pace more in line with revenue.
Plus, Dario Amodei’s startup, currently valued at $183 billion, is avoiding OpenAI’s shiny but costly projects like image and video generation, which require much more computing power. Coders love Claude, too.
It remains to be seen which approach will prove to be smarter. Risk is brave at the moment, though, because AI-exposed stocks are currently falling. Nvidia lost 7% last week and slipped another 3% on Tuesday. Meta and Palantir are also down.
Stocks will undoubtedly bounce back but it’s unclear when exactly because the sustainability of the boom is shrouded in more doubt every day. The gulf between spending on AI infrastructure and AI revenue is consistently widening.
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