Can You Buy OpenAI Stock?

We’re not going to make you scroll through an entire article for your answer: OpenAI is not a publicly-traded company, so you can't buy its shares on a stock exchange.

But OpenAI shares may be available to accredited investors on certain pre-IPO marketplaces, and there are some publicly-traded funds that have some exposure to OpenAI. Also, one of OpenAI’s partners is a blue-chip technology company that anyone can invest in. And if you have any interest in AI stocks or tech stocks in general, you may find it worthwhile to keep up on the latest news from OpenAI.

» You can also check out the top-performing AI ETFs.

What is OpenAI?

OpenAI is a California-based artificial intelligence research organization led by tech entrepreneur Sam Altman. It’s the developer of the generative pre-trained transformer (GPT) AI models that power popular AI products like ChatGPT, DALL-E and Sora.

OpenAI’s mission, according to its charter, is to “ensure that artificial general intelligence (AGI) — by which we mean highly autonomous systems that outperform humans at most economically valuable work — benefits all of humanity^[0]

The organization is widely perceived as being on the cutting-edge of AI development. It also plays a prominent role in AI safety — the study and practice of avoiding conflict between AI and humans — although its approach to AI safety has been controversial.

Can you buy OpenAI stock?

As previously mentioned, you can’t buy OpenAI stock with a normal brokerage account because it isn’t a publicly-traded company.

» Need to back up a bit? Check out our primer on how to buy stocks.

OpenAI has an unusual structure consisting of a nonprofit organization (OpenAI, Inc.) and a for-profit company (OpenAI Global, LLC) that is owned by that nonprofit organization. The nonprofit, OpenAI, Inc. is led by a board of directors consisting of experts on technology and economics, and is focused on guiding the development of AI in a safe and ethical way.

OpenAI employees have equity in the for-profit company, OpenAI Global, which owns the rights to OpenAI’s models and generates revenue by licensing them out to users.

OpenAI Global’s profit margins are “capped” at 100 times the initial investment on a project, which is why it is allowed to operate as a for-profit subsidiary of the nonprofit OpenAI, Inc ^[0]

Buying OpenAI shares on private markets

In September 2024, reports emerged that OpenAI may soon restructure itself into a for-profit corporation and remove nonprofit control. It is not yet known when this change would go into effect, or whether it will happen at all.

But since then, OpenAI shares have become available on certain private marketplaces for accredited investors (people who have a net worth of at least $1 million, or more than $200,000 in annual earned income over the last two years, or certain financial professional licenses). Below is a list of marketplaces that offer OpenAI equity to accredited investors:

• Forge Global.

• Upmarket.

• EquityZen.

• Hiive.

• Nasdaq Private Market.

• Zorion.

• Ace Management Partners.

Even if you meet the wealth requirements to buy private OpenAI shares, it's worth considering that they are likely to be a pricey, complicated and risky investment that may not be easy to sell. Pre-IPO equity marketplaces are notoriously illiquid — there isn't a constant flow of buy and sell orders like you'd find on a major stock exchange, which means that not as many transactions happen and prices don't change as fast.

Typically, shares of nonpublic companies are a very long-term investment. OpenAI investors wouldn't be able to sell their shares on the open market unless OpenAI shed its partial-nonprofit structure and completed an initial public offering (IPO), and there's no telling when (or even if) that'll happen.

Investing in OpenAI via funds

There's another way to get some exposure to OpenAI equity, and it's generally available to all investors, accredited or not: certain publicly-traded funds such as Ark Venture Fund, SuRo Capital and Fundrise Innovation Fund.

But there are caveats here as well. These funds generally invest in multiple nonpublic companies, and aren't a "pure play" on OpenAI. Also, some are interval funds, meaning that investors can only buy or sell on certain dates (which may be quarterly, semiannually or annually).

If you're considering investing in OpenAI via a fund, make sure you read the fine print to make sure you understand how much exposure to OpenAI the fund actually has, and whether there are any limitations on when and how you can buy or sell.

Can you invest in OpenAI’s partners?

If you’re looking to invest in a company that has a substantial relationship with OpenAI, there’s really only one option: Microsoft (MSFT), which invested $1 billion in the organization in 2019.

Two other publicly-traded companies donated to OpenAI at its inception: Amazon (AMZN) and Infosys (INFY). However, neither has reportedly maintained much of a relationship with OpenAI since then.

» Get our primer on stock research.

Microsoft, on the other hand, has only deepened its ties with OpenAI over time. In January 2023, it announced an additional $10 billion investment in OpenAI — about a third of the organization’s market value at the time.

Then, in February 2023, the company announced that it would integrate AI technology developed by OpenAI into its Bing search engine, its Edge web browser and several other products^[0]

» Dive deeper into big tech with our overview of the FAANG stocks

The bottom line on OpenAI

OpenAI isn't like, say, Apple — you can't buy its shares on a normal stock exchange — but that doesn’t mean the organization isn't on investors' radars.

It’s the most prominent AI developer in the world. It’s at the center of many conversations about what AI safety means — and what a benevolent AGI might look like. And it’s worth hundreds of billions of dollars.

At the time of writing, there’s no way to invest directly in OpenAI unless you're an accredited investor — and the only available indirect investments in the organization are Microsoft and certain special funds. But that could change in the future, if OpenAI continues to be in the vanguard of AI research.

» Interested in other AI investments? Learn how to buy NVIDIA stock (NVDA)