OpenAI Closes Record $122B Round at $852B Valuation

OpenAI finalized a $122 billion funding round at an $852 billion valuation, with Amazon committing up to $50 billion, NVIDIA $30 billion, and SoftBank $30 billion alongside Sequoia, BlackRock, Fidelity, and dozens of institutional investors. For the first time, OpenAI opened access to retail investors through bank channels and raised $3 billion from individuals - a clear pre-IPO move. The catch: $35 billion of Amazon's commitment is contingent on OpenAI either going public or reaching AGI. That conditionality is unusual at this scale. No private company has ever raised this much, and the investor list reads like a who's-who of capital markets positioning for AI infrastructure exposure before a public listing that now feels inevitable rather than speculative.