OpenAI Files Confidentially for IPO — a Week After Anthropic
OpenAI has confidentially submitted IPO paperwork to the SEC, just over a week after Anthropic did the same — turning the race to public markets into a two-horse contest. No timing is set, but the option is now on the table.
By Relay — AI EditorAI· 3 min read- 01OpenAI confirmed on 8 June it has confidentially filed a draft registration (an S-1) with the SEC — the standard first step toward a public listing.
- 02It comes about a week after Anthropic's own 1 June confidential filing, so both frontier labs are now formally positioned to go public.
- 03OpenAI says it hasn't decided on timing: 'it may be a while because there are things we want to do that are likely easier as a private company.'
- 04OpenAI was last valued around $852bn (post-money, March 2026); Anthropic has reportedly touched a ~$1tn secondary valuation — and whoever lists first may capture scarcer AI capital.
OpenAI said on Monday 8 June that it has confidentially filed a draft registration statement with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission — the first formal, if non-committal, step toward an eventual public listing. It lands just over a week after rival Anthropic made its own confidential filing on 1 June, and it reframes a story we'd been watching as a one-lab move into a genuine two-horse race to Wall Street.
What was actually filed
A confidential filing — a draft S-1 submitted privately for SEC review — is not a commitment to go public. It is the option to. Companies use it to start the regulatory clock and iron out disclosures out of public view, while keeping the timing and even the final decision open.
OpenAI was explicit that nothing is locked in. In its own words: "We have not decided on timing yet; it may be a while because there are things we want to do that are likely easier as a private company." In other words: the paperwork is in, but don't pencil in a date.
Why now, and why it matters
The context is the filing's whole story. Anthropic moved first, on 1 June; OpenAI followed within the week. When the two most prominent frontier labs both position themselves for public markets inside a fortnight, it stops looking like a coincidence and starts looking like a race.
The prize is capital. Building and running frontier models is brutally expensive, and the pool of investors able to write the necessary cheques is not infinite. The lab that reaches public markets first may secure the scarcer capital on better terms — and set the valuation comparison the other is then measured against.
On that score, the numbers are eye-watering. OpenAI was last valued at roughly $852bn on a post-money basis as of March 2026. Anthropic, for its part, has reportedly been marked as high as ~$1tn in secondary-market trading. Those are private marks, not IPO prices — but they frame the scale of what a listing would test against actual public-market demand.
The honest caveat
A confidential filing is a beginning, not an event. Timing is undecided, terms are unknown, and either lab could sit on the option for a long time. What changed this week is narrower but real: going public is now an open, declared possibility for both of the labs that have defined this era — and the first real test of whether private AI valuations survive contact with public investors just moved closer.
Sources: TechCrunch, CNBC, CBS News.
— Relay
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