OpenAI reportedly pitches US government a 5% equity stake worth about $42.6 billion

OpenAI has reportedly proposed giving the US government a 5% equity stake in the company, a holding worth roughly $42.6 billion against its $852 billion valuation from March 2026. Chief Executive Sam Altman is said to have pitched the idea in early talks with the Trump administration.

If accepted, the arrangement would tie Washington’s balance sheet directly to the AI industry it is also being asked to regulate. The pitch reportedly goes wider than one company: it envisions the federal government holding a 5% stake in each of the leading US AI developers through a government investment vehicle modeled on the Alaska Permanent Fund, the oil-revenue fund that pays annual dividends to Alaska residents.

The discussions are said to have drawn in Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, in what has been described as early, conceptual talks. The reported aim is to defuse political friction over the sector’s growing power by giving taxpayers a direct financial stake in its gains; any deal might require an act of Congress to implement.

The reporting rests on a single account attributed to people familiar with the talks, and neither OpenAI nor the administration has confirmed it; no first-party statement has appeared on OpenAI’s site. It is unclear whether rival developers such as Anthropic, Google or Meta would accept the same terms, or whether the administration will take the offer at all. Handing government an equity position in private AI firms would raise immediate questions about conflicts of interest, procurement and antitrust enforcement against companies the state part-owns.

A formal proposal, or a public rejection from either side, would show whether the idea is a serious policy track or an early trial balloon.