A Private Share Sale That Minted Hundreds of Millionaires
OpenAI’s internal share sale in October 2025 marked one of the most dramatic employee wealth events in recent tech history. The company allowed current and former staff to sell shares they had earned through employment, rather than issuing new stock. Up to 600 employees participated, collectively selling USD 6.6 billion (approx. RM30.36 billion) worth of equity to outside investors. Around 75 staff members hit the individual sale cap, each reportedly cashing out as much as USD 30 million (approx. RM138.2 million). For many early developers behind ChatGPT, this was the first chance to realise gains since the chatbot’s launch in late 2022, due to a two‑year holding requirement. The transaction instantly converted years of paper gains into real fortunes, turning an internal equity program into a headline example of AI company wealth.
How the Tender Offer Worked and Why It Stayed Private
The OpenAI share sale was structured as a secondary tender offer, designed to provide liquidity without taking the company public. Instead of raising fresh capital, OpenAI facilitated a marketplace where outside investors bought shares directly from eligible employees. Earlier, the firm had revised its internal stock‑sale rules in June 2024 to broaden participation, reducing bottlenecks for staff hoping to monetise their equity compensation. In a previous round, sales were capped at USD 10 million (approx. RM46.07 million) per employee, but the latest tender tripled that ceiling, reflecting intense investor demand for scarce private AI equity. By keeping the sale capped and controlled, OpenAI allowed workers to access significant cash while limiting mass exits and preserving a large pool of unsold equity on its cap table, maintaining flexibility ahead of any potential IPO.
Unprecedented AI Valuations and the Scale of Employee Wealth
The tender’s size underscores how rapidly AI company valuations have expanded and how deeply employees are now tied to that value creation. OpenAI was valued at around USD 1 billion (approx. RM4.61 billion) in 2019, rising to USD 29 billion (approx. RM133.77 billion) by 2023 after the launch of ChatGPT and major backing from Microsoft. Reporting now pegs its worth at about USD 852 billion (approx. RM3.93 trillion), with speculation it could pursue an initial public offering at roughly USD 1 trillion (approx. RM4.61 trillion). Against this backdrop, some early equity grants may have appreciated more than 100‑fold. The October 2025 tender offered a snapshot of that wealth in motion, converting a portion of OpenAI’s soaring valuation into tangible gains for staff while still leaving vast, unrealised upside inside the company for both employees and investors.
Greg Brockman’s Stake and Investor Appetite for Future Upside
The wealth created by OpenAI’s equity pool extends far beyond the 2025 tender. In court testimony in May 2026, president Greg Brockman disclosed that his personal stake in the company is worth roughly USD 30 billion (approx. RM138.2 billion), despite not having invested his own money at the firm’s founding. This figure serves as another marker of the enormous value now concentrated in leading AI platforms. Investors such as Gene Munster of Deepwater Asset Management argue that the tender and large insider stakes do not signal a peak, but rather confirm a long runway for growth. He has suggested OpenAI could still evolve into a “multitrillion‑dollar public company someday.” That perspective helps explain why investors were eager to buy into an employee‑focused share sale, even after billions of dollars in paper wealth had already been unlocked.
What OpenAI’s Sale Signals for AI Talent and Equity Compensation
OpenAI’s internal sale sets a powerful precedent for compensation strategies across the AI sector. As competition for top researchers and engineers intensifies, equity compensation and employee stock options are becoming as critical as salary in attracting and retaining talent. The fact that roughly 75 staff members could each sell up to USD 30 million (approx. RM138.2 million) of stock, while hundreds of others became millionaires, signals that working at a leading AI company can generate venture‑scale outcomes for employees, not just founders and investors. Some staff reportedly chose to donate portions of their windfall to charitable investment funds, highlighting broader social implications of this new AI wealth. With rivals such as Anthropic also preparing for large liquidity events, OpenAI’s tender illustrates how secondary share sales may become a standard tool for sharing upside with employees while companies remain private for longer.