OpenAI in 2025: losses skyrocket to $38.5 billion — analysis of a catastrophic financial model
OpenAI's financial results for 2025 show a worrying trend: the company's net loss reached $38.5 billion, nearly eight times the figure from the previous year. These numbers, derived from audited reports, paint a picture of a sector where the race for computing power devours any monetization.
A comparison with 2024 highlights the scale of the problem. At that time, revenue was $3.7 billion with expenses of $12.48 billion. The operating loss was $8.78 billion, and the net loss, including interest income and expenses, reached $8.84 billion. After writing off $3.74 billion for non-controlling interests, the company's own loss was $5.09 billion.
In 2025, the situation worsened dramatically. Revenue grew to $13.07 billion, but expenses surged to $34 billion. The operating loss skyrocketed to $20.92 billion. The key cost item—research and development—absorbed $19.18 billion. Cost of revenue was $7.5 billion, while sales and marketing accounted for $5.73 billion.
Transition to a Commercial Structure and One-Time Write-Offs
2025 was a turning point for OpenAI in terms of corporate structure. The transition from a non-profit to a commercial organization resulted in a one-time loss of $41.55 billion due to the revaluation of the fair value of convertible instruments and warrants. Taking this into account, the net loss could have reached $60.35 billion, but the company managed to reduce it to $38.53 billion by excluding $17.87 billion and an additional $3.95 billion through items related to non-controlling interests.
Dependence on Microsoft: $17.2 Billion in Expenses
An analysis of cross-payments reveals a critical dependence on the technology partner. By the end of the year, OpenAI's assets exceeded $50 billion, with nearly half in cash. In 2025, SoftBank paid the company $867 million, and Microsoft paid $303 million.
However, the reverse flow of funds was enormous. Over the calendar year, OpenAI paid Microsoft $10.59 billion under "research and development"—likely the cost of training models. Another $6.047 billion went to cost of revenue, $527 million to sales and marketing, and $42 million to administrative expenses. Total expenses in favor of Microsoft amounted to $17.2 billion.
At the end of the year, OpenAI's liabilities to Microsoft reached $3.64 billion, plus $21 million in accrued and other current liabilities and $58 million in long-term liabilities.
Expert opinion from Cryptalist: OpenAI's numbers expose a fundamental problem in the entire AI industry: the cost of servicing billions of daily queries on expensive chips is multiple times higher than revenue. The company has already contracted about $600 billion in future data center expenses. While investors still believe in future monetization, the current model resembles a pyramid, where increasingly massive capital infusions are needed to sustain growth. For the crypto industry, this is a mirror: the same risks of overheating and dependence on hype.