{"id":250892,"date":"2026-05-20T18:54:00","date_gmt":"2026-05-20T22:54:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/2026\/05\/20\/when-ai-giants-go-public-will-ordinary-investors-know-if-they-are-along-for-the-ride\/"},"modified":"2026-05-20T19:55:14","modified_gmt":"2026-05-20T23:55:14","slug":"when-ai-giants-go-public-will-ordinary-investors-know-if-they-are-along-for-the-ride","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/2026\/05\/20\/when-ai-giants-go-public-will-ordinary-investors-know-if-they-are-along-for-the-ride\/","title":{"rendered":"When AI giants go public, will ordinary investors know if they are along for the ride?"},"content":{"rendered":"

When AI giants go public, will ordinary investors know if they are along for the ride?<\/a><\/p>\n

https:\/\/theconversation.com\/when-ai-giants-go-public-will-ordinary-investors-know-if-they-are-along-for-the-ride-282963<\/a><\/p>\n

Publish Date: 2026-05-20 18:54:00<\/a><\/p>\n

Source Domain: theconversation.com<\/a><\/p>\n

We\u2019ve heard a lot about the artificial intelligence (AI) boom and how enormous amounts of money are being poured into companies building ever more powerful technologies.<\/p>\n

That boom is now taking a new turn as major AI players edge closer to becoming publicly-traded companies.<\/p>\n

According to reports, OpenAI is preparing to file confidentially for a public listing that could value the ChatGPT maker at hundreds of billions of dollars.
\nRivals including Anthropic (Claude) and Elon Musk\u2019s SpaceX \u2013 which just absorbed xAI (Grok) \u2013 are also moving toward the stock market.<\/p>\n

What many people may not realise, however, is that, through retirement funds, pensions and other managed investments, they could end up owning shares in these giants \u2013 whether they choose to or not.<\/p>\n

And while people might have moral concerns with the AI companies they\u2019re tied to, the greater issue at play is about money, risk and who ends up holding it.<\/p>\n

Where AI\u2019s billions go<\/h2>\n

Building a cutting-edge AI system requires vast numbers of specialised computer chips, running nonstop in data centres that consume enough electricity to power a small city.<\/p>\n

OpenAI plans to spend around US$50 billion on computing power in 2026 alone. In 2017, that same company spent roughly US$30 million, a 1,600-fold increase in less than a decade. OpenAI is targeting roughly US$600 billion in compute spending \u2013 or that in areas such as processing power, data storage and cloud infrastructure \u2013 through to 2030.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s not just OpenAI. The big technology companies are collectively expected to invest around US$650 billion in AI infrastructure in 2026. That\u2019s roughly one-third of Australia\u2019s annual GDP \u2013 or two-and-a-half times New Zealand\u2019s \u2013 being committed to one technology bet in a single year.<\/p>\n

All these expenses must be covered before the companies earn consistent profits. This is why they keep raising money \u2013 and why the question of where that money will eventually come from is…<\/p>\n

Source<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

When AI giants go public, will ordinary investors know if they are along for the…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":250893,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/images.theconversation.com\/files\/737225\/original\/file-20260520-57-qveduo.jpg?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&rect=0%2C469%2C5626%2C2813&q=45&auto=format&w=1356&h=668&fit=crop","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[20],"class_list":["post-250892","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-artificial-intelligence","tag-artificial-intelligence"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/250892"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=250892"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/250892\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":250894,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/250892\/revisions\/250894"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/250893"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=250892"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=250892"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=250892"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}