Rubbish Check
CNBC Top News · 8 October 2026
source“Nvidia, Oracle, CoreWeave and other AI stocks sink on OpenAI revenue report”
R2/ 10
Lightly altered
Rubbish Rating — 1 = base fact, 10 = pure rubbish
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In short
Rubbish Talk rates CNBC's headline on AI stocks sinking over OpenAI's revenue disclosure a 2/10 because the stock moves were real and the article explains the methodology gap behind the $50bn/$68bn discrepancy in its second paragraph, not buried.
The Verdict
Lightly altered. The headline states a true cause-and-effect (OpenAI revenue news, AI stocks down) and the body immediately surfaces the key nuance, that the higher $68bn figure included partner gross revenue, within two sentences. The only soft spot is calling a leaked investor-presentation detail a "revenue report," a label other outlets also used.
What actually happened
OpenAI told investors its annualized revenue hit roughly $50 billion at the end of September, confirmed by CNBC and first reported by the Financial Times. A person familiar with the matter said the $68 billion figure included gross revenue from OpenAI's partners, which helps investors make a more direct comparison with its chief rival, Anthropic. AI-linked stocks including Nvidia, Oracle and CoreWeave fell the same day.
Key facts
- OpenAI's annualized revenue stands at approximately $50bn as of September, about $20bn below figures previously reported to investors.
- The discrepancy stems from differences in how OpenAI and its rival Anthropic calculate annualized revenue. Anthropic includes revenue from sales through cloud partners such as AWS and Google Cloud in its calculations, while OpenAI does not include such partner revenue in its figures.
- OpenAI also touted 77% total run rate growth for Q3 and 107% run rate growth for its enterprise business over the same period, per the CNBC article.
- The ChatGPT maker told investors its annualized revenue was approaching $50 billion at the end of September, rather than the $70 billion previously reported, the Financial Times reported Thursday. Oracle shares fell roughly 5% that day, per Benzinga.
- The company is weighing a 2027 IPO after confidentially filing its prospectus in June, and is in early talks for a possible ~$30bn funding round, both figures sourced to prior CNBC reporting.
What to watch for
Watch whether OpenAI's own investor materials settle on one consistent revenue definition going forward, since the $40bn-to-$50bn-to-$68bn swirl of estimates this cycle shows how easily a single denominator choice can move markets. Also worth tracking: how the $852bn valuation gets re-benchmarked against whichever revenue multiple sticks (28x on $50bn vs 20x on the earlier $70bn estimate) as IPO prep continues.
About this scoreThe R-Score is Rubbish Talk's editorial opinion on how far a headline's framing sits from what the underlying facts support. It is a judgement about presentation and emphasis, not an allegation that any outlet has acted dishonestly. Every figure we rely on is linked under Receipts so you can check it yourself.
