President Donald Trump said on Friday that he’s spoken to AI companies about striking deals “where the American people can benefit from the success of AI.”

Trump does not seem to have mentioned specific companies in his comments, but OpenAI is a likely candidate, especially after CNBC reported that the Trump administration has indeed been discussing an equity stake with the AI company.

CNBC said some of that equity could be used to seed a “Public Wealth Fund” recently proposed by OpenAI. As outlined by the company, proceeds from the fund “could be distributed directly to citizens, allowing more people to participate directly in the upside of AI-driven growth, regardless of their starting wealth or access to capital.”

According to Bloomberg, when reporters on Air Force One asked Trump about the idea, he replied that he’s been talking to AI executives about “concepts where pieces could be given to the American public, where the American public essentially becomes a partner with the companies.”

Bloomberg also reports that CEO Sam Altman has been discussing the idea of a government stake in major AI companies since early 2025.

This seems to align with Trump’s broader interest in government ownership of for-profit companies — most notably, with the government taking a 10% stake in struggling chipmaker Intel last year.

The idea has also found some traction on the left, with Senator Bernie Sanders this week proposing a one-time, 50% tax that companies like OpenAI, Anthropic, and xAI (which is part of SpaceX) would pay in the form of stock.

With all of those businesses potentially going public this year, Sanders argued this tax would “give the public a direct role in determining the future of this technology” and “guarantee that the trillions of dollars potentially generated by A.I. are used to improve the lives of all of us.”

David Sacks, an investor and podcaster who recently stepped down from his role as Trump’s AI and crypto czar, posted that he can see why Sanders’ idea resonates, “including with many on the right,” but warned it would actually “accelerate the corporate-government fusion we’re already sliding toward.” (Sacks now co-chairs the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology.)

Elsewhere on social media, former Microsoft employee Dare Obasanjo suggested, “The groundwork is already being laid for a government bailout of OpenAI.”

SpaceX is warning investors that it may dole out “significant equity” in “future transactions” following its upcoming IPO — language that was added amid constant industry gossip that CEO Elon Musk ultimately plans to merge his space-and-AI company with Tesla.

The new language was tucked deep in the risk factors section of SpaceX’s first official amendment to its IPO filing, which was made public last month. The company tacked this sentence onto the end of the first paragraph of a risk about how mergers and acquisitions may go sideways:

We may issue a significant amount of equity in connection with future transactions.

SpaceX has been busy with M&A, acquiring Musk’s AI company xAI last year, and recently entering into a deal with Cursor that includes an option to buy the startup for $60 billion in stock following the IPO. It’s certainly possible that SpaceX will have other targets in mind after it raises a reported $75 billion when it lists on the Nasdaq exchange (minus $20 billion committed to paying down former xAI and X debt). But this warning seems tailored to prepare investors for the possibility of a major dilution event — like a future combination with Tesla.

Musk has mused about combining his companies for many years, and the SpaceX IPO is only heating up the chatter that he will finally bring his two biggest entities together. A merger of this size would face a number of legal and potential regulatory challenges, and would likely have to pass a shareholder vote at Tesla. But, as the IPO filing showed, Musk has supreme voting power at SpaceX; the only person who could vote down a merger on that side of the term sheet would be Musk.

Musk’s voting power at SpaceX would not be at risk during a major dilution event. SpaceX has three primary classes of shares heading into this IPO. They all have the same basic economic rights, but different voting rights.

The Class A shares are what will be sold to the public and come with one vote per share. The Class B shares are owned exclusively by Musk and have 10 votes per share. SpaceX also has Class C common stock, which comes with no voting rights at all. While those Class C shares are currently used for executive compensation, Musk could use those shares to buy other companies without diluting his power. (SpaceX also has Class D shares set aside, which have reduced economic rights; the company has not yet decided whether those shares will have any voting power.)