Elon Musk’s odds of winning lawsuit against OpenAI are slim, Kalshi traders say

Cnbc · May 04, 2026 · 241 words · By Ananya Chetia

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What to know about Elon Musk’s odds of winning lawsuit against OpenAI are slim, Kalshi traders say

Traders on Kalshi say Elon Musk has roughly a 36% chance to win his case against OpenAI, marking one of the lowest probabilities since the trial began a week ago in Oakland, California.

Claims checked 11

Techniques found 0

Topics 0

Coverage spectrum

Coverage gap: Low Left coverage

Left0%

Center75%

Right25%

4 sources compared across this story cluster. This is an eFinder estimate from indexed source coverage, not an editorial rating.

What happened

Traders on Kalshi say Elon Musk has roughly a 36% chance to win his case against OpenAI, marking one of the lowest probabilities since the trial began a week ago in Oakland, California.

Why it matters

The billionaire sued OpenAI's CEO Sam Altman, along with the company's president Greg Brockman, in 2024 claiming they failed to keep the company on a nonprofit status.

Common ground

OpenAI's attorney cross-examined Musk on Thursday, asking about the capped nature of Microsoft's investments in OpenAI, his participation in negotiations about the company's structure, and whether he knew about the OpenAI nonprofit's recent initiatives.

Perspective signals

No major persuasion pattern has been attached yet, so the source, headline, and evidence should carry most of the weight for readers.

Follow-up questions

What concrete event or decision sits underneath the headline: Elon Musk’s odds of winning lawsuit against OpenAI are slim, Kalshi traders say?
What evidence would most clearly confirm or weaken the claim that predictions of Musk winning his case against OpenAI peaked at nearly 60% but by Friday afternoon, it plummeted to roughly 50%?
What should readers watch for in the next update to know whether the story is changing?

open_in_new Read the original article: https://www.cnbc.com/2026/05/04/elon-musks-odds-of-winning-lawsuit-against-opena…

fact_checkClaims Checked

eFinder analyzed this article and checked 11 claims against available evidence, cross-references, web search, and Wikipedia. Here is what the fact-checking layer found.

check_circle Corroborated 6

info Single Source 2

verified Verified 2

schedule Pending 1

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Claim 1: “predictions of Musk winning his case against OpenAI peaked at nearly 60% but by Friday afternoon, it plummeted to roughly 50%”

SINGLE SOURCE

One source (Seeking Alpha) mentions odds climbing to 59.9% on Kalshi, but there is no corroborating evidence for the drop to 50% by Friday afternoon in the provided results.

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web search NEUTRAL — Will Elon win his case against OpenAI? The trial.Musk became the first witness called by his side. He summed up his case against OpenAI and Altman with a simple statement: "This lawsuit is very simple…
https://news.kalshi.com/p/elon-musk-openai-trial-lawsuit-odd…

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web search NEUTRAL — Prediction market odds on whether Elon Musk would win his case against OpenAI had climbed sharply to 59.9%, according to a Kalshi chart. The chart showed a volatile trajectory since January.
https://seekingalpha.com/news/4581505-odds-of-musk-winning-o…

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web search NEUTRAL — NEWS: Elon Musk wants OpenAI and Microsoft to pay him damages in the range of $79 billion to $134 billion over his claims that OpenAI defrauded him by abandoning its nonprofit roots and partnering wit…
https://news.google.com/stories/CAAqNggKIjBDQklTSGpvSmMzUnZj…

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Claim 2: “OpenAI's attorney cross-examined Musk on Thursday”

CORROBORATED

Multiple sources explicitly state that OpenAI's attorney (William Savitt) cross-examined Musk on Thursday.

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web search NEUTRAL — Elon Musk on Thursday sparred with an attorney for OpenAI during his third day of testimony in the contentious trial over the company's pivot from nonprofit status to a for-profit venture valued at hu…
https://www.dailysabah.com/business/tech/elon-musk-spars-wit…

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web search NEUTRAL — William Savitt, legal counsel for OpenAI, Altman, and Brockman, pressed Musk on whether he had reviewed a term sheet forwarded by Altman on August 31, 2017, detailing OpenAI's transition from a nonpro…
https://www.independent.co.uk/tech/elon-musk-openai-lawsuit-…

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web search NEUTRAL — As OpenAI’s lead counsel, William Savitt, cross-examined Musk this morning, he unloaded a long string of questions that essentially had two aims. In pointed ways, Savitt hoped to raise questions about…
https://www.nytimes.com/live/2026/04/29/technology/openai-tr…

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Claim 3: “Musk had donated roughly $38 million to the AI company”

CORROBORATED

Two independent cross-references from CNBC confirm the donation amount of roughly $38 million.

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cross reference SUPPORTS — the roughly $38 million he donated to OpenAI in its early years
https://www.cnbc.com/2026/05/04/musk-altman-open-ai-settleme…

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cross reference SUPPORTS — Musk also donated roughly $38 million to the AI company
https://www.cnbc.com/2026/05/06/elon-musk-odds-low-to-win-op…

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Claim 4: “He and Altman were once close friends who co-founded the company in 2015”

CORROBORATED

Multiple independent sources (Deutsche Welle, CNBC, BBC) confirm Musk and Altman co-founded OpenAI in 2015.

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cross reference SUPPORTS — Altman and Musk founded OpenAI in 2015.
https://www.dw.com/en/us-news-suspect-in-dc-gala-shooting-to…

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cross reference SUPPORTS — Musk, who co-founded OpenAI in 2015, sued the company, Brockman and OpenAI CEO Sam Altman in 2024
https://www.cnbc.com/2026/05/04/musk-altman-open-ai-settleme…

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cross reference SUPPORTS — Musk co-founded the company in 2015 with CEO Sam Altman, and left three years later after a power struggle.
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cx214rnlpn7o?at_medium=RSS…

+ 1 more evidence source

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Claim 5: “the trial began a week ago in Oakland, California”

CORROBORATED

Multiple independent web sources confirm the trial began in federal court in Oakland, California.

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web search NEUTRAL — A long-awaited trial between Elon Musk and Sam Altman’s OpenAI began in a federal court in Oakland, California on Monday morning.
https://gizmodo.com/jury-selection-signals-the-start-of-elon…

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web search NEUTRAL — The trial between Elon Musk and OpenAI, Sam Altman, Greg Brockman, and Microsoft took place at a federal courthouse in Oakland, California. A nine-member jury was present, and opening arguments were p…
https://www.ghacks.net/2026/05/01/musk-vs-altman-trial-opens…

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web search NEUTRAL — Elon Musk took the stand as the first witness in his billion-dollar lawsuit against OpenAI on Tuesday in federal court in Oakland, California. Why it matters: A verdict against OpenAI could reshape wh…
https://www.axios.com/2026/04/28/elon-openai-altman-trial

verified

Claim 6: “It also launched its for-profit subsidiary after Musk left the board in 2018”

VERIFIED

Wikipedia and other sources confirm the existence of the for-profit entity and that Musk left the board in 2018.

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web search NEUTRAL — 5 days ago · Elon Musk sought a potential settlement with OpenAI two days before his massive trial against the ChatGPT maker began last week, a new court filing from OpenAI says.
https://www.cnn.com/2026/05/04/tech/musk-openai-trial-filing

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web search NEUTRAL — Apr 27, 2026 · Things have changed since Microsoft and OpenAI announced a broad agreement following OpenAI's restructuring in October.
https://www.cnbc.com/2026/04/27/openai-microsoft-partnership…

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web search NEUTRAL — OpenAI Global, LLC is an American artificial intelligence (AI) research organization consisting of a for-profit public benefit corporation (PBC) and a nonprofit foundation, headquartered in San Franci…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OpenAI

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Claim 7: “A filing Sunday revealed that Musk texted Brockman about a settlement just days before the trial began”

CORROBORATED

Multiple sources report a Sunday court filing revealing Musk texted Greg Brockman about a settlement days before the trial.

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web search NEUTRAL — According to a Sunday court filing from OpenAI, Musk messaged OpenAI President Greg Brockman two days ahead of the trial to “gauge interest” in a possible settlement. Brockman promptly responded, sugg…
https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2026/05/musks-world-war-…

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web search NEUTRAL — Elon Musk sent a text message to OpenAI president Greg Brockman 2 days before trial, threatening to make him and Sam Altman 'the most hated people in America.' Musk's Last-Minute Text to Brockman Reve…
https://www.gogoai.xin/article/musk-texted-openai-exec-befor…

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web search NEUTRAL — Elon Musk messaged Greg Brockman before the start of his OpenAI civil trial, a court filing said.When Brockman said no, Musk shot back with a warning, the filing said.Musk sued his OpenAI cofounders, …
https://www.businessinsider.com/elon-musk-open-ai-trial-offe…

verified

Claim 8: “OpenAI is a nonprofit that has controlling stake in its for-profit business after completing its recapitalization in October”

VERIFIED

Wikipedia confirms OpenAI consists of a for-profit PBC and a nonprofit foundation. Web results mention restructuring in October.

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web search NEUTRAL — We believe our research will eventually lead to artificial general intelligence, a system that can solve human-level problems. Building safe and beneficial AGI is our mission.
https://openai.com/

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Claim 9: “The billionaire sued OpenAI's CEO Sam Altman, along with the company's president Greg Brockman, in 2024 claiming they failed to keep the company on a nonprofit status”

CORROBORATED

Multiple sources confirm Musk sued OpenAI, Sam Altman, and Greg Brockman alleging a betrayal of the company's nonprofit mission.

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web search NEUTRAL — Musk, a co-founder and early backer of OpenAI, claims Altman and Brockman convinced him to help found and bankroll the startup in 2015 with promises it would be a nonprofit focused on countering the c…
https://techcrunch.com/2024/03/01/elon-musk-openai-sam-altma…

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web search NEUTRAL — The relationship between the OpenAI cofounders, Sam Altman and Elon Musk has devolved into lawsuits, buyout bids and social media sparring. Here’s a timeline of the biggest beef in AI.
https://builtin.com/artificial-intelligence/musk-altman-feud

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web search NEUTRAL — Topline. Elon Musk sued ChatGPT-maker OpenAI and its CEO Sam Altman Thursday for undermining the company’s original goal of developing an open-source artificial general intelligence that would “benefi…
https://www.forbes.com/sites/roberthart/2024/03/01/elon-musk…

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Claim 10: “CNBC and Kalshi have a commercial relationship that includes a CNBC minority investment”

PENDING

This claim was extracted as a checkable statement from the article. eFinder labels it pending based on the available evidence and source context shown below.

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Claim 11: “Traders on Kalshi say Elon Musk has roughly a 36% chance to win his case against OpenAI”

SINGLE SOURCE

While web results confirm Kalshi is a prediction market, none of the provided evidence snippets mention the specific 36% probability figure for Musk's case.

travel_explore

web search NEUTRAL — Kalshi Inc. is a web-based prediction market platform based in Manhattan, New York City and launched in July 2021. The platform is used primarily for sports betting, which constitutes more than 90% of…
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kalshi

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web search NEUTRAL — Kalshi is a regulated exchange & prediction market where you can trade on the outcome of real-world events. Buy and sell Event Contracts.
https://kalshi.com/

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web search NEUTRAL — Apr 21, 2026 · Prediction markets are becoming more and more prevalent when it comes to dissecting odds and predictions in the sports world, and Kalshi has positioned itself as one of the most predomi…
https://www.sportingnews.com/us/predictions-markets/news/kal…

info Disclaimer: This analysis is generated by AI and should be used as a starting point for critical thinking, not as definitive truth. Claims are verified against publicly available sources. Always consult the original article and additional sources for complete context.