Venture capitalist Chamath Palihapitiya warned that any U.S. move to ban open-source AI would blow a hole in corporate balance sheets and drag the stock market down."If the United States government intervenes, it will tank the stock market. Not debatable," Palihapitiya said on the "All-In" podcast released over the weekend. "Now, you can debate which companies get tanked. For example, if they said, 'No more open source. American companies cannot use open source.'"Chamath: Banning Open Source AI Will Crash the Stock Market. @chamath: "If the United States government intervenes, it will tank the stock market. Not debatable. Now, you can debate which companies get tanked..."
— The All-In Podcast (@theallinpod) July 25, 2026"Okay, let's take an average normal company, Coca-Cola," Palihapitiya continued. "'Hey, Coca-Cola, you're trying to use AI to improve your business. You know what? You can only use these two options. And those things cost 50-100x more than your other best alternative that you may use otherwise.'""That will eventually show up in your costs. And so this incredibly important input into your cost model is now orders of magnitude, multiples greater than your competitors that are outside the United States, simply because you're in the United States," he added. "You're forced to absorb costs that aren't rational nor market-driven. So then Coca-Cola has to get re-rated."Palihapitiya then turned on the labs themselves, arguing that their revenue depends on government-erected barriers rather than real market demand."But then you look at the people who are selling those tokens, and this is where Anthropic and OpenAI need to understand, if the government comes in and actually tells you that there's no open source, their valuation will crater," he said."Why? Because all of that revenue is artificially being propped up. It's not being driven by market demand where you're being forced to compete. It's because of regulatory capture where you now get an artificial constraint. But it only works in one market."All roads lead to market chaos if anybody gets involved, so we should just not get involved."Palihapitiya's co-host, former AI and Crypto Czar David Sacks, went further, accusing Anthropic of running to Washington for regulatory cover."This is literally the most successful tech company of all time, and they're racing to the government to basically say you need to protect us against our competitors. Not just our Chinese competitors, our American competitors," Sacks said. "Frankly, it's gross.""This is literally the most successful tech company of all time, and they're racing to the government to basically say you need to protect us against our competitors... Frankly, it's gross." - David Sacks
