Nvidia (NVDA) and Meta (META) Back Open Models: OpenAI and Anthropic’s Model Moats Are at Stake

Nvidia Corporation (NASDAQ:NVDA), Meta Platforms Inc. (NASDAQ:META), OpenAI and Alphabet Inc (NASDAQ:GOOGL) now appear on the same policy letter supporting open-weight AI. Anthropic does not. The letter published on July 24 asks U.S. policymakers to avoid broad restrictions on models whose weights can be downloaded, modified and run privately. OpenAI and Alphabet Inc (NASDAQ:GOOGL) joined after the initial publication, Axios reported on July 27.

Nvidia sells the hardware and software used to train and run AI models. A larger field of model developers, more local deployments, and cheaper inference can all expand demand for its products. Nvidia can benefit even if the models themselves become difficult to monetize.

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Meta Platforms, Inc. (NASDAQ:META) has another reason to favor open weights. Its models can enter products and corporate systems that might otherwise rely on OpenAI or Anthropic. Outside developers improve the tools, hosting services and integrations around them. Meta can benefit through its applications, advertising business and infrastructure without charging for every model call.

Closed frontier labs can still justify their prices through better performance, enterprise support, reliability and safety. But every task an open model can perform well enough becomes harder to sell through an expensive proprietary API. Customers can also host a model themselves instead of sending data to one provider indefinitely. OpenAI and Anthropic could consequently lose some pricing power and customer lock-in.

OpenAI's signature makes this more complicated than an open-versus-closed fight. It can support some open releases while keeping its most valuable models proprietary. Anthropic has held a firmer line because released weights cannot be recalled, centrally patched, or prevented from being modified for harmful uses. Anthropic has made that safety case repeatedly. It also benefits commercially if capable models remain scarce, gated, and sold through APIs.

Nvidia Corporation (NASDAQ:NVDA) was already widely owned before this policy push. Insider Monkey's hedge fund database counted 275 funds holding Nvidia as of March 31. The figure says nothing about their views on open models, but it shows how popular the infrastructure trade had become.

Nvidia's July 15 short interest stood at 324.05 million shares, up 4.49% from the previous report. The raw number sounds enormous, but it equals only 1.39% of Nvidia's float and 2.5 days of trading volume. The increase may reflect hedging or valuation concerns. At 1.39% of float, it is too small to treat as a broad bearish vote on Nvidia or its open-model strategy.