Oracle Corp (ORCL  ) shares are sliding Thursday after reports that OpenAI is generating far less annualized revenue than earlier figures implied. Here's what you should know.

Oracle Falls as OpenAI Revenue Report Raises Scrutiny Of $500 Billion Deal

OpenAI's annualized revenue sits roughly $20 billion below what the company had signaled, per financial documents shared with investors. OpenAI recently told investors that annualized revenue was nearing $50 billion at the end of September, the Financial Times reported. That falls well short of the $70 billion that the FT and other outlets reported late last month from information given to investors.

The shortfall may draw more scrutiny to Oracle and OpenAI's five-year, $500 billion agreement to supply compute power. The FT said a gap this large is likely to dampen optimism about AI demand. Investors treat annualized revenue, along with the matching number for OpenAI rival Anthropic, as the top gauge of overall AI demand. The metric supports massive infrastructure spending and the rise of public equity markets.

Oracle's business sharpens the effect. The company sells cloud infrastructure that plays a growing role in training and running large language models. That leaves the stock sensitive to the market's appetite for cloud and AI infrastructure themes. Doubts about AI demand can therefore weigh on Oracle shares, even without any change to the contract.

Oracle Trucks Natural Gas to Data Centers

A separate Bloomberg report turned the spotlight on Oracle's own operations. It examined how the company powers its data centers. Oracle is trucking natural gas to several sites to keep data center projects on track, according to people familiar with the work. Truck deliveries sustained a Salt Lake City-area project for over a year while Oracle waited for a pipeline. The same approach supports initial work at a campus Oracle is building for OpenAI in Shackelford County, Texas.

Oracle is now considering that playbook for Project Jupiter in New Mexico. A pipeline delay there puts the project's schedule at risk. Oracle sent the project's developer a notice citing force majeure last month. That notice may shield Oracle from some payments if more delays hit.

ORCL Shares Are Dipping

ORCL Price Action: Oracle shares were down 5.49% at $135.68 at the time of publication on Thursday, according to Benzinga Pro.

Oracle remains in a longer-term downtrend, with the stock trading 4.8% below its 20-day SMA, 6.8% below its 50-day SMA, 13.2% below its 100-day SMA, and 16.3% below its 200-day SMA.

From a structure standpoint, the stock is still trying to stabilize after the July swing low and the September swing high failed to turn into a sustained uptrend. With price still well below the 200-day area, rebounds can act more like "sell-the-rip" setups until Oracle can reclaim key moving-average resistance.

• Key Resistance: $153.50 - a rebound-stall zone that lines up near the stock's intermediate trend area (close to the 100-day/50-day region)
• Key Support: $131.50 - a nearby floor traders may defend after the recent slide, sitting not far below current levels