Telegram is now not only a privacy-first chat app for crypto bros. With a dramatic one-two punch, a $300 million alliance with Elon Musk’s xAI and a $1.5 billion high-yield bond increase, Telegram has moved from rebel platform to revenue engine.
TON jumped 15% after Durov confirmed the collaboration.
But its future, together with IPO prospects, stays hostage to a authorized tangle taking part in out in French courts.
Musk’s Grok will get unique residence on Telegram, for a Value
In a headline-grabbing transfer, Telegram introduced an unique distribution settlement with xAI that can embed Grok, Musk’s LLM chatbot, into the platform for one yr. The phrases: xAI can pay $300 million in money, in addition to fairness and 50% of all Grok-related subscription income generated by Telegram.
“Collectively, we win ❤️📈🏆,” posted CEO Pavel Durov, celebrating what he framed as a platform-defining second. The transfer marks Telegram’s first main monetisation of its 1 billion month-to-month energetic customers (MAUs) – a pointy pivot from its traditionally donation- and debt-fuelled operations.
Durov has insisted that Grok integration received’t compromise person knowledge: “No Telegram knowledge can be provided for Grok coaching,” he wrote. The deal places Telegram forward of rivals like WhatsApp and Snapchat, who’ve struggled to extract income from AI options inside messaging ecosystems.
From cash-burn to money move: The shock revenue surge
Telegram additionally disclosed its first-ever revenue: $540 million in 2024, on income of $1.4 billion. This determine marks a dramatic turnaround from prior years, when the corporate operated at a steep loss. With 15 million paying customers and natural development of two.5 million customers per day, 2025 income is forecasted at $2 billion, with revenue exceeding $700 million.
For traders, the metrics lastly validate Telegram’s long-gestating monetisation mannequin.
Together with asserting its AI deal, Telegram accomplished an oversubscribed $1.5 billion bond providing at a 9% yield, with main backers together with BlackRock, Citadel, and Mubadala, in response to WSJ. The five-year paper refinances debt from a 2021 convertible be aware and contains an IPO-linked conversion sweetener, an implicit wager that Telegram will go public earlier than 2030.
The bond’s success stunned some market watchers, particularly given CEO Durov’s ongoing authorized entanglements. However traders seem keen to cost that danger as noise in opposition to Telegram’s unit economics and development profile.
The Paris Downside: Authorized cloud over Durov looms massive
Regardless of operational momentum, a major cloud looms over Telegram’s prospects: founder Pavel Durov’s arrest in France in August 2024 and subsequent indictment on 12 preliminary expenses, together with non-cooperation with youngster security investigations.
Durov stays underneath judicial supervision and is barred from leaving France. A Might 12 court docket ruling blocked his deliberate journey to the U.S. to satisfy traders. “We complied with all of the binding authorized requests we acquired,” Durov instructed the WSJ. “Up till at the present time, we don’t perceive what we did incorrect.”
The authorized case may delay or derail IPO ambitions, increase governance considerations, and complicate world platform operations. It additionally emphasizes broader regulatory questions concerning the liabilities of end-to-end encrypted app suppliers.
IPO or Bridge? What the Grok and bond offers actually sign
Is Telegram now on a glide path to IPO? Presumably, however not inevitably. The bond’s conversion function means that no less than the choice stays alive. However some analysts argue the high-yield increase may very well be a bridge or perhaps a hedge, a strategy to lock in development with out public-market scrutiny whereas Durov navigates his authorized peril.
The one-year Grok integration, too, carries open questions: Will AI subs stick? Can xAI ship? Will regulators scrutinise the information layer regardless of Durov’s assurances? And if Musk stumbles, what turns into of the promised $300 million?
Nonetheless, with its platform pivot, Telegram has shed the picture of a burning-money outlier. Whether or not it turns into a public tech titan or a cautionary story could rely as a lot on courtroom outcomes as on product-market match.
Telegram Timeline
Aug 24, 2024: Durov arrested in ParisMar 19, 2025: Telegram hits 1B MAUsMay 12, 2025: French court docket bars Durov’s US tripMay 28, 2025: xAI–Telegram Grok deal announcedMay 28, 2025: $1.5B bond priced at 9% yield
Backside Line
Telegram’s summer time surge, marked by AI monetisation and a daring debt increase, alerts an organization evolving right into a sustainable enterprise. However Durov’s authorized cloud could show the last word variable in whether or not Telegram turns into the following nice tech IPO or a cautionary story of platform governance within the age of encryption.
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