In a stunning display of algorithmic benevolence, artificial intelligence systems have apparently decided that humanity deserves a break. Forget wars, inflation, and a national debt that would make a medieval peasant weep—the stock market keeps hitting record highs, and the only reasonable explanation is that our robot overlords are feeling generous.
The evidence is overwhelming. Despite Iran tensions that should terrify investors and inflation that keeps pretending it is not a problem, US markets have responded by doing what they do best: going up. The culprit? AI. Not the actual productivity gains from AI, mind you. Just the word itself, whispered like a magic incantation that turns spreadsheets into confetti cannons.
Wall Street has convinced itself—and is working hard to convince you—that artificial intelligence will solve everything. Cancer? AI. Climate change? AI. Your mortgage? Definitely AI. The market has priced in a future so rosy that even the most delusional startup founder would blush. Valuations have reached the kind of altitudes where oxygen is thin and logic goes to die.
So is the bubble ready to burst? That depends on whether you believe the robots are actually as smart as we have told ourselves they are, or whether we have simply found a new way to justify paying $300 billion for a company that does not make anything you can hold.
History suggests one outcome. Your brokerage account suggests another. Place your bets accordingly.