The AI trade now runs on borrowed money, and the lenders are repricing it

klodolph

A while ago I was thinking, “Gee, AI is so complicated, how can I keep up with the landscape?” After reading these articles go by so often, it feels like what I actually can’t keep up with is the bond market. To paraphrase Trotsky, you may not be interested in the bond market, but the bond market is interested in you. I want to be able to read the signals at the bottom of this article, and divine some kind of prediction that can guide me… I don’t know, to choose whether I should buy a house or change the investment strategy in my retirement fund or something. But I’m just seeing all these signals go by, waiting for the story to be written, which only happens when the dust settles. I guess I’ll go back to not understanding AI, instead of not understanding the bond market.

fsckboy

you won't get debt if you don't have assets that can be repossessed, so having debt means these AI companies have assets: that's a strong thing, not a weak thing. interest rates are what they are, and they go up and down for reasons exogenous to your industry; debt regardless of interest is always "cheaper" than equity, and the shareholders expect to make their money from equity, paying interest on debt as a type of impedance matching and cost of keeping more equity. so everything is going according to plan, and nobody knows the future, and predicting collpses has never been a profitable business. I didn't have to read past the first few confusing contorted and convoluted paragraps of this article to decide to come over here and explain it, this is all straightforward corporate finance 102 and the article is fluff

robomartin

I remember when Amazon was going to go broke every year for over a decade. Until they didn't.

defactor

Warren Buffet way Revolutionary technology + massive adoption ≠ good investment Investors have poured money into a bottomless pit, attracted by the growth and glamour of the industry. The airline industry since its birth has had a collective net loss, in aggregate, despite moving hundreds of millions of people. Commodity Product, no switching costs. Infinite competition

mempko

As a side note. All money is borrowed. That's how money gets created! Short explainer video by the great late David Graeber https://youtu.be/LxJW7hl8oqM?is=IjdyHwZchaiMHk4C

okzgn

Key reports to understand the root problem (no ROI): - Gen AI: Too Much Spend, Too Little Benefit?: https://www.goldmansachs.com/insights/top-of-mind/gen-ai-too... (Goldman Sachs) - AI’s $600 Billion Question: https://sequoiacap.com/article/ais-600b-question/ (Sequoia Capital) - The Simple Macroeconomics of AI: https://www.nber.org/system/files/working_papers/w32487/w324... (MIT / Daron Acemoglu)

tyre

> Grey Swans: risks that were in the data but overlooked or dismissed because few had synthesized the signals into a coherent picture. Directly conflicts with > Alert and Critical signals represent readings that have historically been associated with meaningful financial stress. These are all pretty standard things to track and are regularly (and publicly!) Not saying we’re not in a bubble or near/far from it popping, but these metrics aren’t going to precisely tell you _when_, which is pretty much the only thing that matters.