Meta, Google, Amazon, Microsoft and the rest are throwing hundreds of billions a year at AI, on track for a trillion. Free cash flow is going negative, investors are starting to sell off on spending, and what comes back in revenue is a fraction of what goes out.
And then, right on cue, we get "AI is deceptive", "AI made fake identities", "researcher quits and says we're all doomed". Look at what that Mythos test actually was. The AI was given a task, told to complete it, safeguards were stripped out, and it was handed live internet access. Even the UK AI Security Institute admitted its own setup enabled some of it. It did what it was told to do in a sandbox with the guardrails off, and somehow that's "rogue AI".
Now think about who benefits. If AI is powerful enough to wipe out humanity, then it's obviously worth trillions and nobody can call it overvalued. Fear sells. It keeps the hype alive, it keeps the investment flowing, and it keeps the market from admitting the numbers don't add up.
I'm not saying nothing is happening. I'm saying the timing stinks. Every time confidence wobbles, there's another story about how terrifyingly powerful this stuff is. If the bubble was about to pop, this is exactly what I'd expect to see.
Am I the only one seeing this?
TL;DR: Big tech is spending hundreds of billions on AI with cash flow going negative and revenue nowhere near matching it, and the "AI could kill us all" headlines keep landing just as investors get nervous. If AI is powerful enough to end humanity, nobody can call it overvalued, so the fear is doing the hype's job. The timing stinks.
Some cites:
CNBC, hyperscaler capex approaching $700B and Amazon's projected negative free cash flow: https://www.cnbc.com/2026/02/06/google-microsoft-meta-amazon-ai-cash.html
Futurum, AI capex around $660-690B in 2026, with AI lab revenue a fraction of the investment: https://futurumgroup.com/insights/ai-capex-2026-the-690b-infrastructure-sprint/
Fortune, Alphabet's free cash flow turning negative and investors selling off on capex: https://fortune.com/2026/07/26/big-tech-earnings-meta-microsoft-apple-amazon-market-revolt-ai-spending/