A Spinning Top in the Mind

Artificial intelligence is pushing natural intelligence to the brink of exhaustion. There are probably very few people whom AI passes by entirely. And if you’re one of them, congratulations on your inner peace. But are there any groups that are drawn so intensely, so relentlessly, so 24/7 into the machinery of large language models as those whose profession and passion is investing?

We already struggle enough to assess the implications for our own fields of expertise. Whether doctor, lawyer, IT specialist, chef, plumber, professor, or tax advisor, everyone is affected. Clearly to different degrees. And almost everyone has arguments ready as to why, in their particular profession, change will come more slowly, less easily, and with fewer consequences. Did you notice that I didn’t even mention investors as a profession?

Capital Flows Without a Safety Net

In recent weeks, the tech giants have told us about their capex plans for 2026. The announced figures exceeded even the boldest expectations. 180 billion dollars from Google parent Alphabet, 200 billion from Amazon, and so on. There is no shortage of voices warning of overinvestment and the possibility that profits may fail to materialize.

What is undeniable, however, is the explosion in the current numbers. Just last week, Alphabet reported a 48% increase in Google Cloud revenues. No technology has ever been adopted as quickly as AI. Only a few months ago, ChatGPT was the benchmark. Today, the Gemini app already counts more than 750 million monthly active users. Numbers that quite literally take your breath away.

Running Just to Stay in Place

Each of the major players sees a winner-takes-it-all future. This makes mega-investments a matter of survival. In such an incentive system, doubts are mandatory for investors.

At around 650 billion dollars of investment in a single year, spread across roughly 6 billion people active online, that comes to about 100 dollars per person. Money that still has to be earned.

The Red Queen* already knew this 160 years ago:
“Now, here, you see, it takes all the running you can do, to keep in the same place. If you want to get somewhere else, you must run at least twice as fast as that.”

So we keep running. Twice as fast. 

*From Through the Looking-Glass (1871), the sequel to Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland (1865)