The gas for the AI ​​growth that drives markets is promoting. Additionally it is an existential threat.

Sam Altman, CEO of OpenAI Inc., during a media tour of the Stargate AI data center in Abilene, Texas, USA, on Tuesday, September 23, 2025.

Kyle Grillot | Bloomberg | Getty Images

With OpenAI’s recent release of its AI browser, historical levels of capital spending in the current AI arms race could accelerate even further, if possible.

Due to the reciprocal and what some have described as circular nature of hundreds of billions in investment commitments tied to future chip purchases to the extent to which GDP growth depends on this boom, some have said it is a bubble. A Harvard economist estimates that 92% of US GDP growth in the first half of 2025 came from investments in AI.

However, much more needs to be understood about the connection between the rapid investment in AI and the business models that underpin the entire economy: the advertising technology (ad tech) industrial complex.

Over the last 25 years, the Internet’s infrastructure has been designed to generate advertising revenue. Search engine marketing, the advertising business model at the center Googleis perhaps the greatest business model of all time. Metas The engagement and attribution-based advertising business is a close second. And right behind it is Amazon’s advertising business, driven by its position as the largest online retailer. While a smaller part of it AmazonThe bottom line is that its highly profitable advertising business accounts for a disproportionate share of Amazon’s profits. So much so that almost every major retailer has built their own version of retail media networks, all of which contribute significantly to the bottom line and market capitalization of large companies like… Walmart, Hook, Above (and UberEats), Doordash and many more.

In fact, these platforms have been using AI for years to refine their advertising business models in the form of algorithmic models that power their search and recommendation engines, and to increase engagement and better predict purchasing decisions, aiming for an ever-larger share of all commerce, not just what is normally considered “advertising.” Also these three companies with a market capitalization of several trillion dollars
derive their profits in whole or in part from advertising. And now they are using some of that historically profitable advertising revenue to drive infrastructure investment on a scale the world has never seen other than government war spending.

But at the same time, the latest wave of AI has the potential to disrupt the very trillions in market capitalization that drives it. AI will undoubtedly change the way people search (Google), shop (Amazon), and are entertained (Meta). Answers delivered without having to look online. AI-powered shopping. Unlimited personalized content creation.

If AI poses such a potential existential risk, why are Google, Meta and Amazon such a big part of the current arms race to invest in AI? The “moonshot” outcome would be that achieving artificial general intelligence or superintelligence, an AI that can do everything a human can do only better, would unlock so much value that it would dwarf any investment.

But there is a greater urgency to protect or disrupt the advertising business model that drives the trillions in market capitalization and hundreds of billions in current investments before someone else does. While the groundbreaking paper that launched this phase of AI, “Attention is All You Need,” was written primarily by Google researchers, it was OpenAI and Microsoft and now Grok that sparked the current AI arms race. And they are not nearly as dependent on the current advertising industrial complex. Actually,
Sam Altman has called the feeds of the major platforms using AI to maximize advertising dollars “the first misaligned AIs at scale.” He makes it clear which companies he believes OpenAI is trying to disrupt.

What’s next?

This time it is different, but it also poses different risks. The main difference between the current infrastructure investment fever and the dot-com bubble of 2000 is that the companies that finance it are largely among the most profitable companies in the world. And so far there have been no signs of cracks in advertising’s business model, which serves to finance both its investments and its market capitalization (next to so many large companies, people wouldn’t think of being in the advertising business).

However, if AI disrupts or even causes the current advertising model to fail, the shock to the economy and markets would be far greater than most can imagine.

Google, Meta and Amazon remain best positioned to create new business models and, as previously mentioned, have been using AI to support their advertising business models with great success for much longer.

However, fundamentally changing the way people interact with search, commerce and content online will require exactly that: entirely new revenue models, perhaps, hopefully, some that are aligned and not advertising-based. But whatever the model, perhaps it’s helpful to consider that the reasoning lies in AI
Infrastructure spending may serve not only to generate new revenue but also to protect the business models that make up a much larger portion of the market capitalization of listed companies than most people realize.