[trhway]

>it's cost hundreds of billions of dollars and it has absolutely zero hope of making the trillions needed to justify that.

The BigTech companies have been flush with liquidity and poured those hundreds of billions into the promising tech, and as result we got a wonderful new technology. There is not much need for those trillions in return - just look at liquidity positions of those companies, they are just fine. If those trillions come in eventually - even better.

[automatic6131]

>There is not much need for those trillions in return

Whilst you are correct that big tech cos do not need the return to survive, that's not how public markets work at all, and thus not how the incentives for those in charge of the companies work, and so making you actually wrong.

[trhway]

If i were wrong, those companies would be distributing that cash to shareholders instead of chasing any promise of any big chance.

If investment in AI don't pan out (i do think that it will pan out, and those trillions will come) then those companies would just pour even more billions into whatever big thing/promise would come next. Rinse and repeat. Because some of those things do generate tremendous returns, and thus not playing that game is what really constitute true loss of money.

[ben_w]

Markets are funny things.

US right now is run by someone whose explicit promises, if actually implemented, have an obvious immedidiate 13-14% reduction in GDP — literally, never mind side effects, I'm not counting any businesses losing confidence in the idea that America is a place to invest, this is just direct impact.

DOGE + deportation by themselves do most of that percentage. The tariffs are a rounding error in comparison, but still bad on the kind of scale that gets normal politicians kicked out.

And yet, the markets are up.

[whatshisface]

If you factor in the inflation and the worldwide trade crisis, trading dollars for shares that will lose 10% real value doesn't sound so bad.

[leovingi]

What timeframe are you working with, as in, when do you expect to see this reduction in GDP?

I just want to know so that I can set a reminder and check back on your comment when the time arrives.

[krainboltgreene]

Funny, I had been told we had to lay off all those workers because they weren’t flush with cash.

[TheOtherHobbes]

They're convinced they no longer need them.

Just as they were convinced after Covid that they needed to put hiring into overdrive.

Tech management has the collective IQ of a flock of sheep.

[Aeolun]

Nobody has ever been punished for choosing IBM. It’s the same story here. Nobody is going to blame them for following the zeitgeist, but you bet they’d be punished if they didn’t and it doesn’t pan out.

The whole thing is like bitcoin. There’s too many people that benefit from maintaining the collective illusion.

[trhway]

cash on hands GOOG - 100B, AMZN - 80B, FB - 70B, and their core businesses are basically printing money, so they pretty much do have to invest into new things. If somebody sees a multi-billion dollar sink better than AI right now ...

[Hasu]

> If somebody sees a multi-billion dollar sink better than AI right now ...

I think if they could find a way to make their software good, instead of bad, like it increasingly is, that would be a good use of that money.

[krainboltgreene]

Workers, infrastructure, taxes…

[SZJX]

They’ll be fine and will survive regardless, but their current astronomical valuations probably won’t be.