Hedge fund tycoon Ken Griffin has a blunt message for those who expect artificial intelligence to instantly rewrite the global economy. The hype is real and exists to justify huge spending.
Speaking at the World Economic Forum in Davos on Wednesday, Citadel’s CEO said the AI boom is being driven not just by actual productivity gains, but also by narrative.
Griffin, who ranks as the 39th richest person in the world with a net worth of about $48.3 billion, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, said that doesn’t mean AI isn’t powerful, but that expectations far exceed reality.
“Is it all hype? Absolutely,” Griffin said, pointing to the extraordinary scale of investment currently being poured into AI infrastructure.
Griffin said US data center spending is estimated to exceed $500 billion this year. Bank of America previously predicted that Microsoft, Amazon, Google, and Meta, which are driving the data center construction boom, will spend a total of $385 billion annually on AI infrastructure from 2025 to 2028.
“You can’t generate this kind of spending unless you promise to make a big difference in the world,” Griffin said.
“How else are you going to write people $500 billion in checks this year alone?” he added.
Warnings of job losses due to AI collide with actual productivity
Griffin’s skepticism came after he was asked if he agreed with the predictions of AI leaders, including Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei, who said half of entry-level white-collar jobs could disappear within five years.
Griffin did not support that view, instead questioning whether AI systems are producing productivity gains large enough to justify such predictions.
Technology leaders such as OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates have pointed to overheated valuations and overexcitement among investors predicting a looming bubble.
Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg and others said AI spending reflects fundamental changes in computing, and that demand and model capacity are still growing fast enough to justify the increase.
What Griffin is certain of, he said, is that AI has “re-empowered the heads of technology in every business in America.”
Early results of AI are impressive – until you look closely
Griffin was particularly critical of the artifacts of generative AI in white-collar jobs, saying they often look impressive at first glance but fall apart under scrutiny.
He explained that when he reviewed the AI-generated reports, they looked insightful at the top, but were “garbage” at the bottom.
Still, Griffin doesn’t rule out the long-term impact of AI. He said the technology would be transformative in areas such as call centers and software development, and said heavy investment in a wide range of technologies was already benefiting the economy.
