China Is Why AI Won't Pop Like The Dot-Com Bubble

Everyone's favorite half-time activity has become comparing the AI bubble to the dot-com bubble. While we ourselves draw such comparisons, we think this time around there is a crucial element that is being glossed over: China and its army of high-performance, cheap AI models. Last bubble pop, China was very much on the outside looking in, while this time, it is seemingly sharpening the needle that'll pop AI CapEx spend. Chinese open-weight AI models are rapidly closing the performance gap with U.S. models, undercutting on price and threatening U.S. frontier model monetization. We share our take on why China may change the way this bubble pops.