I do not believe it is possible to effectively report on the current AI boom without thinking hard about how tech has become finance, and finance has become an elaborate house of cards.

Consider that Mira Murati’s new AI startup, Thinking Machines, is now valued at $12 billion. The company launched in February 2025. It does not yet have any revenues or a product. And that spending on AI infrastructure contributed more to growth in the U.S. economy in the past two quarters than all of consumer spending.

A question that every tech journalist on the AI beat ought to be repeatedly asking is, “how much of this money is actually real?”