Panel, Conference Presentation
Manias, Panics, & Crashes: Can We Learn to Avoid Great Financial Mistakes? | Global Conference 2026
Milken InstituteJames Mackintosh, Zoe Cruz, Benedict Evans, Austan Goolsbee, Sebastian Mallaby, Catherine Wood
- Real GDP growth is projected to sustainably accelerate into the 6%, 7%, 8% range driven by productivity gains.
- Inflation is expected to decline, a trend currently observable in Truflation data.
- World models are predicted to emerge within the next couple of years.
- Future income increases may trigger a wealth effect that overheats the economy before productivity fully materializes, potentially necessitating Federal Reserve rate hikes if investment and consumption rise significantly.
- A resurgence of human involvement in decision-making could slow progress as proof of humanhood becomes a prioritized factor.
- The CPU-to-GPU ratio is forecast to shift from one-to-one to four-to-one to meet agentic AI demands.
- Agentic AI may cause a temporary pause in momentum as stakeholders reassess economic implications before further expansion.
- Sovereign governments are expected to continue money printing, leading to a global rise in debt-to-GDP ratios.
- Five-year interest rates exceeding 30% or 30-year rates surpassing 5% are identified as potential warning signals for market shifts.
- Private market valuations face potential distress if nominal paper valuations remain persistently above secondary market transaction prices.
- Circular economic deals are anticipated to form between foundation model builders, compute cluster suppliers, and service providers.
- OpenAI's projected burn from the present through 2030 is estimated at $660 billion based on internal documents.
- AI annualized recurring revenue (ARR) is predicted to reach $44 billion, up from $9 billion in December to $30 billion in April.
- Autonomous transportation is identified as the primary revenue-generating opportunity over the next five to ten years.
- The convergence of healthcare and AI is expected to significantly reduce the cost and time required to research and discover new drugs.
- Orbital data centers are forecast to surpass Starlink in terms of scope.
- SpaceX's revenue base could increase 20 to 30-fold in out years if orbital data centers are pursued.
- A valuation target of $2.5 trillion for pre-orbital data centers is projected for 2030, with a potential revision to a range of 1.75 to 2 times current value.
- Economic activity could slow over the next three years, mirroring the trajectory of the autonomy sector.
- Increased demand may eventually be met by efficiency gains, causing prices to collapse and models to become cheap or free commodities.
- An enormous supply of IPOs from companies such as SpaceX, OpenAI, and Anthropic is expected, potentially requiring index providers to liquidate other indices to absorb the volume.
- Steepening yield curves combined with sovereign money printing could increase borrowing risks for investors in hyperscalers operating in public markets.
- Uncertainty remains regarding whether AI will lead to a feudalistic structure with increased income inequality where an elite retains value while others lose jobs.