OpenAI chief executive Sam Altman believes the artificial intelligence sector is showing signs of a bubble, comparing today’s market enthusiasm to the late 1990s dot-com boom, according to comments reported by The Verge on Friday.
“When bubbles happen, smart people get overexcited about a kernel of truth,” Altman told a group of reporters. “Are we in a phase where investors as a whole are overexcited about AI? My opinion is yes. Is AI the most important thing to happen in a very long time? My opinion is also yes.”
His remarks echo concerns raised by investors such as Alibaba co-founder Joe Tsai, Bridgewater Associates’ Ray Dalio and Apollo Global Management’s Torsten Slok, who have all cautioned that valuations are rising too quickly. Last month, Slok warned that today’s AI surge may be even larger than the internet bubble, with leading S&P 500 firms more inflated than in the 1990s.
Still, some analysts view the risks as uneven. “From the perspective of broader investment in AI and semiconductors… I don’t see it as a bubble,” said Ray Wang of Futurum Group, noting that fundamentals across supply chains remain strong, though speculative capital is flowing into weaker companies.
Speculation about overheated markets intensified after Chinese start-up DeepSeek claimed to have trained a powerful reasoning model for under $6 million, challenging industry giants like OpenAI that spend billions.
OpenAI itself is preparing a $6 billion stock sale that would value it near $500 billion, following a $40 billion funding round earlier this year. Altman has acknowledged that while the firm is set to surpass $20 billion in annual recurring revenue, it remains unprofitable.
The rollout of OpenAI’s GPT-5 model earlier this month has faced criticism, with some users saying it feels less intuitive than its predecessor. The company reinstated access to GPT-4 for paying customers in response. Altman has also begun tempering expectations around “artificial general intelligence,” saying the concept is losing relevance.
Beyond AI software, he confirmed OpenAI’s ambitions in consumer hardware, brain-computer interfaces and even social media. He also suggested the company could spend trillions on data centers in the near future and hinted at possible interest in Chrome if regulators force Google to divest it.
Asked if he expected to remain OpenAI’s CEO, Altman quipped, “I mean, maybe an AI is in three years. That’s a long time.”
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