Claims that can’t be checked by Ed Zitron, page 1 of 13
Deadlines are judged as of 2026-10-29. About Ed Zitron and the sources covered.
Claims that can’t be checked by Ed Zitron (1290)
Public evidence cannot settle these claims, so they are recorded and attributed, not scored. Most were screened out: both AI providers read the claim on its own and found it a value judgment, rhetoric, hedged, too vague to test, or about something no public evidence could show. The rest were found to be recommendations or too open to test in a full review.
Page 1 of 13: claims 1 to 100 of 1290, ordered by the date first said, newest first. To find a claim by its words, use search.
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Observation
“The gaps in this S-1 filing are seemingly custom-built to obfuscate any ability to try and work out anything about its future.”
Our reading: The omissions in Anthropic's S-1 appear designed to obscure its future prospects.
No horizon
Source: Exit Liquidity
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Observation
“In other words, the Anthropic of Q2 2026 — the so-called “profitable,” compute-light firm that’s got boosters hot under the collar — is a moment in time specifically chosen so that people come away with a vision of a very, very different company to the one they’d be investing in.”
Our reading: Anthropic deliberately chose Q2 2026 to present a misleadingly favorable picture of the company.
No horizon
Source: Exit Liquidity
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Observation
“I should also be clear, as I discussed two weeks ago in my premium newsletter, that the only objective of this IPO is to dump Anthropic onto the public markets.”
Our reading: The sole objective of Anthropic's IPO is to dump the company onto public markets.
No horizon
Source: Exit Liquidity
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Causal claim
“That’s an abominable interest rate you take only when you’re convinced that the money is running out.”
Our reading: An interest rate as high as the up-to-8.75% on parts of Musk's chip debt is an abominable rate that a borrower takes only when convinced the money is running out.
No horizon
Qualifier: only when
Source: Exit Liquidity
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Observation
“In other words, while everybody in tech and AI is telling you to buy now and get in on the ground floor, their actual actions suggest an unwillingness to stick around and find out what might happen next.”
Our reading: While everybody in tech and AI is telling people to buy now and get in on the ground floor, their actual actions suggest an unwillingness to stick around and find out what happens next.
No horizon
Qualifier: suggest
Source: Exit Liquidity
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Forecast
“Is there a version of Anthropic that could be truly economically viable? It’s unlikely given that so much of its revenue is dependent on venture capital.”
Our reading: Anthropic is unlikely to be truly economically viable because so much of its revenue depends on venture capital.
No horizon
Qualifier: revenue dependent on venture capital
Source: Exit Liquidity
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Recommendation or value judgment
“With the vast majority of its revenue coming from venture backed startups, it’s reasonable to question whether there’s fundamental demand for AI writ large”
Our reading: With the vast majority of Anthropic's revenue coming from venture-backed startups, it is reasonable to question whether there is fundamental demand for AI, and the 'it's just the early days' defense is laughable for a company with nearly half a trillion dollars in commitments that claims a $30 trillion addressable market.
No horizon
Qualifier: vast majority of its revenue from venture-backed startups
Source: Exit Liquidity
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Observation
“And it’s clear that Anthropic offered temporary discounts to pump its revenues through IPO, only to discontinue them unless the startup committed to spending more on the platform through tactics I’d describe as a little brutal:”
Our reading: Anthropic offered temporary discounts to inflate revenue through its IPO, then withdrew them unless customers committed to more spend.
No horizon
Source: Exit Liquidity
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Causal claim
“And I imagine the reason Anthropic is doing so is that it realizes it’s bitten off more than it can chew with its compute commitments.”
Our reading: He imagines Anthropic is pressing customers for minimum spends because it realizes it has bitten off more than it can chew with its compute commitments.
No horizon
Qualifier: I imagine
Source: Exit Liquidity
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Observation
“While some of this is fairly standard, the sheer speed at which insiders and shareholders can exit this company is remarkable, purpose-built to allow insiders to use retail investors to financialize their early bets in a company that’s been drained of any opportunity or value.”
Our reading: Anthropic's lock-up schedule is designed to let insiders exit quickly by selling to retail investors.
No horizon
Source: Exit Liquidity
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Causal claim
“Anthropic was smart enough to realize that post-IPO fundraising would be difficult, and chose to fill its boots at the height of its hype, with $65 billion or so coming in at the height of its valuation without any of the messiness of a public at-the-market offering.”
Our reading: Anthropic possibly raised about $65B pre-IPO at peak valuation because it foresaw post-IPO fundraising would be hard.
No horizon
Qualifier: one of two possible reasons
Source: Exit Liquidity
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Observation
“While Tan had to pay an indeterminately-higher interest rate on the deal, his urgency tells me that he’s well aware that the party is winding down and he needs to get as much money out of the system as possible.”
Our reading: Hock Tan's urgency over the Broadcom debt deal tells the author that Tan is well aware the party is winding down and that he needs to get as much money out of the system as possible.
No horizon
Qualifier: tells me
Source: Exit Liquidity
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Causal claim
“You see, this was an opportunistically-timed S-1, as the vast majority of Anthropic’s big compute contracts only got started in or around Q2 2026, with $224.5 billion in non-cancellable agreements with Amazon and Google starting in April and May.”
Our reading: Anthropic's S-1 was timed opportunistically because most of its big compute contracts only started around Q2 2026.
No horizon
Source: Exit Liquidity
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Causal claim
“The era of token-maxxing — when companies like Meta incentivized their employees to burn as many tokens as possible, only to pull back after costs skyrocketed — ended somewhere in Q2 or Q3 2026, which is why Anthropic is so keen to push this company out the door”
Our reading: Enterprise token-maxxing ended around Q2–Q3 2026, and that is why Anthropic is rushing to IPO before investors learn about its latest quarter.
No horizon
Source: Exit Liquidity
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Recommendation or value judgment
“The fact that Anthropic doesn’t include the exact breakdowns is an insult to basically every investor putting money in this IPO.”
Our reading: Anthropic's failure to include exact breakdowns of its compute commitments is an insult to basically every investor putting money into its IPO.
No horizon
Scope: basically every investor
Source: Exit Liquidity
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Recommendation or value judgment
“other than Anthropic’s IPO, which I believe is an egregious swindle of retail investors”
Our reading: He believes Anthropic's IPO is an egregious swindle of retail investors.
No horizon
Qualifier: I believe
Source: Exit Liquidity
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Conditional forecast
“Sidenote: Should Anthropic debut at $1.4 trillion, it would no doubt be a massive disappointment for those that invested when the company was targeting a paper valuation of $960 billion.”
Our reading: If Anthropic debuts at $1.4 trillion, it would no doubt be a massive disappointment for those who invested when the company was targeting a $960 billion paper valuation.
No horizon
Only if: if Anthropic debuts at $1.4 trillion
Source: Exit Liquidity
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Causal claim
“We’re In A Bubble, And The Longer It Goes On, The Worse It Gets”
Our reading: AI is a bubble, and the longer it lasts, the worse the damage will be.
No horizon
Source: Exit Liquidity
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Observation
“I’m going to be a little more brutal, as I believe that Anthropic is intentionally misleading investors at a scale unseen in the history of IPOs.”
Our reading: Anthropic is intentionally misleading IPO investors at an unprecedented scale.
No horizon
Source: Exit Liquidity
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Forecast
“At some point the money runs out — the funds behind the venture-backed customers of OpenAI and Anthropic, the debt underlying AI data centers, and the willingness of investors to tolerate endless quarters of eleven-digit capital expenditures — and once it does, everything I’ve been saying will become consensus.”
Our reading: Eventually the money funding AI (VC for customers, data-center debt, investor tolerance of capex) will run out, and his skeptical view will then become consensus.
No horizon
Source: Exit Liquidity
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Causal claim
“Anthropic signed those deals to help boost the neoclouds’ IPOs, the capacity doesn’t currently exist, and building it will require debt from a market that, if you believe Elon Musk, has stopped lending money.”
Our reading: Anthropic signed its Nscale and Lambda deals to help boost those neoclouds' IPOs; the capacity doesn't currently exist, and building it will require debt from a market that, if you believe Elon Musk, has stopped lending money.
No horizon
Qualifier: if you believe Elon Musk
Source: Exit Liquidity
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Rhetoric
“And that’s because this entire industry is sold with a genuine contempt for the end customer or investor.”
Our reading: The AI industry is sold with genuine contempt for end customers and investors.
No horizon
Source: Exit Liquidity
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Forecast
“Yet if we (sigh) annualize Anthropic’s Q3 2026 compute spend, this means that Anthropic is likely on the hook to nearly double how much it’s spending on chip rentals at precisely the moment it’s slowing down.”
Our reading: Anthropic is likely committed to nearly doubling its chip-rental spending just as its growth slows.
No horizon
Qualifier: annualizing Q3 2026 compute spend
Source: Exit Liquidity
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Forecast
“At this point, the sheer scale of the AI bubble is too large and unwieldy for things, to quote Mr. Slok, “work out,” and yes, I believe we “have a problem.””
Our reading: The AI bubble is too large and unwieldy for things to 'work out,' and Zitron believes 'we have a problem.'
No horizon
Qualifier: I believe
Source: AI Had Better Work Out
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Forecast
“The US government cannot bail out NVIDIA, Microsoft, Google, Amazon, CoreWeave or Meta’s future misses of analyst expectations, nor can it cover every single bankrupt data center, nor can it bail out investor sentiment when it realizes the AI “boom” was yet another tech-based bust.”
Our reading: The US government cannot bail out future misses of analyst expectations by NVIDIA, Microsoft, Google, Amazon, CoreWeave or Meta, cannot cover every single bankrupt data center, and cannot bail out investor sentiment once investors realise the AI boom was another tech bust.
No horizon
Scope: every single bankrupt data center
Source: AI Had Better Work Out
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Observation
“However you might hand-wave away the AI bubble’s economic issues by saying it’s “just like the Dot-Com Bubble” — when the NASDAQ 100 fell 77% from its peak — the consequences are now global, at a scale unseen in history, flowing into both direct stocks and indices.”
Our reading: The consequences of the AI bubble are global and at a scale unseen in history, larger than the Dot-Com Bubble.
No horizon
Source: AI Had Better Work Out
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Rhetoric
“Everything is more annoying, expensive and worse on some level because of generative AI, down to the price of fucking US treasuries.”
Our reading: Generative AI has made everything more annoying, expensive and worse, including US Treasury prices.
No horizon
Source: AI Had Better Work Out
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Observation
“It appears that NVIDIA is channel stuffing.”
Our reading: NVIDIA appears to be channel stuffing by pushing customers to take early delivery of GPUs.
No horizon
Source: AI Had Better Work Out
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Observation
“Every problem that burst the Dot-Com Bubble is here, but it’s worse, bigger and uglier, with global contagion risk that I basically never see discussed.”
Our reading: The AI bubble has every problem that burst the Dot-Com Bubble, in worse and bigger form, with global contagion risk.
No horizon
Source: AI Had Better Work Out
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Recommendation or value judgment
“This is extremely bad and extremely important to resolve.”
Our reading: The lack of knowledge about AI companies' financial condition is very bad and should be resolved.
No horizon
Source: Annualized Enron Rate
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Rhetoric
“Most coverage of AI lives in its own bubble where nothing bad has happened or could happen, and that every promise will come true.”
Our reading: Most AI coverage lives in its own bubble in which nothing bad has happened or could happen and every promise will come true.
No horizon
Scope: most coverage of AI
Source: Annualized Enron Rate
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Rhetoric
“Investors are fucking stupid for using it.”
Our reading: Investors are stupid for using annualized run rates.
No horizon
Source: Annualized Enron Rate
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Rhetoric
“The entire AI bubble is inflated based on stupid, made up numbers that only exist to pump the bags of investors and make the AI startups look more successful than they are.”
Our reading: The entire AI bubble is inflated based on made-up numbers that exist only to pump investors' holdings and make AI startups look more successful than they are.
No horizon
Scope: the entire AI bubble
Source: Annualized Enron Rate
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Causal claim
“The problem — and the reason I’d argue that the actual revenues of these companies are so shrouded in secrecy — is that the underlying economics do not match up when you consider that effectively every AI startup has to resell tokens at a discount.”
Our reading: AI startups' revenues are kept secret because effectively every one must resell tokens at a discount, so the economics do not work.
No horizon
Source: Annualized Enron Rate
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Observation
“We are basing the vast majority of words written and billions invested in the AI bubble on assumptions built on assumptions built on assumptions, several of which fall apart when you ask simple questions like “how does that work?” or “how did you get that number?””
Our reading: The vast majority of words written and billions invested in the AI bubble rest on stacked assumptions, several of which fall apart when you ask simple questions such as how something works or how a number was derived.
No horizon
Scope: several of which
Source: Annualized Enron Rate
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Rhetoric
“The AI bubble is inflated by bullshit numbers peddled by the ignorant, craven or easily-led. Your ability to distinguish between which of them you’re talking to is critical to not losing your shirt.”
Our reading: The AI bubble is inflated by bogus numbers pushed by the ignorant, the craven or the easily led, and being able to tell which of these you are talking to is critical to avoiding heavy losses.
No horizon
Source: Annualized Enron Rate
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Observation
“I must also say how utterly disappointed I was to see how Bloomberg credulously reported that OpenAI “expected to hit $70 billion in annualized revenue by end of 2026,” a transparent attempt to send the markets back up with a story that tells the world less than nothing.”
Our reading: OpenAI's projection of $70 billion annualized revenue by end of 2026, credulously reported by Bloomberg, was a transparent attempt to lift markets and conveys no information.
No horizon
Source: Annualized Enron Rate
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Causal claim
“The obfuscation of the actual underlying financial of these companies is intentional, because it makes it harder to do the kinds of comparisons I’ve done today,”
Our reading: The obscuring of AI startups' actual underlying financials is intentional, because it makes the kinds of comparisons he made in the post harder to do.
No horizon
Source: Annualized Enron Rate
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Recommendation or value judgment
“There is absolutely no value in using “annualized run rates” for anyone other than the company and its investors, and the fact that modern tech and business journalism continues to accept it for what are meant to be the largest and most-important companies in the world is a sign that something is very wrong with how we cover the tech industry.”
Our reading: Annualized run rates have absolutely no value for anyone other than the company and its investors, and tech and business journalism's continued acceptance of them for the largest companies is a sign that something is very wrong with tech coverage.
No horizon
Scope: for anyone other than the company and its investors
Source: Annualized Enron Rate
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Causal claim
“Let’s be clear about something: the reason we’re not getting these numbers is that these companies are not actually making these amounts on an annual basis.”
Our reading: AI startups withhold real revenue figures because they do not actually earn their claimed annualized amounts.
No horizon
Source: Annualized Enron Rate
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Recommendation or value judgment
“Reporting “run rates” is a marketing exercise, and if you disagree, please answer me the following: what does a “$65 billion annualized run rate” tell you about Anthropic, exactly?”
Our reading: Reporting run rates, such as Anthropic's '$65 billion annualized run rate', is a marketing exercise.
No horizon
Source: Annualized Enron Rate
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Recommendation or value judgment
“This all makes pontifications that data center spending will increase to $32 trillion by 2050 equal parts stupid and wasteful, on top of the overall problem that there isn’t even enough demand right now for hyperscalers to break even on their 2026 and 2027 capex plans.”
Our reading: Pontifications that data center spending will increase to $32 trillion by 2050 are equal parts stupid and wasteful.
No horizon
Source: Credit Crunch
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Recommendation or value judgment
“Anthropic and OpenAI Should Not Be Allowed To Go Public, and Allowing Them To Do So Actively Harms Investors”
Our reading: OpenAI and Anthropic should not be allowed to go public because doing so harms investors.
No horizon
Source: Credit Crunch
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Recommendation or value judgment
“I’ll add that if this happens, it will be a catastrophic failure of regulation and ratings agencies at a level unseen in the equities markets.”
Our reading: If OpenAI or Anthropic get an investment-grade rating, it will be a catastrophic failure of regulation and ratings agencies at a level unseen in the equities markets.
No horizon
Only if: if OpenAI or Anthropic get an investment-grade rating
Source: Credit Crunch
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Recommendation or value judgment
“In other words, stop making these comparisons, they are not accurate.”
Our reading: People should stop comparing OpenAI and Anthropic to Amazon and Uber at their IPOs, because those comparisons are not accurate.
No horizon
Source: Credit Crunch
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Conditional forecast
“It’s hard to gauge this based on the unknowns of its trading volume, but if I had to guess, there’s maybe $20 billion in annual share sales it could do.”
Our reading: At a $2 trillion valuation with a roughly 5% float, Anthropic could maybe do about $20 billion in annual share sales, as a tentative guess given unknown trading volume.
No horizon
Only if: at a $2 trillion valuation
Source: Credit Crunch
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Conditional forecast
“This means that it’s unlikely that we’ll have a “booming open source AI market” in the end, and at best we’ll have some sort of handicapped Google monstrosity, though even that seems less likely based on the fallout I fear.”
Our reading: Once the AI bubble bursts, a booming open-source AI market is unlikely; at best there will be some sort of handicapped Google monstrosity, though even that seems less likely given the fallout he fears.
No horizon
Only if: once the AI bubble bursts
Source: Credit Crunch
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Forecast
“OpenAI and Anthropic represent 80%+ of all compute demand, and their customers — unprofitable venture-backed AI startups — make up 80% of their enterprise revenues, which means they’re likely to die before OpenAI and Anthropic.”
Our reading: OpenAI and Anthropic account for 80%+ of compute demand, and their startup customers (80% of enterprise revenue) are likely to die before them.
No horizon
Source: Credit Crunch
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Forecast
“I’m not sure venture capital — or anyone covering venture capital — has actually conceptualized how significant the losses may be, because I can see a world where virtually every AI investment goes to zero at a time when venture capital is facing an historic losing streak.”
Our reading: Virtually every AI venture investment could go to zero.
No horizon
Source: Credit Crunch
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Recommendation or value judgment
“I’ll add that the only thing worse than allowing them to go public will be to allow them to raise debt at anything other than the junkiest levels that the market has to offer.”
Our reading: OpenAI and Anthropic should not be allowed to raise debt at anything but the junkiest levels.
No horizon
Source: Credit Crunch
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Rhetoric
“Even if you think AI is the most wonderful, beautiful software tool ever imagined, there is no rational basis under which you can look at the current economic picture and say that everything will be fine.”
Our reading: There is no rational basis for believing the AI industry's economics will turn out fine.
No horizon
Source: Credit Crunch
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Conditional forecast
“With most of the demand for AI driven by endless media and peer pressure, once the AI bubble bursts, the “demand” for AI services will be entirely driven by utility…and considering most services lose money even during the hype cycle, it’s hard to see what post-bubble economy even exists.”
Our reading: Most AI demand is driven by hype; once the bubble bursts, demand will depend only on utility and little post-bubble AI economy may exist.
No horizon
Only if: once the AI bubble bursts
Source: Credit Crunch
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Forecast
“It’s time to talk about why that’s very, very unlikely.”
Our reading: It is very unlikely that OpenAI and Anthropic will go public, grow forever, raise whatever debt they need, and that every data center investment works out fine.
No horizon
Source: Credit Crunch
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Rhetoric
“The fact we can’t cleanly answer this question as hundreds of billions of dollars get sunk into AI data centers may be the most glaring miss in the history of finance.”
Our reading: The fact that we can't cleanly answer who will pay for AI services, as hundreds of billions of dollars are sunk into AI data centers, may be the most glaring miss in the history of finance.
No horizon
Source: Credit Crunch
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Conditional forecast
“In any case, if either gets an investment-grade rating, it’s likely that a hyperscaler has stepped up and guaranteed some or all of the debt, but in doing so, they’d likely sacrifice part of their own credit rating in the process.”
Our reading: If OpenAI or Anthropic gets an investment-grade rating, a hyperscaler has likely guaranteed the debt and would likely sacrifice part of its own credit rating.
No horizon
Only if: if either gets an investment-grade rating
Source: Credit Crunch
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Rhetoric
“Anthropic is not the future of technology, nor is it the next Google, nor is it the next Microsoft, nor is it, to quote Reuters, capable of “[transforming] the global economy more profoundly than industrialization, electricity and the internet.””
Our reading: Anthropic is not the future of technology, not the next Google or Microsoft, and not capable of transforming the global economy more profoundly than industrialization, electricity and the internet.
No horizon
Source: Dead Money
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Conditional forecast
“As Oracle sits exactly one rung above junk — and its debt trades at junk rates (meaning that the markets buy and sell it as if the yields were junk (an average of 7.8%) — it would likely see its debt priced at around 25-50bps more than what we’ve seen here.”
Our reading: Because Oracle sits one rung above junk and its debt trades at junk rates, it would likely see new debt priced around 25–50bps above the flat repricing estimate.
No horizon
Only if: if Oracle issued this debt today
Source: Dead Money
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Conditional forecast
“Every single day — even on the weekends — someone asks me either how or when all of this breaks, and my answer is simple: when the money runs out.”
Our reading: The AI bubble will break when the money runs out.
No horizon
Only if: when the money runs out
Source: Dead Money
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Conditional forecast
“And if Oracle raises more debt, it runs the risk that two ratings agencies could downgrade it to “junk,” immediately forcing investment funds and indices that cannot hold junk debt to dump it, turning it into a “fallen angel” (as I covered a few months ago).”
Our reading: If Oracle raises more debt, it could be downgraded to junk by two agencies, forcing funds to dump its bonds.
No horizon
Only if: if Oracle raises more debt
Source: Dead Money
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Observation
“In fact, I’d argue that the last year and a half’s worth of AI capex is fundamentally speculative, because there has never been any proof — even with Anthropic and OpenAI’s compute spend — that spending a trillion or more dollars on GPUs and data centers would ever pay off.”
Our reading: The last 18 months of AI capex is fundamentally speculative because there was never proof that trillion-dollar GPU and data center spending would pay off.
No horizon
Qualifier: last year and a half
Source: Dead Money
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Forecast
“Even then, at the end of the five year period, we’ll theoretically have multiple new generations of NVIDIA GPUs (Vera Rubin and Feynman), which will further suppress the ongoing rates that your data center earns”
Our reading: At the end of the five-year period there will theoretically be multiple new NVIDIA GPU generations (Vera Rubin and Feynman), which will further suppress the ongoing rates a data center earns.
No horizon
Qualifier: theoretically
Source: Dead Money
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Forecast
“Said customers are brittle, unprofitable and unsustainable, with the very real risk that they simply won’t exist by the time construction is complete.”
Our reading: AI data center customers are brittle and unprofitable, and may not exist by the time construction is complete.
No horizon
Source: Dead Money
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Observation
“Though some of them talk a big game about building or training their own models, doing so is enormously expensive with little chance of a payoff, especially given the massive advantage in compute, capital and talent held by the labs.”
Our reading: AI startups training their own models is enormously expensive with little chance of payoff given the labs' advantages.
No horizon
Source: Dead Money
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Recommendation or value judgment
“We must treat OpenAI and Anthropic as what they are: economic disasters waiting to happen.”
Our reading: OpenAI and Anthropic should be treated as economic disasters waiting to happen.
No horizon
Source: Dead Money
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Forecast
“And things are only going to get worse from here.”
Our reading: Things are only going to get worse from here.
No horizon
Source: Dead Money
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Observation
“In truth, I think there’s a world where AI revenues are much lower ($150 billion or less) and Anthropic and OpenAI’s share is more like 70% to 80%, especially in the case of Oracle.”
Our reading: Hyperscaler AI revenues may actually be $150 billion or less, with Anthropic and OpenAI's share around 70–80%.
No horizon
Source: Dead Money
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Observation
“Considering that The Information had it at around $900 million a month beforehand, I think it’s likely that its revenues sit at around $300 million to $400 million.”
Our reading: Cognition's actual revenues are likely around $300–400 million despite its claimed $1 billion annualized figure.
No horizon
Source: Dead Money
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Rhetoric
“AI data centers — and their associated costs and debt — are priced for a level of perfection that no other industry has ever rivaled.”
Our reading: AI data centers and their associated costs and debt are priced for a level of perfection that no other industry has ever rivaled.
No horizon
Source: Dead Money
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Observation
“Goldman aggressively clears it throat by adding that “revenues are growing quickly and revenue backlogs are sizable”, but that’s far from a foregone conclusion considering (as I’ve mentioned) the fact that hyperscalers appear to be warehousing hundreds of billions of dollars of GPUs”
Our reading: Goldman's statement that AI revenues are growing quickly and revenue backlogs are sizable is far from a foregone conclusion, given that hyperscalers appear to be warehousing hundreds of billions of dollars of GPUs.
No horizon
Qualifier: hyperscalers appear to be warehousing GPUs
Source: Dead Money
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Rhetoric
“Anthropic is a cloud software company with volatile products and economics, sold in a fundamentally insincere and deceptive manner, pushed upon society with threats of death and destruction by aggressive zealots and members of the media bereft of shame.”
Our reading: Anthropic is a cloud software company with volatile products and economics, sold in a fundamentally insincere and deceptive manner and pushed on society with threats of death and destruction by aggressive zealots and shameless media.
No horizon
Source: Dead Money
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Causal claim
“And if the price of their debt is crashing — and the expected yield on the future debt is skyrocketing as a result — then their problems are everyone’s problems.”
Our reading: If CoreWeave's and Oracle's debt prices are crashing and expected yields on their future debt are skyrocketing as a result, their problems are everyone's problems.
No horizon
Only if: if their debt prices are crashing and expected future yields skyrocketing
Source: Dead Money
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Conditional forecast
“This company will, if allowed to go public, likely lean on the very same junk-grade/high-yield debt that AI data centers and neoclouds like CoreWeave currently need, and it will do so at volumes of somewhere between $50 billion and $100 billion a year for a company with few assets, endless losses and a CEO with the grace of a drunk elephant.”
Our reading: If Anthropic goes public, it will likely rely on junk/high-yield debt of $50–100 billion a year.
No horizon
Only if: if Anthropic goes public
Source: Dead Money
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Observation
“While things could change in 2026, it’s important to note how many people said that Anthropic was “a better business” that would “be profitable faster than OpenAI,” which is, until we are able to see both of their audited 2026 financials, somewhere between a myth and an outright lie.”
Our reading: The claim many people made, that Anthropic was a better business that would be profitable faster than OpenAI, is somewhere between a myth and an outright lie until both companies' audited 2026 financials can be seen.
No horizon
Qualifier: until both audited 2026 financials are available
Source: Dead Money
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Conditional forecast
“Once this happens, there will be a fundamental reevaluation of the value of all AI data center debt, which may lead to a sell-off of the underlying bonds and associated debt, which will make any investor deeply entrenched in the GPU credit business extremely nervous and, in some cases, unable to exit their positions in anything short of an embarrassing fashion.”
Our reading: Once AI data center debt becomes untenable, all such debt will be reevaluated, possibly triggering a bond sell-off that traps GPU credit investors.
No horizon
Only if: once AI data center debt becomes untenable
Source: Dead Money
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Forecast
“This means that before the bubble bursts, these companies will continue to sap the venture capital world of billions more dollars, all with little chance of an acquisition and a near-zero chance of an IPO considering their ugly economics.”
Our reading: Before the AI bubble bursts, AI startups will absorb billions more in VC with little chance of acquisition and near-zero chance of IPO.
No horizon
Qualifier: before the bubble bursts
Source: Dead Money
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Observation
“I fear that every single model around existing and future data center construction and AI compute demand is wrong, and that every assumption we have about the underlying economics of AI is corrupted by the belief that there’s far more operational capacity than there really is.”
Our reading: The author fears that every model of existing and future data center construction and AI compute demand is wrong, and that every assumption about the underlying economics of AI is corrupted by the belief that there is far more operational capacity than there really is.
No horizon
Qualifier: I fear
Source: Where're All The AI Chips?
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Recommendation or value judgment
“Most of NVIDIA’s sales are sitting in warehouses, and that is a significant disclosure that NVIDIA should have already been forced to make.”
Our reading: NVIDIA should have been forced to disclose that most of its sales are sitting in warehouses.
No horizon
Source: Where're All The AI Chips?
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Observation
“It’s also clear that Microsoft, Google, Amazon, Meta, SpaceX, and every neocloud are purchasing NVIDIA GPUs tens of billions at a time under the implicit knowledge that it will take years to build the capacity and connect the power to them, creating what amounts to the largest pre-order campaign in the history of capitalism, but also a material misrepresentation of the current AI buildout.”
Our reading: It is clear that Microsoft, Google, Amazon, Meta, SpaceX and every neocloud are buying NVIDIA GPUs tens of billions at a time, implicitly knowing it will take years to build the capacity and connect power, which amounts to the largest pre-order campaign in the history of capitalism and a material misrepresentation of the current AI buildout.
No horizon
Qualifier: it's also clear
Source: Where're All The AI Chips?
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Recommendation or value judgment
“Everybody celebrating Anthropic’s (entirely fictional) plans to have 5GW of capacity by the end of 2026 should know that this company is inspiring one the largest misallocation of capital in the history of capitalism.”
Our reading: Anthropic's plan to have 5GW of capacity by the end of 2026 is entirely fictional, and the company is inspiring one of the largest misallocations of capital in the history of capitalism.
No horizon
Source: Where're All The AI Chips?
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Causal claim
“This, by the way, is the problem with hyperscalers not explicitly breaking out their AI revenue, because in doing so they create the (I’d argue deliberate) illusion that AI capex is creating revenue growth, which both tricks investors into buying their stock and tricks developers into building AI data centers, believing that capex quickly translates into revenue.”
Our reading: By not breaking out AI revenue, hyperscalers create an arguably deliberate illusion that AI capex drives revenue growth, misleading investors and developers.
No horizon
Source: Where're All The AI Chips?
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Forecast
“Everybody wants AI to be just like the Dot-Com Bubble, when I fear that GPUs may end up like the millions of unsold copies of Atari’s ET found buried in New Mexico.”
Our reading: The author fears that GPUs may end up like the millions of unsold copies of Atari's ET found buried in New Mexico.
No horizon
Qualifier: I fear
Source: Where're All The AI Chips?
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Recommendation or value judgment
“Perhaps this doesn’t rise to the level of SEC action, but every single journalist and analyst should be asking Jensen Huang and every hyperscaler executive buying GPUs the following questions:”
Our reading: Journalists and analysts should press NVIDIA and hyperscaler executives on how many GPUs are actually operational and generating revenue.
No horizon
Source: Where're All The AI Chips?
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Forecast
“In other words, I think everybody is completely wrong about data center capacity, and it’s going to be a nightmare to untangle once they work it out.”
Our reading: The author thinks everybody is completely wrong about data center capacity, and that it will be a nightmare to untangle once they work it out.
No horizon
Qualifier: I think
Source: Where're All The AI Chips?
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Recommendation or value judgment
“In all honesty, the best case scenario would be if NVIDIA stopped selling GPUs, or AI data center debt stopped being issued, because every single time a data center is funded and breaks ground, it increases the severity of the overbuild scenario.”
Our reading: The best-case scenario would be for NVIDIA to stop selling GPUs or for AI data center debt to stop being issued, because every time a data center is funded and breaks ground it makes the overbuild worse.
No horizon
Qualifier: every single time a data center is funded and breaks ground
Source: Where're All The AI Chips?
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Observation
“While I cannot say the exact rationale for making these statements, I can find no way to interpret them other than being an act of deception.”
Our reading: The author cannot say the exact rationale, but can find no way to interpret Microsoft's FY26 earnings-call statements about adding a gigawatt of capacity a quarter other than as an act of deception.
No horizon
Qualifier: I cannot say the exact rationale
Source: Where're All The AI Chips?
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Causal claim
“And if the truth — and this very much seems to be the case — is that NVIDIA has sold hundreds of billions of dollars of GPUs years in advance, that materially changes everything about the AI bubble and the AI data center buildout.”
Our reading: If NVIDIA has sold hundreds of billions of dollars of GPUs years in advance, which very much seems to be the case, that materially changes everything about the AI bubble and the AI data center buildout.
No horizon
Only if: if NVIDIA has sold hundreds of billions of dollars of GPUs years in advance
Source: Where're All The AI Chips?
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Observation
“If Microsoft is struggling, everybody’s struggling, and we may have a very inconvenient truth: that NVIDIA has potentially sold hundreds of billions of GPUs years in advance.”
Our reading: If Microsoft is struggling, everybody is struggling, and it may be true that NVIDIA has potentially sold hundreds of billions of GPUs years in advance.
No horizon
Only if: if Microsoft is struggling
Source: Where're All The AI Chips?
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Observation
“It has claimed again and again that it has brought gigawatts of capacity online for the best part of a year, all, in my opinion, with the intent of misrepresenting the scale of an AI data center buildout where I believe most of the GPUs, to quote Satya Nadella, are now “sitting in inventory that [they] can’t plug in.””
Our reading: In Zitron's opinion, most of Microsoft's GPUs are sitting in inventory uninstalled and its capacity claims are intended to misrepresent the AI buildout.
No horizon
Qualifier: in my opinion
Source: Where're All The AI Chips?
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Recommendation or value judgment
“Hyperscalers have a spending problem.”
Our reading: Hyperscalers have a spending problem.
No horizon
Source: Where're All The AI Chips?
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Recommendation or value judgment
“This is a huge scandal.”
Our reading: It is a huge scandal that Microsoft buys GPUs it has nowhere to put while saying it is bringing gigawatts of capacity online.
No horizon
Source: Where're All The AI Chips?
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Rhetoric
“None of this ever had anything to do with AI, and everybody who cheered Jensen Huang’s ascent in the belief it did is a mark.”
Our reading: The NVIDIA GPU boom never had anything to do with AI itself.
No horizon
Source: Where're All The AI Chips?
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Conditional forecast
“The longer this continues, the more promises are made, the more projects that are announced…the worse it’s going to be.”
Our reading: The longer the AI buildout continues and more projects are announced, the worse the eventual fallout will be.
No horizon
Only if: the longer this continues
Source: Where're All The AI Chips?
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Rhetoric
“If LLMs were a toy, they’d be taken off the shelves. If LLMs were a drug, they would be banned.”
Our reading: If LLMs were a toy they would be taken off the shelves, and if they were a drug they would be banned.
No horizon
Source: AI Is Already In Dangerous Hands
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Forecast
“There’s also the very reasonable question of what happens to SoftBank if OpenAI can’t go public, which is now a very real possibility.”
Our reading: It is now a very real possibility that OpenAI cannot go public, which raises the reasonable question of what happens to SoftBank in that case.
No horizon
Source: AI Is Already In Dangerous Hands
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Observation
“There is no way a “slow down” actually gels with the overall narrative of AI’s rapacious growth.”
Our reading: A slowdown cannot coexist with the narrative of AI's rapid growth.
No horizon
Source: AI Is Already In Dangerous Hands
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Recommendation or value judgment
“the grim truth that we need to start arresting people for committing crimes, halting any and all training runs, and putting real safeguards on this technology”
Our reading: We need to arrest people for AI-enabled crimes, halt all training runs, and impose real safeguards because the labs are irresponsible.
No horizon
Source: AI Is Already In Dangerous Hands
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Conditional forecast
“While this might have the short-term benefit of reducing costs (and maybe even, with the right amount of accounting shenanigans, eek out a razor-thin positive margin), it’s likely that Chinese open source developers would distill (as they have been) Western models, create a much cheaper and “good enough” model to compete, and their “lead” in a race where everybody loses money would deteriorate.”
Our reading: If AI labs paused training, Chinese open source developers would likely distill Western models into cheaper competitors and erode the labs' lead.
No horizon
Only if: if AI labs pause training
Source: AI Is Already In Dangerous Hands
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Recommendation or value judgment
“The fact that LLMs from both Anthropic and Meta have been involved in similar incidents is a sign that we need to arrest more people.”
Our reading: Because Anthropic and Meta LLMs were involved in similar hacking incidents, more people need to be arrested.
No horizon
Source: AI Is Already In Dangerous Hands
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Recommendation or value judgment
“In my opinion, there is no further reason to invest in this industry, nor has there been for the vast majority of its existence.”
Our reading: In his opinion, there is no further reason to invest in the AI industry, nor has there been for the vast majority of its existence.
No horizon
Qualifier: in my opinion
Source: AI Is Already In Dangerous Hands
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
Recommendation or value judgment
“I agree that we need to take “AI safety” seriously, but that starts with treating LLMs as normal software run in a reckless and dangerous manner by malevolent entities with little regard for society.”
Our reading: Taking AI safety seriously should start with treating LLMs as normal software run recklessly by malevolent entities.
No horizon
Source: AI Is Already In Dangerous Hands