If the AI bubble bursts marketing could take the first hit | MarTech

"When Greenspan asked that question, the iPhone didn't exist, and "dot-com" was as overused as AI is today. Four years later, the exuberance gave way to a rational collapse. Today, the same question hangs over artificial intelligence - only this time, the stakes are bigger and the debt exposure is deeper. For digital marketers, whose tools, strategies and even customer experiences increasingly depend on AI systems, the fallout from a potential correction would be more than financial - it could be operationally crippling."

"According to JPMorgan Chase, $1.2 trillion of debt is now tied to AI-related companies, making it the largest single segment of the investment-grade market. Never before has so much corporate debt been tied to such a speculative story about future productivity gains. That debt is also masking deeper economic problems. Harvard economist Jason Furman recently calculated that GDP growth outside of data centers was just 0.1% in the first half of 2025. Remove AI infrastructure, and the U.S. economy is barely treading water."

""We are in a phase of the build-out where the entire industry's got to come together and everybody's going to do super well. You'll see this on chips. You'll see this on data centers. You'll see this lower down the supply chain." 'The entire industry's got to come together and everybody's going to do super well.' That sentence is gibberish. Only an AI hallucination could connect it to how business operates. It isn't meant to make sense, though. It's meant to boost morale and keep everyone on the same page."

A historical question about when irrational exuberance inflates asset values is again relevant amid AI enthusiasm. AI-related companies now carry roughly $1.2 trillion of corporate debt, representing the largest single segment of the investment-grade market. That concentrated debt exposure amplifies systemic risk and masks weaker growth elsewhere: GDP growth outside data centers measured just 0.1% in the first half of 2025. A market correction in AI valuations would be more than a financial event for organizations reliant on AI tools—it could cause operational disruptions across marketing, supply chains, chips, and data-center ecosystems.

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