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Apollo's Chief Economist Looked at 493 of America's 500 Biggest Companies and Found AI Has Paid Off for None of Them. The Seven Selling It Took the Whole Gain, and Wall Street Spent the Week Dumping the Builders
In a note published Saturday, October 24, Apollo Global Management chief economist Torsten Slok wrote that AI 'has delivered zero financial payoff to corporate America outside of tech': revenue per worker and profit margins are rising for the Magnificent 7 and flat for the other 493 S&P 500 companies, and total factor productivity growth sits near zero. His charts show AI spending is overwhelmingly concentrated in a thin, venture-backed top tier, while mainstream firms treat token spending as a cost center and pull back. The note landed in a week when the Nasdaq fell 694 points on doubts AI…
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