The headlines this weekend were all about an AI slowdown. Dan Ives isn't buying it. He argues we're barely getting started, only a fraction of the way through trillions in AI spending, and the fear is just noise.
He joins Evan at Future Proof to explain why he thinks we're still in the "third inning" of the AI buildout, why the US is ahead of China in tech for the first time in 30 years, how he separates real threats from scary narratives, and his take on the coming Anthropic IPO.
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What Dan Ives said
Written from the verified transcript and checked against it. Every figure links to the moment it was said.
Dan Ives, Managing Director and Global Head of Technology Research at Wedbush Securities, argued that fears of an AI slowdown are misplaced, stating the industry is only less than 15% through the trillions of dollars of capital to be spent on AI, and we are in the 'third inning' of the buildout. He dismissed calls for a slowdown, asserting that neither China nor the US is slowing down, and that slowing would mean China wins. Ives highlighted the importance of data and infrastructure over models, citing the accelerating spending by CIOs as a key confidence signal. He discussed Anthropic's upcoming IPO, calling it a 'centerpiece of the AI revolution' and positive for the market. Ives also announced his new venture, Yorkville Ives Management, an investment bank focused on energy, tech, and infrastructure, and praised leaders like Alex Karp and Jensen Huang for their vision.
Key takeaways
AI is only less than 15% through the trillions of dollars of capital to be spent, and we are in the 'third inning' of the buildout.
The US is not slowing down AI investment; slowing down would mean China wins.
Anthropic's IPO will be very positive for the overall market and tech, providing transparency.
0:00It is Evan from the Wolf Financial team here at the Future Proof Conference in the amazing BitMine booth with the one and only Dan Ives. How are you doing, sir?
0:10I would love to hear your just general take on the market and then we'll kind of dig in deeper, but what's going on?
1:29So these are really critical things, but it doesn't feel like we necessarily need to slow down the AI thing to go and do that. What's your take?
What is up everybody? It is Evan from the Wolf Financial team here at the Future Proof Conference in the amazing BitMine booth with the one and only Dan Ives. How are you doing, sir?
I'm super excited to have you, even though a little awkward. I made it awkward there, unfortunately. But I'm super excited for this conversation. There is so much going on in this world right now. Are we going to pause AI? Are we going to slow down? We have Fed interest rate hikes possibly coming in. I would love to hear your just general take on the market and then we'll kind of dig in deeper, but what's going on?
Look, my general take is that we're still only less than 15% through the trillions of dollars of capital that are going to be spent in AI. So when we go through some of these moments like this weekend or circular financing or other white knuckle moments, it's my view we're in the third inning of this buildout. And as someone that sees the data center build out in the US, sees the chip demand in Asia, first time in 30 years the US has headed China when it comes to tech. That's why I just don't get caught up sometimes whether it's 10-year oil, different narratives, SaaS, AI, cross, whatever you want to say. It's the work we do that gives me confidence to sometimes navigate in the near term scary narratives.
Yeah, that makes total sense. This weekend was very interesting as this AI safety conversation. It didn't pop up out of nowhere, but it became the conversation for a little bit this weekend. There were some calls for maybe a little slowdown in this data center buildout, but we also got headlines like Elon talking about Grok 5 being better than Opus. We had Zuckerberg talking about Muse and all this stuff here. We even had Sam Altman. He put out stuff like they're going to ship a bunch of products for Dev Day. So, I'm hearing stuff, but it doesn't feel like we're going to slow down. And a lot of the conversation ended up centering around China and UK ended up kind of letting them back into this. So how do you kind of view this kind of conversation over the last little bit? Obviously, you know, AI safety and alignment is super important. It's not good business to have an AI get into a company and then goes in and just hacks them, whatever. There's also questions like who's that liable if I use Claude's AI and it goes in and hacks someone else. So these are really critical things, but it doesn't feel like we necessarily need to slow down the AI thing to go and do that. What's your take?
We're not slowing down. I mean, we could word salad this however you want. The reality is China's not slowing down. US not slowing down. It's as simple as that. Politicalization of this, if we slow down, China wins. And also with Anthropic and some of the things that we saw this weekend, there also is a you get to the top floor and then you pull the ladder up. Call it regulatory capture, whatever. So, let's take a step back. Like, there's other things going on here as well. Meta, not coincidental that that stock's had such a run because guess what? Zuckerberg's not slowing down. They'll look to narrow the gap. Go back to April RSA Security Conference. You know, Anthropic's going to ruin the cybersecurity industry because they're going to be able to just eat their lunch. Look at CrowdStrike's chart. But I was with George from CrowdStrike doing our podcast and the whole time we're like, I can't believe people think that the industry is done. It just speaks to my view and me and you have known each other a long time. It's like you have to be able to separate from fiction to what's a real threat.
How do you sometimes that's really difficult. I know you've talked a lot about your time on the ground in Asia seeing the actual kind of thing there. As someone who talks about news online, I hear so much noise. I hear people from different directions telling me why I should be scared. I hear people that I respect who are normally very bullish on this change opinions. How do you see through the noise on all this stuff and keep in that like we are in the third inning. This is the game-changing thing.
I mean part of it is just 26, 27 years I like doing this, thousands of data points every month. I'll have confidence in my own thesis and I don't get caught up sometimes in like the white knuckle moment. Listen, if I talked to a CIO who I respected and they told me use cases are not panning out. They're cutting spending. I care about that 25 times more than like narratives. And it's the opposite. They're accelerating. So that's why to me like three and a half million air miles over my career, that's the confidence that helps me navigate like if a stock's down after a quarter, whatever may things like that.
Makes a lot of sense. We're getting to a really exciting time in the market for IPOs. We obviously had SpaceX, a once-in-a-lifetime company, and then here we are, they're talking about another company maybe coming in and going public at a higher valuation. Anthropic, the IPO seems to be about a month away. How do you kind of view that coming to the market? Is it a name that you're excited about? Is a name that you want to kind of see how the market reacts to it? Obviously, the company Anthropic has exploded. There's no one who's going to say that this isn't the best model in the world, not even $2 trillion is a high valuation. How do you kind of view it at this point?
Also high valuation but it's all relative to what the opportunity. I mean, so I think sometimes with the transformational growth companies you can't just put like a bow around it and just say like it's expensive. Look, Anthropic, it's a centerpiece of the AI revolution. Them going public will be very positive for the overall market and tech and it would also give a lot of transparency to, you know, I think to the, you know, once they're public. I think with these IPOs, SpaceX included, you have to sometimes understand like the narratives and the thesis and the fundamentals they could take years to play out but it's hard for an investor to look at Anthropic and say, 'Oh, I don't, I'm just going to pass on this.'
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Ives, D. (2026, September 17). Dan Ives: Why the AI Slowdown Fears Are Wrong [Interview transcript]. WOLF Financial. CEOInterviews.AI. https://ceointerviews.ai/interview/2370459/
MLA
Dan Ives. "Dan Ives: Why the AI Slowdown Fears Are Wrong." WOLF Financial, 17 Sep. 2026. Transcript, CEOInterviews.AI, https://ceointerviews.ai/interview/2370459/.
BibTeX
@misc{ives2026_2370459,
author = {Dan Ives},
title = {Dan Ives: Why the AI Slowdown Fears Are Wrong},
howpublished = {Interview transcript, WOLF Financial. CEOInterviews.AI},
year = {2026},
month = {sep},
url = {https://ceointerviews.ai/interview/2370459/},
note = {Speaker-attributed transcript with timestamps}
}
