Over the weekend, Space Exploration Technologies Corp (NASDAQ:SPCX) CEO Elon Musk reacted to Atreides Management CIO Gavin Baker’s prediction that rapidly rising AI usage will make compute spending increasingly critical.
Atreides AI Spending Set to Jump 100x
In a post on X, Baker said that Atreides’ internal AI spending in August 2026 will be roughly 100 times higher than in March, while continuing to double approximately every month.
He said the increase comes as AI becomes more deeply integrated into investment research and other knowledge-based work.
Baker expects companies to find a balance between “computationally efficient humans,” cheaper open-source AI models and more expensive frontier models.
Baker Warns of ‘Compute Inequality’
“AI means that scale has become more important to investing,” Baker wrote on X, adding that there could eventually be a minimum level of token spending required to remain competitive across many knowledge-based industries.
He described this potential gap as “compute inequality,” suggesting organizations with the resources to consume substantially more AI could gain an advantage over those that cannot.
Baker also noted that his spending could rise further when Grok Bot shifts to consumption-based pricing, which he expects could create a “step function” in his AI costs.
Elon Musk Responds
Musk, who owns AI company xAI and its Grok chatbot, shared Baker’s post while saying, “Interesting.”
Larry Fink Warns AI Could Create a ‘K Economy’
In May, BlackRock Inc. (NYSE:BLK) CEO Larry Fink warned that the enormous cost of adopting AI could sharply divide market winners from losers. "With the AI economy in every industry, we’re going to see a K economy," Fink said.
He argued that the massive capital investments needed to compete in AI could make that divide increasingly permanent, as companies race to secure the infrastructure required to keep up.
Fink highlighted growing shortages in electricity, semiconductors and data-processing capacity, and predicted that "a new asset class will be buying futures of compute."
Disclaimer: This content was partially produced with the help of AI tools and was reviewed and published by Benzinga editors.
Photo: Frederic Legrand – COMEO on Shutterstock.com