AC = AI: Andreessen's Hot Take Finally Gets a Cold Reception From Barclays ⚡

A Barclays survey of 410 fixed-income investors across North America, Europe, the Middle East and Asia found artificial intelligence has moved past pilot programs and into daily operations at institutional money managers, even as Marc Andreessen, cofounder of Andreessen Horowitz, warns that electricity and cooling capacity will determine where the technology can scale next. About 52% of long-only managers and asset owners reported using AI mainly for research, while 44% of hedge funds use it to process market data, according to the survey. Hedge funds registered the heaviest usage, with 72% reporting daily AI use, compared with 49% of long-only managers and 38% of asset owners.

Trading and execution showed far less penetration, with most respondents describing only minor impact, and data security was ranked the top barrier to broader deployment. Job losses are not expected to follow, with only 7% of respondents forecasting meaningful staff cuts and most predicting higher output at steady headcount.

Andreessen linked AI's growth to physical constraints in a recent social media post, writing, "In the future, in each country, the amount of AI will be proportional to the amount of AC. And vice versa." His framing builds on a long-running case for energy abundance and points to the demands that AI servers place on power grids and cooling systems. The International Energy Agency expects global data center electricity demand to more than double by 2030, reaching roughly 945 terawatt hours, a level close to Japan's total current power consumption. In the United States, data centers may soon draw more electricity than the combined output of the country's aluminum, steel and cement industries, per the IEA.

The capital flowing into the buildout underscores the demand picture. Microsoft, Amazon, Alphabet and Meta have together set out $725 billion in 2026 capital guidance, a 77% increase over this year's level, according to Barclays. Whether grids and cooling infrastructure can keep pace will shape both AI's expansion and the energy markets tied to it.