Is AI 'one big bubble?' Behind the tech selloff

The tech-heavy Nasdaq stock index has lately been on a roller coaster. Chris Hondros/Getty Images/Hulton Archive hide caption toggle caption Chris Hondros/Getty Images/Hulton Archive Stay up to date with NPR's Up First newsletter sent every weekday morning. A wave of selling in tech stocks is starting to reflect doubts over whether the spending boom on artificial intelligence is worth it. The best-known AI-related tech stocks, Nvidia and Google-parent, Alphabet, were down for a second day in a row. Among the biggest losers on Tuesday, however, was chip maker Micron Technology, whose shares plummeted 12%. These selloffs sent the tech-heavy Nasdaq index down around 2% on Tuesday afternoon. Micron's stock is the perfect representation of what's going on in the stock market. It has skyrocketed in value in the past year — up about 800% — on soaring demand for memory chips from the AI buildout, showcasing the massive valuations for AI-related stocks. "The market just continues to oscillate between 'AI is going to be great and increase productivity and all these companies are going to win,' and 'AI is a big waste of time and it's not worth the return on investment at all and this is all one big bubble,'" said Gil Luria, head of technology research at investment firm D.A. Davidson. Over $1 trillion spent. "Are we going to start to see returns?" Spending on AI has been monumental. …