Ai-Driven Productivity Expectations And Cross-Sector Rotation
Sources: 1 • Confidence: Medium • Updated: 2026-02-09 16:41
Key takeaways
- A step-up in productivity expectations is described as creating disinflationary pressure and coinciding with rolling over breakevens and the 2-year yield.
- Average S&P 500 single-stock volatility relative to index volatility reached the 99th percentile, with the average stock moving about seven times the index.
- Credit is flagged as the key risk monitor, with widening high-yield spreads and large HYG tail-put buying cited as potential warning signals.
- Gold is described as rising to about 25% of world reserves while the U.S. dollar share of global reserves declines.
- 2s10s is described as breaking out to the highest level since about 2018 and expected to keep steepening due to easier front-end policy and less support for long-end yields.
Sections
Ai-Driven Productivity Expectations And Cross-Sector Rotation
- A step-up in productivity expectations is described as creating disinflationary pressure and coinciding with rolling over breakevens and the 2-year yield.
- Top-decile AI/software companies are cited as showing about 75% revenue-per-employee growth in 2025, consistent with early AI productivity gains.
- The opportunity cost of holding cash can be framed as inflation plus foregone productivity growth, making equities the natural hedge for productivity gains.
- If expected productivity growth rises sharply, capital should rotate toward the AI CapEx supply chain (especially hardware), while high-multiple software de-rates.
- Amazon and Google are described as guiding to materially higher AI CapEx than the market expected, implying less room for buybacks.
- A large AI data-center CapEx build can mechanically boost GDP via capital investment in a way that buybacks typically do not, potentially keeping headline growth strong even if the labor market weakens.
Equity-Market Dispersion And Flow-Driven Microstructure
- Average S&P 500 single-stock volatility relative to index volatility reached the 99th percentile, with the average stock moving about seven times the index.
- New Monday and Wednesday single-stock options listings mean several major names will regularly trade as 0DTE options, expanding retail access to ultra-short-dated leverage.
- As call options move out-of-the-money during declines, dealer delta-hedging can force additional selling that accelerates downside and drains liquidity in a self-reinforcing loop.
- Market internals are experiencing violent dispersion and factor rotation even though headline indices are only modestly off highs.
- Crowded long positioning and low cash buffers are contributing to a deleveraging and liquidation phase.
- Because much equity volume is HFT-driven, large buyback programs can support prices with relatively little incremental capital, so shrinking buybacks can raise volatility and weaken the bid.
Credit And Funding-Market Fragility (Including Hidden Treasury-Market Leverage)
- Credit is flagged as the key risk monitor, with widening high-yield spreads and large HYG tail-put buying cited as potential warning signals.
- Positioning is described as highly imbalanced with hedge funds net short Treasury futures while asset managers are among the most net long 10-year Treasuries in years.
- Bond volatility appears deceptively calm as MOVE falls while leverage in the Treasury basis trade rises, implying elevated hidden fragility despite low surface volatility.
- If credit meaningfully tightens, it is described as introducing crash risk for concentrated large-cap indices.
- Private equity and private credit are described as having absorbed risk pushed out of banks, with software-heavy leveraged buyouts at very high leverage and growing exposure as funders of AI data-center CapEx.
- The weighted-average bid of U.S. leveraged loans is characterized as deteriorating as supply increases.
Gold, Reserves, And Dollar/Trust Narratives
- Gold is described as rising to about 25% of world reserves while the U.S. dollar share of global reserves declines.
- Gold outperformance versus Bitcoin is framed as consistent with China viewing crypto as increasingly U.S.-aligned, making gold the more likely reserve-style collateral for a Chinese digital currency than Bitcoin.
- The dollar is expected to weaken further, with USDJPY back near 157 and the dollar index retesting around the 98 area.
- There are rumors, mentioned in testimony, that China is considering a digital yuan backed by another asset such as gold.
- International investors may repatriate capital and sell U.S.-linked assets as trust in established power structures chips away.
- The Latin American carry trade index shows capital leaving trades funded by short-dollar positions, interpreted as money seeping out of American assets.
Rates Regime Shift And Policy Coordination Risk
- 2s10s is described as breaking out to the highest level since about 2018 and expected to keep steepening due to easier front-end policy and less support for long-end yields.
- A policy mix of front-end rate cuts alongside long-end duration pressure is described as producing a curve steepener that benefits banks via improved net interest margins and loan creation.
- If the Fed chair resists easing the front end for optical or political reasons while Treasury policy shifts away from prior long-end support tactics, rates management could enter a destabilizing coordination gap.
- The Fed is expected to be pushed toward aggressive easing if credit shuts off and inflation breakevens keep rolling over.
Watchlist
- Credit is flagged as the key risk monitor, with widening high-yield spreads and large HYG tail-put buying cited as potential warning signals.
- Gold is signaling that something is off in the broader system.
- Escalating bond volatility is highlighted as a condition under which the capital-leaving dynamic becomes more visible.
- Bitcoin is suggested to be front-running a prospective policy pivot, with a potential local bottom forming when policy begins to change.
- On near-term dips, investors should consider positioning for outcomes where Republicans do not control both houses, with continued sector dispersion and potential volatility hedges such as VIX calls highlighted.
Unknowns
- How persistent is the extreme single-name dispersion relative to index volatility, and does it normalize or broaden into index-level volatility?
- To what extent are buybacks actually declining due to AI CapEx increases (magnitude and timing), and how much does that reduce mechanical price support?
- Is the AI productivity step-change an expectation narrative or a measurable, broad-based phenomenon beyond a subset of top-decile AI/software firms?
- Does AI actually commoditize digital output enough to compress software moats and valuations broadly, or is the effect limited to specific categories?
- Does credit tighten meaningfully from here, and what specific spread/issuance thresholds would correspond to the described crash-risk condition?