Ever Cheaper AI Will Limit Its Returns. Just ask AT&T

The investment banking firm Morgan Stanley is out with a report that finds companies are reporting real and rising benefits from artificial intelligence, even as investors fret over whether AI investments will ever pay off. That makes sense. To pay for the more than $750 billion the hyperscalers plan to spend just this year, AI will have to transform the economy and capture the value that creates. But those two requirements sit in deep tension.