Is AI debt heading the world into another year 2000 “Dot-Com Boom”?

The NewYorkTimes.com reported that “Artificial intelligence companies looking to raise funds are being made to pay lofty interest rates, as debt investors become cautious.”  The December 26, 2025 report entitled “As A.I. Companies Borrow Billions, Debt Investors Grow Wary” (https://www.nytimes.com/2025/12/26/business/ai-debt-investors.html) included this comments from reporter Joe Rennison:

Investors in the A.I.-fueled stock market have largely shrugged off warnings about a tech bubble, an optimism that has pushed up share prices to repeated new highs this year.

But the debt market is telling a different story, some investors say. New artificial intelligence companies looking to raise funds to supercharge their nascent businesses are being made to pay lofty interest rates on the money they borrow, indicative of investors’ skepticism when new, unproven A.I. businesses take on large debts.

In one debt deal for Applied Digital, a data center builder, the company had to pay as much as 3.75 percentage points above similarly rated companies, equivalent to roughly 70 percent more in interest.

There are other indicators of debt investors’ wariness: Some of the bonds have tumbled in price after being issued, in a sign of increased caution among investors. And the cost of credit default swaps, which protect bond investors from losses, has surged in recent months on some A.I. companies’ debt.

Construction delays at these sprawling data facilities could push out the time it takes before they can start generating revenue from their leases to A.I. companies. Investors also worry that, in the end, there could be less demand for A.I. computing power, creating a glut of unneeded data centers and leading to defaults on the debt used to finance the buildings.

Are you ready for the “AI Boom”?