Apollo Global Management chief economist Torsten Slok says AI has so far produced no measurable financial return for US companies outside the technology sector. In an October 24 note in Apollo's Daily Spark series, titled "No Signs of AI Payoff Outside the Tech Sector," Slok wrote that the technology "has delivered zero financial payoff to corporate America outside of tech."
Slok's note splits the S&P 500 into the Mag 7 and the remaining 493 companies and runs five charts. Revenue per worker, adjusted for inflation back to the fourth quarter of 2019, is rising for the Mag 7 and flat for the S&P 493. Profit margins show the same split.
On productivity, Slok uses the San Francisco Fed's utilization-adjusted total factor productivity series and finds no sign yet that AI is boosting productivity growth across the economy.
Key facts
- 01Apollo chief economist Torsten Slok published "No Signs of AI Payoff Outside the Tech Sector" on October 24, 2026.
- 02Slok's charts show revenue per worker and profit margins rising for the Mag 7 but flat for the S&P 493.
- 03The note finds no sign of AI lifting growth in the San Francisco Fed's utilization-adjusted TFP series.
- 04Ramp data cited by Apollo shows AI spending is extremely concentrated in a small number of firms.
- 05Economist Brad DeLong agreed the gains are not yet measurable but argued AI's user surplus is "massive."
The spending side is where the note gets sharper. Slok writes that mainstream corporate America is "pulling back and starting to view token spending not as a source of growth but as a cost center." Using data from Ramp chief economist Ara Kharazian and the Ramp AI Index, Apollo shows AI spending is extremely concentrated in a small number of firms, with signs of circularity in token spending as well.
Slok argues that AI's macroeconomic effects will stay limited as long as agentic AI use is confined to a small part of the economy. He also makes a qualitative case: business decisions depend on context, and AI "does not understand accountability, trust, culture, unwritten rules, ethical trade-offs or fairness," factors he ties to reputational risk and revenue.
“AI may be a great calculator, but in business, intelligence is mostly judgment.”— Torsten Slok, Partner and Chief Economist, Apollo
Economist Brad DeLong responded on his blog the same day. He agreed that AI's effects outside tech are not yet visible in revenue, margins or measured productivity, but argued the bigger gains flow through channels shareholders cannot easily capture: user surplus, new business formation, and platform incumbents using AI to deepen their moats.
“User surplus, which I think is massive.”— Brad DeLong, Economist
DeLong drew a line between those gains and the market math, writing that they do not "produce a hyperboom in measured GDP or an explosion in profits that justifies current market valuations." Joe Weisenthal noted on X that the top token spenders in Slok's data are "overwhelmingly VC-backed companies," which "may have implications if VC-funding starts to slow."
Slok closes the note by arguing that the AI story "will be decided in the S&P 493, not the Mag 7," and that so far there is no evidence of revenue growth or margin improvement outside tech.
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