BitMEX co-founder Arthur Hayes said the debt-fueled artificial intelligence infrastructure boom could end in a 2008-style credit crisis and predicted the resulting government liquidity response could drive Bitcoin (BTC) to $1 million or higher.
In a Tuesday blog post, Hayes said investors have mistakenly treated spending on data centers and power infrastructure as high-growth technology investment rather than leveraged real estate. He said he expects lenders to finance excessive construction before a slowdown in AI capital expenditure exposes weaker borrowers.
The thesis connects the trillion-dollar expansion of AI infrastructure to a potential new source of crypto-market liquidity. However, Hayes predicted crisis, government bailout and subsequent BTC rally remain speculative.
Hayes described the AI boom as a “credit story like 2008 and not an earnings story like 2000.” He said BTC could remain between $60,000 and $70,000, with possible downside to $50,000, before the credit cycle and resulting liquidity response drive a recovery. Hayes also forecast that Ether (ETH) would reach $5,000 by year-end and said Maelstrom intends to build a significant position while selling out-of-the-money ETH put options.
Hayes‘ latest outlook builds on his earlier views on AI’s competing effects on crypto liquidity. On May 13, he said US-China competition in AI would encourage bank lending and fiat creation, benefiting Bitcoin. On June 4, Hayes sold HYPE and NEAR after warning that major AI listings could divert capital from crypto.
Big Tech locks in $1 trillion of future leases
The scale of commitments underpinning the AI boom is already visible. On Tuesday, Reuters reported that Microsoft, Meta, Oracle, Amazon and Alphabet have committed about $1.09 trillion to leases that have not yet commenced, primarily for data centers.
The commitments are nearly four times the roughly $285 billion in lease liabilities already recognized by the companies. However, Reuters noted that the $1.09 trillion cannot simply be treated as debt because it represents undiscounted payments spread across several years.
Related: Iran war, AI spending could push Bitcoin back to $126K this year: Hayes
Still, the financial strain is uneven. Oracles debt was about 4.3 times its earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization, while Alphabet, Amazon, Microsoft and Meta had ratios below one, according to a separate Reuters analysis.
S&P Global analyst Andrew Chang said Oracles data-center leases, which run for 15 to 19 years, pose a key risk because its customer contracts last no more than five years.