Apollo's Torsten Slok has been examining what he refers to as the "S&P 493" — essentially the S&P 500 excluding Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, Meta, Microsoft, Nvidia, and Tesla. His findings indicate that profit margins and revenue per worker seem to be stagnant, with no signs that AI is boosting productivity. According to Slok, "Despite massive investments and widespread hype around artificial intelligence, the technology has delivered zero financial payoff to corporate America outside of tech."

The question arises whether this is merely a case of non-tech companies trailing behind the tech giants. Slok expressed skepticism, suggesting it will be difficult for corporate America to "turn increasingly cheap intelligence into higher revenue growth and higher profit margins."

In his view, "AI may be a great calculator, but in business, intelligence is mostly judgment." He further explained, "AI does not understand accountability, trust, culture, unwritten rules, ethical trade-offs or fairness, all of which shape reputational risk and ultimately drive revenue growth and profit margins."

Additionally, recent studies have similarly concluded that AI has not yet produced meaningful productivity improvements.