Retail investors appear to have remained steady in their approach to AI-related investments, even as markets reacted to calls for a slowdown from AI industry leaders earlier this month. Finimize CEO Carl Hazeley noted in City AM today that this response challenges the idea that individual investors are easily spooked by headlines.
Following the slowdown news, stocks central to the AI story, such as Nvidia and AMD, saw declines, and the semiconductor index also dropped. However, the Nasdaq recovered to a record high within a week.
Data from Finimize's Modern Investor Pulse, which surveyed 2,488 retail investors, suggests that rather than a stampede, investors were reassessing opportunities. Between September 12 and 14, the percentage of investors who believed chipmakers would generate the biggest AI-related returns over the next three to five years increased from 41% to 43.2%. During the same period, energy generation assets, which previously led, saw their support narrow from 44% to 40.5%.