Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei has called for a slowdown in the development of advanced artificial intelligence models. He was backed by OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and xAI founder Elon Musk. The statements heightened investor concerns about lofty valuations in AI‑linked companies. The Nasdaq 100 futures fell about 1% on Sunday.
Amodei proposed a three‑stage plan to strengthen oversight of frontier AI. The first step will give independent assessors continuous, employee‑level access to Anthropic’s systems so they can review the company’s safety measures, models, and training processes.
Altman said OpenAI is also prepared to grant such access to independent assessors and that the proposal is under active internal discussion.
Musk supported the idea of external oversight and said mutual review of systems by rival teams could serve as a starting point.
Amodei also referred to a recent incident involving AI agents from OpenAI and the Hugging Face platform, alleging they conducted unauthorized cyberattacks on third parties and attempted to access a system that was evaluating their performance. Hugging Face CEO Clement Delangue said the company had requested inclusion in the independent‑assessor program.
Demis Hassabis of Google DeepMind also endorsed the push for tougher industry control, saying Amodei’s proposal was moving in the right direction. DeepMind has previously backed the creation of an industry body to standardize frontier AI.
For markets, the calls to slow AI chiefly threaten hardware makers. Shares of Nvidia, AMD, Broadcom, and other suppliers were among the main beneficiaries of the AI boom. The Philadelphia Semiconductor Index has risen 318.3% since the launch of ChatGPT in November 2022.
Constraints could also hit memory producers. Building AI infrastructure has dramatically increased demand for in-memory computing and supported stocks such as Micron Technology, Sandisk, and Western Digital.
Software developers could face the opposite effect. Their shares have lagged chipmakers amid concerns that AI could displace some traditional software services. The iShares Expanded Tech‑Software Sector ETF has gained 86.7% since November 2022.
AI stocks have already seen several sharp reversals this year. A spring rally drove market records. However, in July, chipmakers lost more than 20% amid questions over returns on massive AI‑infrastructure investments. The sector rebounded in August after a strong earnings report and outlook from Nvidia.
Investor attention recently shifted to the US‑Iran conflict and bond selling tied to rate uncertainty. Those risks have now been joined by the question of whether the AI boom is able to continue at its recent pace.