This factor will determine whether the current valuations of AI companies turn out to be rational [FELIETON]
The year 2025 was very good both in terms of economic conditions and financial markets. In Poland, economic growth reaches 3.5%. compared to the European Union average of 1.5%, which is also one of the best results in the EU. At the same time, inflation seems to be under control, at least in 2026, and is expected to be below 3%, according to the NBP projection. Let us remember that in 2023 it was over 11%. Such a significant drop in inflation combined with high economic growth is rare. Historically, a strong reduction in inflation was most often accompanied by economic stagnation or even recession.
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These factors create a feeling of uncertainty
The central bank followed the decline in inflation by lowering interest rates from 5.75%. up to 4 percent However, such a decline in rates was not accompanied by a decline in the yield of long-term Treasury bonds, e.g. 10-year bonds. Their profitability is still above 5%. Here, the market is clearly starting to discount the high budget deficits that have been going on for several years and are also forecast for the near future. They result in large supplies of bonds from the State Treasury, which will also take place in 2026. This most likely means that the yield on long-term bonds will remain significantly above the NBP interest rates.
Another element of concern for the future is the low level of investment. Their ratio to GDP began to drop significantly from around 2015 to levels significantly below the average for European Union countries. For example, in 2020 it was already 18%. to GDP compared to the EU average of 22 percent, in 2022 it was 16 percent, respectively. compared to 22 percent in the EU. Low level of investment and economic growth driven mainly by the budget deficit and consumption in the long term, it reduces the competitiveness of the economy and its development.
The indexes on the WSE defeated foreign competition
When it comes to stock markets, the Warsaw Stock Exchange recorded spectacular increases. The WIG index increased by over 40%. , i.e. twice as much as the American Nasdaq, focused on technology companies. Moreover, in the last 5 years the return rate of our market is 80%. — just like the S&P 500 index, the main US market. For many who are convinced that the Polish market is stagnant and investing in shares only makes sense on the American market, this may come as a big surprise.
See also: What will change in taxes from January 1, 2026? Again, a long list
Markets around the world were dominated by AI, a sector that is practically absent from our market. In the case of AI, both the technology itself and the valuation level, on the one hand, investors are very enthusiastic, on the other fears of a speculative bubble similar to “dotcom” are growing from the early 2000s. The question about the bubble is one of the main issues for investors in global stock markets at the beginning of 2026. Unfortunately, the answer is not obvious.
Is there an AI bubble in the stock market?
The largest technology-related companies – Apple, Microsoft, Nvidia, Alphabet, Amazon, Meta, Tesla – already constitute approximately 35%. the S&P 500 broad American market index, which means increasing risk.
The surge in interest in the AI market reflects the tremendous acceleration in the complexity of AI tools and technology capabilities in recent years. To give you an idea: the number of parameters for main AI models has increased from approximately 100 million in 2020 to hundreds of billions today. Advanced, specialized AI tools have in many cases reached human levels. For example, this is the case with the ability to understand images, i.e. identify what is happening in a photo or video, as well as IT coding and language understanding, including lip reading – here the error rate was just over 1%. When it comes to solving word-based math problems, AI is already at a level higher than the average human. About 5 years ago, these competencies were most often around 50 percent. and lower compared to humans.
See also: These AI data may shock investors. Are we really at risk of a bubble?
The increase in investor interest is therefore largely due to the actual development of technology, which is beneficial from the point of view of the sustainability of the market situation. What is now crucial is the pace of application of AI tools. On the one hand, data from the USA indicate that approximately half of listed companies have implemented AI tools in at least three business functions. On the other hand, only 5 percent companies, AI tools have been deeply integrated into operational processes, and currently in only 2 out of 9 sectors, changes resulting from the use of AI are transformative.
Difficulties in implementing AI tools
The challenge in large-scale implementations is natural human resistance and organizational inertia of companies. The main challenges also include the integration of diverse data, ensuring the explainability of results and the functioning of tools in accordance with regulations. Finally, the problem with generative models is to reliably distinguish fact from fiction, which creates serious operational and reputational risks.
The pace of implementation of AI tools in practice will determine whether current valuations and their growth opportunities will prove to be rationalor whether the market irrationally exceeds its expectations of the actual situation in companies, which most often leads to painful declines. This is exactly the situation we faced in the Internet bubble – financial markets quite well identified the revolutionary scale of the possibilities of the new technology, but they significantly overestimated the pace of change.
Particularly worrying is the scale of expenditure on infrastructure, which can most easily lead to large losses across the entire markettaking into account the scale of planned expenditure on, for example, data centers. In relation to GDP, they are currently greater than the expenditure on infrastructure by telecommunications companies during the Internet bubble. There are visible concerns, among others: about the competitive position of OpenAI in the light of the recent premiere of the Gemini model from Google, and thus the justification for such large expenditures on the data centers of the first company.
It is worth adding that the current most important technology companies are usually profitable (except, among others, OpenAI). The dynamics of their profits exceeds the market average for other sectors. This is definitely a positive difference compared to what took place during the Internet boom.
What's on the Warsaw Stock Exchange? The WSE has a chance
As for the Polish stock exchange, the Warsaw Stock Exchange, the boom in recent years was mainly due to banks, which recorded a very large increase in profits. In 2025, it should amount to approximately PLN 40 billion. For comparison, in 2022 it was only PLN 10 billion. Banks constitute approximately one third of the capitalization of the Warsaw Stock Exchange, which translates into their great influence on the general economic situation.
See also: Dividend harvest from Polish banks in 2026. Record payouts and challenges for 2027.
It is expected that in 2026 it will be difficult for this sector to significantly increase their profits, so we can only count on an increase in valuation multipliers. Persistently high dividends will also support banks. In addition, For the boom to continue, it is necessary to increase the profits of companies in other sectors. Here, the beneficiaries of the increase in consumer spending come to the fore: trade, distribution, e-commerce.
Author: Michał Szymański, president of VIG/C-Quadrat TFI
