Billions spent and hypothetical returns: the AI boom explained with six charts

Expenditure is growing fast and consumer take-up accelerating.

But alarm bells are sounding

The race is very much on.

Elon Musk’s SpaceX, which makes AI models as well as space rockets, announced last week it is https://www.theguardian.com/science/2026/jun/03/spacex-ipo-stock-musk">seeking a $1.77tn (£1.31tn) valuation on the US stock market while Anthropic, the startup behind the Claude chatbot, https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2026/jun/01/anthropic-ai-ipo">said it had filed for an initial public offering.

OpenAI, the developer of ChatGPT, is expected to follow.

This latest peak in the AI market comes amid a multitrillion-dollar spending spree on related infrastructure such as datacentres.

Meanwhile, companies are attempting to deploy the technology in a way that makes investing in it worthwhile.

Here’s a look at what stage the AI boom is at and six key charts that tell us how we got here.