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BlackRock CEO Larry Fink has a blunt warning about what could derail the U.S. economy: slamming the brakes on the data centers powering the AI boom.
Key facts
- Wall Street analysts estimate AI capital expenditures could top $1 trillion in 2027 and exceed $5 trillion cumulatively through 2030, making the sector a meaningful driver of the roughly 3%
- The fight is central to Ohio’s Senate race, where Democrat Sherrod Brown has campaigned against the buildout, and a super PAC backed by AI billionaires including Marc Andreessen and OpenAI President
- According to Brookings, at least 100 localities had approved moratoriums by July, and New York has paused certain permits for up to a year
- Fink, who runs the world’s largest asset manager and oversees its dominant spot Bitcoin ETF, has become one of Wall Street’s most prominent crypto converts
Summary
BlackRock CEO Larry Fink says a U.S. moratorium on data center construction would trigger a recession, saying “so much of our economy is based on the build-out of this capex.” He dismissed the mounting backlash—over electricity, water and grid strain—as “misinformation,” insisting “data centers are not the problem. Speaking to CNBC on Wednesday after BlackRock posted better-than-expected third-quarter earnings, Fink said the surge in AI infrastructure spending has become so central to economic growth that choking it off would be dangerous. “If we have a moratorium of some sort in this country, we will be in a recession,” he said, adding that “so much of our economy is based on the build-out of this capex.”