American AI capital is making a huge bet, gambling with the fate of the US dollar.

The United States is mobilizing capital on an unprecedented scale, deeply binding the AI race to the dollar's hegemony. The logic of this high-stakes gamble is clear and aggressive: to use the full opening of capital markets to fund AI infrastructure, to use blockchain technology to reshape the global accessibility of dollar assets, and then to use AI leadership to bolster the dollar's status. However, the inherent vulnerability of this model is equally evident— the dollar is becoming more like a high-risk stock rather than a traditional safe-haven anchor.

According to a foreign exchange report released by Deutsche Bank on September 3, US companies are expected to invest approximately $800 billion in AI capital expenditures this year, with AI venture capital raising over $400 billion this year. The two largest AI labs alone have raised nearly $217 billion in funding, with valuations approaching $1 trillion each. Meanwhile, the amount of funding raised this year through the investment-grade credit market by mega-tech companies such as Google, Meta, Amazon, and Oracle is already about ten times the average annual level from 2020 to 2024.

The impact of this capital mobilization has directly translated into structural risks for the US dollar. As US financing sources shift from official long-term capital to private short-term technology capital, the correlation between the dollar and the stock market is increasing, and its traditional risk-hedging attributes are weakening. Once the AI business model is disproven, or the US falls behind in the AI race, the dollar will face severe downward pressure.

A flood of capital pours in: Three financing channels open simultaneously.

The United States is simultaneously raising large amounts of funds through three channels: private equity, public debt, and the stock market.

In the private equity market, AI venture capital raised over $400 billion this year, with more than 90% of the largest deals concentrated in the United States, representing a three-fold annualized growth rate compared to last year. In the debt market, mega-cap tech companies were forced to shift to bond financing on a massive scale for the first time—Google, Meta, Oracle, and Amazon raised approximately ten times their average annual level from 2020 to 2024 through investment-grade credit markets this year. In the public equity market, Google will complete its first share offering since its 2004 IPO in June 2026, raising $85 billion; SpaceX will complete the largest IPO in history with a market capitalization approaching $2 trillion.

This financing wave is occurring against the backdrop of the United States' widening twin deficits—a fiscal deficit exceeding 6% of GDP and a current account deficit approaching 4% of GDP. Lacking domestic fiscal savings, the incremental demand for AI capital expenditures must rely on foreign funding. Deutsche Bank data shows that in the second quarter of 2026, the US attracted over $400 billion in foreign equity capital, far exceeding any previous quarterly level and significantly surpassing debt capital inflows—the latter having long been the primary source of US capital account financing.

It is worth noting that foreign official sectors' willingness to allocate long-term to US Treasury bonds is declining due to geopolitical rifts, but the attractiveness of technology assets is filling this gap through private channels such as retail investors. SpaceX reportedly reserved about 30% of its IPO for retail investors, more than three times that of a traditional IPO, reflecting a clear understanding among US companies of the shift in financing structures.

Asset tokenization: The next technological fulcrum for dollar hegemony

While raising large amounts of capital, the United States is deploying blockchain technology as an infrastructure to attract global capital, pushing asset tokenization from concept to reality.

Asset tokenization refers to the conversion of ownership of financial assets such as stocks, bonds, and real estate into digital tokens recorded on a blockchain. The Depository Trust Company (DTCC), which currently holds approximately $115 trillion in U.S. assets, completed the tokenization of its first batch of assets in July 2026 and put them into real-world trading. Forty financial institutions participated, including tokenization tests of the S&P 500 ETF (SPY) and JPMorgan Chase's tokenized assets meeting CME Group margin requirements. DTCC plans to officially launch its tokenization service in October 2026.

From a regulatory perspective, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) issued a "no-action" letter to the DTCC in December 2025, confirming that the same security can be traded in parallel on both traditional and on-chain tracks, enjoying the same investor protection and ownership rights. A subsequent ruling in January 2026 further clarified that the issuance format or holding method of a security does not affect the application of federal securities laws. This provides sufficient regulatory endorsement for tokenization.

At the exchange level, the NYSE is collaborating with Securitize to develop a new digital platform with the goal of enabling 24/7 trading, instant settlement, fragmented stock trading, and stablecoin settlement; Nasdaq announced the launch of "equity token design," with plans to achieve full tokenization capabilities by 2027, and has announced that it will launch 23/5 trading by the end of 2025.

Deutsche Bank believes that the strategic significance of tokenization for the US dollar lies in two aspects: First, tokenized assets offer higher collateral liquidity, improving capital efficiency and enhancing the attractiveness of US assets to global investors; second, if US stocks and bonds achieve 24/7 instant settlement, it will significantly lower the entry barrier for global retail investors, further expanding the demand base for US dollar assets. The case of South Korea provides a reference—South Korea accounts for only 2% of global nominal GDP, yet contributed approximately 10% of the $740 billion in foreign investment flowing into the US stock market last year, partly because South Korea was among the first to open up fragmented trading of foreign stocks.

Currently, the global scale of tokenized real-world assets is approximately $40 billion, which represents a vast potential for growth compared to the over $100 trillion in total assets in the United States. Market forecasts predict that by the 2030s, the scale of tokenized assets could reach $2 trillion to $30 trillion.

A New Risk Map for the US Dollar: From Safe-Haven Assets to AI Betting

This high-stakes gamble of capital and technology is reshaping the risk profile of the US dollar.

Deutsche Bank points out that the United States is undergoing a fundamental shift in its financing structure: from long-term, geopolitically driven capital inflows dominated by the official sector to short-term, technology-return-driven capital inflows dominated by the private sector. This shift has significantly increased the correlation between the dollar and the stock market, weakening its historical role as a hedge against stock risk.

This logic implies that the fate of the US dollar is deeply intertwined with the outcome of the AI race. If AI capital expenditure ultimately proves to be uneconomical, or if the US loses its leading position in the technological competition, a large-scale withdrawal of private capital will directly impact the dollar.

At the same time, while tokenization lowers the threshold for capital inflows, it also reduces the friction of capital outflows to the same extent. Increased capital liquidity is a double-edged sword—it can accelerate the inflow of funds when things are going well, but it can also accelerate the outflow of funds when things are going badly.

From a broader perspective, Deutsche Bank believes that the United States is participating in the AI race using an "open market + closed technology" model: attracting global capital through the full opening of capital markets while maintaining the closed weighting of AI models to preserve corporate pricing power and shareholder returns. The core premise of this model is that US AI companies can continuously maintain technological leadership and translate it into sustainable profitability.

The capitalist model itself is facing stress tests.

In its report, Deutsche Bank raised a deeper issue: the AI race is not only a competition of technology, but also a competition of economic models, and the US shareholder capitalism model itself is facing a stress test.

The underlying logic of the US model is: open capital markets attract global funds → large-scale capital investment drives technological innovation → technological leadership supports corporate pricing power → high profit returns attract more capital inflows. This positive cycle relies on AI companies being able to charge high subscription fees to global users and monetize their intellectual property in international markets.

However, this cycle is clearly fragile. If AI business models fail to generate sufficient economic returns, or if the pricing power of US companies is eroded, corporate profits will come under pressure, thereby undermining the core logic of attracting foreign investment and exacerbating the already high fiscal deficit pressure.

Deutsche Bank also pointed out that AI revenue streams are expected to improve the US current account by about 1 percentage point over the next decade by increasing service exports, but this prospect is highly dependent on whether US AI companies can maintain pricing power and successfully monetize their international user base.

The report ultimately characterizes this competition as the ultimate test of the core American belief that "free and open capital markets can always foster the best innovation." The outcome of the AI competition will, to a considerable extent, determine whether this belief still holds true and whether the dollar's status as the global capital hub can continue.

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The above content is from Zhuifeng Trading Platform .

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