Craig Johnson, Chief Market Technician at Piper Sandler, used his CNBC Morning Call Sheet appearance to flag concerns for self-directed investors riding the AI trade. Introducing Piper Sandler’s report The Bull Market That Few Trust, Johnson said: “The technology sector is now 41% of the investable assets here in the US. Semiconductors are 50% of that total technology sector. We haven’t seen levels like this since Y2K in the year 2000. I think that’s a risk that investors do need to monitor.”
That is the headline number. Let’s dig into the details of what may have changed since the year 2000.
Why The Y2K Comparison Matters
The last time tech weighting in US investable assets reached these levels, the dot-com peak gave way to a multi-year drawdown in tech and semis.
Today’s concentration is driven by a much smaller set of names. NVIDIA (NASDAQ:NVDA | NVDA Price Prediction) alone carries a market cap of roughly $5.3 trillion, with a trailing P/E near 45 and a forward P/E around 27. The stock is up 79.54% over the past year. Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) sits at $4.3 trillion, and Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) at $3 trillion. Three names represent well over $12 trillion of capitalization.
Inside the SPDR S&P 500 ETF Trust (NYSEARCA:SPY), Information Technology is 32.91% of the index, with NVIDIA at 7.58%, Apple at 6.66% and Microsoft at 4.91%.
Johnson’s 41% figure for total US investable assets sits above that index-only weighting, which is the point. The semiconductor slice is even tighter: NVDA, AVGO, MU, AMD, AMAT and LRCX dominate sector ETFs.
The Macro Backdrop Is Not Helping Multiples
Johnson framed the concentration call alongside two macro signals. The CRB commodity index is breaking out to multi-year highs, and bond yields are not falling, contradicting current rate-cut expectations. The 10-year Treasury sits at 4.42%, in the 86.7th percentile of its 12-month range. WTI crude has rallied from near $65/barrel in late February 2026 to $109.76 on May 4, 2026. Higher discount rates and stickier inflation compress the multiples that justify mega-cap tech leadership.
Where Johnson Thinks AI Benefits Broaden
Johnson is constructive on AI as a technology. His view: AI will be a powerful tool, but its benefits should broaden into other sectors such as industrials and financials, while he believes the massive AI capex buildout in tech is not likely sustainable at the current pace. The performance gap is already visible. The Industrial Select Sector SPDR is up 25.93% over one year, while the Financial Select Sector SPDR is up just 2.95%, against the Technology SPDR’s 54.76% and the iShares Semiconductor ETF’s 149.79%.
For Piper Sandler’s full framing, the firm’s research portal is the primary source. Johnson’s takeaway is straightforward: monitor concentration, watch for AI benefits to migrate down the value chain, and recognize that the macro tape is not arguing for further multiple expansion in the names already doing the heavy lifting.
For my $.02, I’ve long been bullish on AI stocks. The AI portfolio I manage on 24/7 Wall St. has seen the average recommendation soar 166% (across 49 different recommendations!) since I launched it in late 2024. However, I believe Johnson is right that many of the benefits of AI could soon spill over to the larger economy and industrials is a prime spot to select many of the earliest adopters and most well-positioned companies.
Top Gaining Stocks
Top Losing Stocks