JPMorgan's Lebovitz: AI Investing Demands Careful Selection, Not Broad Buying

Artificial intelligence is everywhere in markets, but not every AI bet is winning the same way. A top JPMorgan strategist says the real challenge now is choosing among AI assets, because the easy "buy everything" phase is over. One big example: SK Hynix, a Korean chipmaker, saw its shares drop roughly 20% from a June 2026 record high. That decline happened even as the stock still more than tripled in 2026.

The New AI Investing Landscape

In a July 9, 2026 TV interview, David Lebovitz, a strategist with JPMorgan Asset Management who focuses on global markets, described the changing environment. "It's not this, this view that, 'Oh, we love AI and we're going to buy everything that has AI associated with it,'" he said. Instead, investors are starting to separate AI-related sectors by how much demand is real and how much is hype.

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Lebovitz put it plainly: "People are beginning to delineate a bit more between the different pieces and where there may be excess supply, where there may be robust demand." The central question has shifted from "whether you play it" to "how you play it."

The Chip and Hardware Risk

Lebovitz pointed directly to semiconductors and hardware as the areas most vulnerable to oversupply. "The risk to me around supply is primarily in the chip space and the hardware space," he said. He also warned that investor excitement in those sectors may have run ahead of reality.

"This is where obviously a lot of investor enthusiasm is, and you know if history is any guide, when there's a lot of enthusiasm, people tend to get a little bit ahead of themselves," Lebovitz said. The company was scheduled to list its shares in the US on July 10, 2026, just one day after Lebovitz's interview. Meanwhile, JPMorgan Chase & Co., the parent company, showed a share price of $335.45 with a 1.46% change in the article's stock data.

'Everything Is an AI Trade'

Despite the risks in chips, Lebovitz sees AI spreading into every corner of investing. "The thing that I'm recognizing is that everything is becoming an AI trade," he said. Demand for building and running data centers, for example, looks more lasting than the chip frenzy. Lebovitz said: "demand for the construction and operation of data centers is likely to remain 'more structural' than the production of semiconductors and hardware."

SK Hynix's stock data in the article showed a price of 2,253,000.00 South Korean won with an 11.26% change. Lebovitz summed up the new mindset: "AI is everywhere. And so it's how you play it, not whether or not you play it. I think that's the big question for investors going forward."

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