Blackstone's Jon Gray Says AI Demand Is 'Parabolic,' Rejects Bubble Comparison

According to a Bloomberg report on Oct. 22, 2026, Blackstone President Jon Gray pushed back against billionaire Ken Griffin's recent claim that AI is a bubble. Gray said that in a bubble, capacity is built first and demand is expected to appear later; in AI, however, companies are building capacity while trying to keep up with existing demand. He described current AI demand as “quite different” from the telecom bubble of the 1990s. Gray also mentioned Ode, an AI consulting firm co-founded by Blackstone and Anthropic, saying the firm “cannot keep up with client demand” and that demand is growing “nearly parabolically.”