US growth forecasts are collapsing and the AI spending boom that propped up the economy is showing cracks — bad news for investors and the broader economy.

• The Atlanta Fed's real-time growth tracker crashed from nearly 4.5% to about 1.2% in weeks, driven mostly by a exploding trade deficit.
• A brutal jobs report followed — only 57,000 jobs added, with prior months revised down and over half a million Americans dropping out of work — which will drag growth even lower, possibly negative.
• The trade deficit ballooned because companies imported a flood of chips and servers to build AI data centers, and that same spending has powered most recent growth.
• Now the boom is cooling: Blackstone cancelled the largest data center project ever planned and is selling existing ones, while Meta is renting out spare AI computing power it can't use.
• The AI economy looks circular — Google funds SpaceX, SpaceX buys Nvidia chips, money loops back — and firms are now selling stock and debt to keep it going, a classic late-stage sign.

Outlook: Growth could tip negative if the AI spending machine slows, and the real danger is the ordinary economy weakening enough to break the AI money loop.