An article published by the state-run Economic Daily cautions investors against chasing the ChatGPT hype with no regard to a potential bubble. The article says some stocks have ‘jumped in leaps and bounds’ despite not having made many AI breakthroughs
A Chinese state-run publication has warned of a “market bubble” and “excessive hype” around artificial intelligence (AI) technology such as ChatGPT, the intelligent chatbot built by US start-up OpenAI that has made headlines worldwide.
The piece, headed “Bubble prevention required while promoting AI,” was published on Monday by the Economic Daily, a journal formed by the State Council, China’s cabinet, and overseen by the propaganda department of the governing Chinese Communist Party.
“While capital chases the ChatGPT concept, it must exercise caution to avoid a bubble,” the report stated, adding that certain domestic equities connected to AI and huge language models have risen by more than 50 per cent in the previous two months.
After the report was released, Chinese equities plummeted from a five-week high, with a gauge of technology stocks falling 3.8 per cent, the most of any industry group in the CSI 300 Index. The market in Hong Kong is closed for the Easter break and will return on Tuesday.
“While capital chases the ChatGPT concept, it must exercise caution to avoid a bubble,” the study claimed, adding that certain domestic stocks associated with AI and massive language models had increased by more than 50 per cent in the preceding two months.
Following the publication of the study, Chinese equities fell from a five-week high, with a gauge of technology stocks losing 3.8 per cent, the largest of any industry group in the CSI 300 Index. The Hong Kong market is closed for the Easter holiday and will reopen on Tuesday.
Smaller firms have also jumped on the bandwagon.
Hongbo Co, a Shenzhen-listed printer and lottery technology company, stated in February that it was “developing and testing” ChatGPT-related goods. In late March, it debuted a chatbot that only permitted 20 new users to register every day during the beta test.
Since February, the company’s stock has increased by more than 70 per cent.
“Some companies haven’t made many breakthroughs in related technologies… but their stock prices have already risen by leaps and bounds,” the Economic Daily report added, without identifying any companies.
“Regulators should strengthen monitoring and crackdowns on behaviours aimed at hyping up popular concepts and manipulating stock prices, as well as create an orderly market with information disclosure standards, to support the long-term development of AI,” according to the paper.
Similar warnings have already been given by state media. During the country’s ChatGPT craze in February, state news outlet Xinhua released a piece urging “bubble prevention” and “patience.”
“Although ChatGPT’s technological paradigm shift has given the company a large user base, there is no mature commercial application,” the report claimed, adding that such technologies may bring societal problems such as misleading information and plagiarism.
China Science Daily, a newspaper backed by the Chinese Academy of Sciences and other top research bodies in the country, published an article on Friday warning that ChatGPT may corrupt rather than improve users’ moral judgment, citing a study published last week in the journal Scientific Reports by German and Danish researchers.
Several mainland and Hong Kong-based AI specialists joined Tesla’s Elon Musk and other industry veterans worldwide in signing an open letter, calling for a halt in the development of AI systems more powerful than GPT-4.
Despite the controversy, Wang Xiaochuan, creator and former CEO of Chinese search engine Sogou, announced the launch of his start-up Baichuan Zhineng on Monday, with the goal of “creating China’s best large language model by the end of the year.”
Wang Huiwen, a cofounder of food delivery company Meituan, has launched an AI start-up that had received US$280 million as of February 18, according to the startup database PitchBook.
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