THE 2028 GLOBAL INTELLIGENCE CRISIS
James van Geelencitriniresearch.com
Citrini is the pseudonymous founder of Citrinitas Capital Management Inc. and the author of Citrini Research, a top finance Substack specializing in thematic equity investing and global macro trading, known for early calls on AI and GLP-1 investments.
Author Perspective
Across 17 tracked claims, James van Geelen skews pessimistic.
0% optimistic100% pessimistic
Note
Note that this article specifically claims to not make predictions, and is only a fictional scenario. However, it was widely read and believed to have significantly affected markets, so it has been included.
Claims from this article
17 claims
As investors, we still have time to assess how much of our portfolios are built upon assumptions that won't survive the decade. The premium on human intelligence will narrow.
PessimisticPessimisticJames van Geelencitriniresearch.combeyond 5 yearsconfidence certain
The income assumptions underlying $13 trillion in residential mortgages are structurally impaired by the white-collar employment crisis.
PessimisticPessimisticJames van Geelencitriniresearch.com2028confidence high
The lack of a comprehensive government plan is threatening to accelerate a deflationary spiral, as policy response has always lagged economic reality.
PessimisticPessimisticJames van Geelencitriniresearch.com2028confidence likely
Machine intelligence is now a competent and rapidly improving substitute for human intelligence across a growing range of tasks, and we are experiencing the unwind of the premium that human intelligence derived from its scarcity.
PessimisticPessimisticJames van Geelencitriniresearch.com2026-2028confidence certain
If mortgage market fears manifest, the mortgage market cracks in the back half of 2028, and the S&P 500 drawdown would ultimately rival the GFC's 57% peak-to-trough, bringing the S&P to ~3500.
PessimisticPessimisticJames van Geelencitriniresearch.com2028confidence conditional/possible
Labor's share of GDP, which declined from 64% in 1974 to 56% in 2024, drops further to 46% in the four years since AI began its exponential improvement — the sharpest decline on record — causing federal tax receipts to fall.
PessimisticPessimisticJames van Geelencitriniresearch.com2026-2028confidence speculative scenario
Displaced white-collar workers do not sit idle but downshift into lower-paying service sector and gig economy jobs, increasing labor supply in those segments and compressing wages there too.
PessimisticPessimisticJames van Geelencitriniresearch.com2027confidence high within scenario
AI has created new jobs — prompt engineers, AI safety researchers, infrastructure technicians — but for every new role AI created, it rendered dozens obsolete, and the new roles paid a fraction of what the old ones did.
PessimisticPessimisticJames van Geelencitriniresearch.com2026-2028confidence high
India's IT services sector, exporting over $200 billion annually, faces contract cancellations as the marginal cost of AI coding collapses, causing the rupee to fall and forcing IMF discussions.
PessimisticPessimisticJames van Geelencitriniresearch.com2027-2028confidence speculative scenario
AI agents routing transactions through stablecoins via Solana or Ethereum L2s to avoid the 2-3% card interchange rate poses a major threat to card-focused banks and issuers.
PessimisticPessimisticJames van Geelencitriniresearch.com2027confidence speculative scenario
Consumer AI agents handle price optimization and transactions continuously, eliminating habitual intermediation and destroying the moats of platforms like DoorDash and travel booking sites.
PessimisticPessimisticJames van Geelencitriniresearch.com2026-2027confidence high within scenario
A competent developer working with agentic coding tools could replicate the core functionality of a mid-market SaaS product in weeks, causing enterprise customers to renew at steep discounts or cancel entirely.
PessimisticPessimisticJames van Geelencitriniresearch.com2026confidence high
The first wave of defaults due to AI disruption in mid-2027 challenged the assumption that ARR would remain recurring, and by end of 2027 threatened every business model predicated on intermediation.
PessimisticPessimisticJames van Geelencitriniresearch.com2027confidence speculative scenario
White-collar workers' incomes were the bedrock of the $13 trillion mortgage market, forcing underwriters to reassess whether prime mortgages are still money good.
PessimisticPessimisticJames van Geelencitriniresearch.com2027-2028confidence possible
AI capabilities improved, companies needed fewer workers, white-collar layoffs increased, displaced workers spent less, margin pressure pushed firms to invest more in AI — a negative feedback loop with no natural brake: the human intelligence displacement spiral.
PessimisticPessimisticJames van Geelencitriniresearch.com2026-2028confidence likely
A single GPU cluster generating the output previously attributed to 10,000 white-collar workers is more economic pandemic than economic panacea. The velocity of money flatlines. The human-centric consumer economy, 70% of GDP, withers.
PessimisticPessimisticJames van Geelencitriniresearch.com2026-2028confidence speculative scenario
The initial wave of layoffs due to human obsolescence began in early 2026, and margins expanded, earnings beat, stocks rallied. Record-setting corporate profits were funneled right back into AI compute.
PessimisticPessimisticJames van Geelencitriniresearch.com2026confidence presented as certain within scenario