Emily Flippen

That number grows to 93% amongst those who already have exposure.

The gist of this report is there's still a lot of excitement around AI, even with the hype.

Now, Asit, I know there's always going to be biases in this type of self-reported data.

Those who are most excited about AI are probably also the ones who are most likely to respond to a survey about

for instance.

But when you see that people are largely holding or adding to AI in a world that continues to focus on the fact that we're in a, quote, AI bubble, what does that tell you?

I think that's a fair read, Asit.

One of the things that we don't get from the survey is how much exposure already exists.

We talked to people who say they already have exposure, but in terms of a total portfolio, that exposure could be smaller than what somebody may want to allocate.

The intention to add may just be actually building out what would then be a full-size position to exposure to AI, however that's defined in 2026.

But I also think, and this is maybe the irrational hope of mine, that anybody who answers this survey and says that they're planning on adding or maintaining their AI exposure is doing so with the awareness that I'm going to hold these companies for the extreme long term.

So, yeah, maybe this is a bubble.

Maybe there are risks and we do have a crash, but that's okay because the companies I'm invested in have very real, appreciable cash flow.

And I believe that a decade from now, even if there is a short pullback in share price of a company, they're going to be bigger, better, more important businesses in the future.

Maybe I'm giving too much credit here, but as a Motley Fool investor, that's where I hope we're going.

Donato, I want to pass the mic to you because, obviously, you're the head of AI here at The Motley Fool.

One of the things that I really liked about the report was that the optimism that Asit just mentioned and we talked about, it wasn't totally blind in this report.

When they asked about risks, the top two risks from respondents were things like data quality, security, as well as a sense of overvaluation in the sector.

You're somebody who already spends all of your days living inside the world of AI, obviously.

When you see this investor confidence shown in the report, is that matched by what you're seeing in terms of real-world adoption?