The Stock Market Could Crash in an AI Doomsday Scenario, According to Analysts. Wall Street Is Panicking.

The S&P 500 (SNPINDEX: ^GSPC), Nasdaq Composite (NASDAQINDEX: ^IXIC), and Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJINDICES: ^DJI) dropped sharply on Monday as investors contemplated a report from Citrini Research about how artificial intelligence could reshape the economy .

In recent months, investors have become increasingly concerned that AI code generation tools will disrupt the software industry. The Citrini report extended that anxiety to multiple industries by describing a doomsday scenario in which autonomous machines bring about an economic disaster.

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While the work is mostly fiction and intended to be through-provoking, it clearly struck a nerve on Wall Street. Here are the important details.

The Citrini Research report reads like a movie script. It starts with a flash-forward. The real publication date (Feb. 22, 2026) is struck through and replaced with a future date (June 30, 2028). The fictional work sets the scene by explaining unemployment has topped 10% and the S&P 500 has plunged 38% from its high.

How did we get there? Artificial intelligence worked too well. Machines replaced human labor as AI agents became increasingly productive, while never needing sleep, sick days, or health insurance. The impact was most profound among white-collar workers like accountants, lawyers, marketers, software engineers, and systems administrators.

So, while economic output continued to grow on paper, white-collar unemployment spiked and consumer spending dropped sharply. That prompted companies to reduce wages for blue-collar workers and increase spending on AI agents, which created a feedback loop without brakes. White-collar unemployment continued to rise and consumer spending continued to fall.

Ultimately, many borrowers (even those who once had high-paying jobs and excellent credit scores) began to default on loans. That forced financial institutions to tighten their lending standards, which led to a further reduction in consumer spending. The economy eventually spiraled into a recession and the stock market crashed.

The Citrini report ends with a reflection: “We are certain some of these scenarios won’t materialized. We’re equally certain that machine intelligence will continue to accelerate,” the authors state. “As investors, we still have time to assess how much of our portfolios are built upon assumptions that won’t survive the decade.”