S&P 500 Profits Surge 47.4% as AI Stakes Inflate the Real Number
Wall Street is throwing itself a party, and Main Street didn’t get an invite. S&P 500 companies are on pace for 47.4% profit growth this quarter, the strongest pace in five years. Heavy AI spending, sturdy consumer demand, and rising energy prices are driving the boom — but it's not lifting every paycheck.
- This earnings season delivered rare breadth — nearly 90% of S&P 500 companies beat consensus estimates, with eight of 11 sectors posting double-digit profit growth.
- But much of that is paper gains from Alphabet and Amazon's stakes in Anthropic and SpaceX — strip those out, and S&P 500 growth falls to ~29%.
Two Americas: Amid the boom, spoils are concentrated in fewer hands than ever. Corporate profits hit a record 13.9% of US economic output in the first quarter, and RSM’s Joe Brusuelas says that’s because asset owners are pulling further ahead of everyone else. That divide shows up on the ground too, as Procter & Gamble’s CFO says lower-income households are living paycheck to paycheck. With energy prices still elevated from the war in Iran, some analysts warn that this widening wealth gap could provoke a public backlash.