When confidence disappears, it happens like this.
A seasoned chronicler of financial collapse is sounding an alarm that history may be rhyming with its most devastating verse. Andrew Ross Sorkin, drawing on nearly a decade of research into the 1929 crash, sees in today's AI-fueled market surge and dismantled regulatory safeguards the same architecture of fragility that preceded the Great Depression. The guardrails built from hard-won catastrophe are being removed in the name of democratization, and Sorkin believes the question is no longer whether a reckoning will come, but how many ordinary Americans will be holding the risk when it does.
- Stocks have climbed for months on AI euphoria, but the underlying economy has quietly softened — a split that mirrors the deceptive calm of 1928 before the world fell apart.
- Regulations forged in the wreckage of 1929 — disclosure rules, investment restrictions, consumer protections — are being stripped away, leaving the financial system exposed in ways not seen in nearly a century.
- Retirement accounts may soon be opened to high-risk private markets and startups, framed as fairness but carrying the same logic that once let ordinary Americans borrow their way into catastrophic losses.
- A meme coin bearing Sorkin's own name rose to $170 million in daily trading volume before collapsing to near nothing — a small, vivid rehearsal of the speculative manipulation the old guardrails were designed to stop.
- Sorkin offers no escape clause: a crash is coming, its timing unknowable, its depth uncertain, and its cost likely borne by millions of Americans whose retirement savings will have been quietly repositioned at the edge.
Andrew Ross Sorkin has spent nearly a decade writing about 1929 — not as a distant historical curiosity, but as a warning. The more he studied the year the market collapsed and erased fortunes across America, the more uncomfortable the present began to feel. Today's stock market has surged for months, carried upward by enthusiasm for artificial intelligence. In the years before the Great Depression, the market climbed 90 percent between 1928 and September 1929. Sorkin sees the parallel clearly. "We are either living through some kind of remarkable boom," he said, "or everything's overpriced."
The surface of the economy and its depths are telling different stories. Equities soar while the real economy softens. Hundreds of billions pour into AI investment, but whether this represents durable transformation or a speculative sugar rush won't be clear for years. In 1929, the fuel was credit — Wall Street began lending ordinary people money to buy stocks with only ten percent down. When markets turned, the losses were catastrophic. Congress responded by building guardrails: disclosure requirements, restrictions on risky investments, agencies to police the system. Those guardrails are now being dismantled.
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau has been gutted. SEC rules have loosened. Most consequentially, restrictions that once kept ordinary Americans out of high-risk private markets are being removed under the banner of democratizing finance. BlackRock CEO Larry Fink — whose firm manages $14 trillion including pension funds — has advocated opening 401(k)s to private markets and startups. The Trump administration has signaled support. The appeal is real: for decades, only the wealthy had early access to companies like Facebook and Uber before they went public. But Sorkin hears the echo of 1929 in the argument. The guardrails existed not to protect elites, but to protect people from losing what they could not afford to lose.
A meme coin created as a joke in Sorkin's name reached $170 million in daily trading volume before collapsing to roughly twenty dollars a day — a small, sharp illustration of the speculative manipulation that modern regulation was designed to prevent. Sorkin suspects an inside group pumped and abandoned it. This is the texture of 1929, playing out in miniature.
Asked directly whether a crash will come, Sorkin did not soften his answer. "We will have a crash," he said. "I just can't tell you when, and I can't tell you how deep." Confidence, he noted, can vanish without warning — one moment the system feels solid, the next it unravels. CEOs are too afraid of regulatory retaliation to speak openly about the risks they see. When the moment arrives, millions of Americans with retirement savings newly exposed to private markets will learn what investors in 1929 discovered: that democratized access to risk is still risk, and the cost falls on whoever is holding it.
The stock market has climbed steadily for months, buoyed by enthusiasm for artificial intelligence and technology. But Andrew Ross Sorkin, one of America's most prominent financial journalists, sees something darker in the numbers. He has spent nearly a decade writing a book about 1929—the year the market collapsed and wiped out fortunes, businesses, and lives—and he believes we are living through an eerily similar moment. The question is not whether a crash will come, but when, and how far it will fall.
Sorkin has spent two decades covering Wall Street. He joined the New York Times after college, founded the DealBook newsletter, co-hosts CNBC's "Squawk Box," and wrote a bestseller about the 2008 financial crisis. His new book about 1929 was not born from a lack of news to cover. It emerged from a growing unease. In the years before the Great Depression, the stock market surged 90 percent between 1928 and September 1929. Today, stocks have climbed for months on the back of an artificial intelligence boom. The parallel troubles him. "I'm anxious that we are at prices that may not feel sustainable," he said. "We are either living through some kind of remarkable boom, or everything's overpriced."
The underlying economy tells a different story than the stock market does. While equities have soared, the real economy—the one where people work and spend and build—has softened. Sorkin argues that the AI boom is propping up the entire system almost artificially. Hundreds of billions of dollars are flowing into artificial intelligence investments. Whether this represents a genuine gold rush or merely a sugar rush—a temporary speculative frenzy—remains unclear. "We probably won't know for a couple of years which one it is," he said.
In 1929, the sugar rush was fueled by a dangerous innovation: credit. Before 1919, using debt to buy anything was considered a moral sin. Then General Motors pioneered the idea of lending money so people could afford cars. Wall Street bankers saw the opportunity and began lending to ordinary people so they could buy stocks. You needed only 10 percent down; the broker lent you the rest. It felt like free money in good times. When markets turned, borrowers were on the hook in catastrophic ways. After 1929, Congress and regulators built guardrails to prevent this from happening again: disclosure rules for public companies, restrictions on who could invest in riskier private markets, agencies like the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Consumer Protection Bureau to police the system.
Those guardrails are now coming down. The SEC rules have become less stringent. The Consumer Protection Bureau, Sorkin noted, "practically doesn't exist anymore." More troubling, restrictions that once kept ordinary Americans out of high-risk private investments are being dismantled in the name of democratizing finance. Larry Fink, CEO of BlackRock—which manages $14 trillion in assets including pension funds—has advocated for allowing retirement accounts like 401(k)s to invest in private markets and startups. The Trump administration has signaled openness to the idea. "There are many great opportunities to be investing in startup companies, to invest in AI or data centers," Fink said. "Right now, we're precluded to put those type of assets in many retirement products."
The argument has appeal: for decades, only the wealthy had early access to investments in companies like Facebook and Uber before they went public. Those early investors made enormous returns. Ordinary Americans were locked out. Opening these opportunities seems fair. But Sorkin sees the echo of 1929 in the logic. "There is a view that it's been only the elites that have had access to these investments," he acknowledged. "And there is a real push, partially by the Trump administration, partially by the industry itself, which wants to get more money in—to open up the market to more and more people." The guardrails existed for a reason: to protect people from losing what they could not afford to lose.
One vivid example of the risks emerged from cryptocurrency. Sorkin was on television with Fink when Fink joked that there should be a "Sorkin coin." Within two hours, someone created one. The coin soared in value, eventually reaching $170 million in daily trading volume. Today it trades for roughly $20 or $21 a day. Sorkin suspects manipulation—an inside group of speculators pumping up the price, then letting it crash. This is the kind of behavior that flourished in 1929 and was supposed to be prevented by modern regulation.
When asked directly whether a crash will occur, Sorkin did not hedge. "The answer is we will have a crash," he said. "I just can't tell you when, and I can't tell you how deep. But I can assure you, unfortunately, I wish I wasn't saying this, we will have a crash." The timing is unknowable because confidence can evaporate suddenly. One moment the market feels solid; the next, fear takes hold and everything unwinds. CEOs, he noted, are too frightened to speak out about risks, worried about regulatory retaliation or blocked mergers. The system is primed for a sudden loss of confidence. And when that happens, millions of Americans with retirement savings in these newly opened private markets will discover what investors in 1929 learned: that democratized access to risk is still risk, and someone has to bear the cost.
Citas Notables
I'm anxious that we are at prices that may not feel sustainable. We are either living through some kind of remarkable boom, or everything's overpriced.— Andrew Ross Sorkin
The answer is we will have a crash. I just can't tell you when, and I can't tell you how deep. But I can assure you, we will have a crash.— Andrew Ross Sorkin
La Conversación del Hearth Otra perspectiva de la historia
You've spent a decade studying 1929. What made you decide to write that book now, in 2025?
I wasn't trying to predict the future. I was trying to understand how confidence works—how it builds, and how it collapses. When I started, the parallels weren't as obvious. But as I watched the AI boom accelerate and the guardrails come down, the pattern became impossible to ignore.
The guardrails—you mean the regulations. Why does it matter that they're being dismantled if the underlying economy is still functioning?
Because regulations aren't there for good times. They're there for when things break. In 1929, there were no rules against manipulation, no disclosure requirements, no circuit breakers. When panic started, there was nothing to slow it down. We built those rules in blood. Now we're removing them while speculation is rising.
But Larry Fink makes a fair point, doesn't he? Ordinary people have been locked out of the best investments. Isn't it unfair to keep them out?
It's fair to ask that question. But fairness and safety aren't the same thing. A 65-year-old with a 401(k) isn't the same investor as a venture capitalist. One can afford to lose everything. The other cannot. Democratizing access to risk doesn't help people if it destroys their retirement.
You mentioned that confidence can disappear suddenly. How does that actually happen? What's the trigger?
That's the thing—you can't predict it. It could be a geopolitical shock, a company failure, a sudden realization that valuations don't make sense. One day everyone believes. The next day, they don't. And once doubt spreads, it moves like fire.
So what should people do? Should they pull their money out of the market?
I'm not a financial advisor. But I think people should understand what they own and what they're risking. If your retirement is in private equity or crypto through your 401(k), you should know that these are speculative assets. You should know the history. And you should ask yourself whether you can afford to lose it.