According to Ramp AI Index data, the share of U.S. businesses with paid subscriptions to AI models, platforms, and tools has climbed from under 10% to 54% as of the end of May. Put simply, more than half of American businesses are now paying for AI in some form, up from fewer than one in ten only a couple of years ago. That is a meaningful signal, telling us the market has clearly embraced the potential for AI to contribute to the broader economy. But in our opinion, there is still a very long way to go.
Leadership in LLMs can shift fast
Currently, the adoption trends for large language models (LLM) is illustrative of a two horse race. OpenAI dominated the early innings of LLM adoption but Anthropic's Claude has surged, seemingly taking the baton of leadership in 2026 with a 41% adoption rate versus OpenAI's 40%.
We highlight these two specifically because they illustrate a critical dynamic:
- The AI race is constantly evolving .
- A new entrant or a single technological breakthrough can reshape the competitive landscape rapidly.
In July 2026, China's Moonshot AI released Kimi K3, a 2.8-trillion-parameter model that, on Artificial Analysis's independent Intelligence Index, ranked fourth of 189 models at the time of release, scoring on par with several leading US proprietary systems. Whether or not Kimi K3 ultimately translates benchmark performance into meaningful enterprise adoption is an open question. But this serves as a reminder how quickly a challenger can leap into the frontier conversation. Today's adoption leaders are not guaranteed to be tomorrow's, and a single release can put a new name on the board overnight.
AI Spending is Concentrated
There is no shortage of case studies and proof points showing how generative AI can drive productivity gains, improve business operations, and lower costs. But even with the widespread adoption we have seen take hold over a relatively short period, we believe this is still just the beginning.
The firms in the top 1% of AI spending are laying out nearly $5,000 per employee. The top 10% spend $516 per employee. The median firm spends just $11.
What does this tell us? In our view, it indicates that the firms that have truly embraced AI are willing to commit real capital to it, while the typical firm is only beginning to engage. Adoption may be broad, but depth of adoption is still concentrated at the top. For most businesses, the runway ahead is long, and in our view that is precisely what makes this moment the early innings.
How To Play It
Adoption still has room to run, and leadership within the space has the potential to rapidly evolve. A growing market with a constantly shifting competitive order, is exactly why active management for AI investing is critical. We believe the Roundhill Generative AI & Technology ETF (CHAT) is well positioned as an actively managed strategy, able to respond to technological breakthroughs with a faster cadence than passively managed strategies, and allocate to the leaders throughout the AI value stack as the generative AI revolution matures.
Learn more about CHAT: https://www.roundhillinvestments.com/etf/chat/
Investors should consider the investment objectives, risk, charges and expenses carefully before investing. For a prospectus or summary prospectus with this and other information about Roundhill ETFs please call 1-855-561-5728 or visit the website at www.roundhillinvestments.com/etf/. Read the prospectus or summary prospectus carefully before investing.
Artificial Intelligence Company Risk. Companies involved in, or exposed to, artificial intelligence related businesses may have limited product lines, markets, financial resources or personnel. These companies face intense competition and potentially rapid product obsolescence, and many depend significantly on retaining and growing the consumer base of their respective products and services.
Technology Sector Risk. The Fund will invest substantially in companies in the information technology sector, and therefore the performance of the Fund could be negatively impacted by events affecting this sector. Market or economic factors impacting technology companies and companies that rely heavily on technological advances could have a significant effect on the value of the Fund’s investments. The value of stocks of information technology companies and companies that rely heavily on technology is particularly vulnerable to rapid changes in technology product cycles, rapid product obsolescence, government regulation and competition, both domestically and internationally, including competition from foreign competitors with lower production costs.
New Fund Risk. The Fund is a recently organized management investment company with no operating history. As a result, prospective investors do not have a track record or history on which to base their investment decisions. Small-Capitalization Investing. The securities of small-capitalization companies may be more vulnerable to adverse issuer, market, political, or economic developments than securities of large- or mid-capitalization companies. The securities of small capitalization companies generally trade in lower volumes and are subject to greater and more unpredictable price changes than large- or mid-capitalization stocks or the stock market as a whole.
Micro-Capitalization Investing. Micro-capitalization companies often have limited product lines, narrower markets for their goods and/or services and more limited managerial and financial resources than larger, more established companies, including companies which are considered small- or mid-capitalization.
Concentration Risk. The Fund will be concentrated in securities of issuers having their principal business activities in the technology group of industries. To the extent that the Fund concentrates in a group of industries, it will be subject to the risk that economic, political, or other conditions that have a negative effect on that group of industries will negatively impact them to a greater extent than if its assets were invested in a wider variety of industries.
CHAT is distributed by Foreside Fund Services, LLC.
