Beyond the Hype: Evaluating AI Monetization and Earnings Growth in Non-Tech S&P 500 Companies
By mid-February 2026, the S&P 500 has officially entered the “Harvest Phase” of the artificial intelligence cycle. For the previous two years, market gains were heavily concentrated in the “Enablers”—the semiconductor giants and cloud hyperscalers providing the picks and shovels. However, the narrative has shifted. Investors are no longer asking who is building AI, but rather: “Who is actually making money from it?”
In a significant “performance handover,” non-tech sectors are now driving the next leg of the S&P 500’s projected 15% earnings growth for 2026. Companies in healthcare, finance, and retail that successfully transitioned from experimental pilots to Agentic AI workflows are seeing tangible margin expansion. This is the era of the “AI Dividend,” where proprietary data meets operational execution.
The 2026 Inflection Point: From Chatbots to Agents
The defining characteristic of 2026 is the rise of Agentic AI. Unlike the generative tools of 2024 that merely predicted …
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