Safety first. That’s the approach suddenly being taken by Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei and AI rivals Elon Musk and Sam Altman.

It’s also the approach being taken by investors, who are dumping chip stocks and other AI plays to start the week. But it might be an overreaction to Amodei’s calls for a slowdown in the pace of artificial-intelligence development. Of course, we at Barron’s might be wrong as we were about SpaceX.

The market’s flight to safety is unusual—go-to haven gold is falling and Treasury yields are unmoved, yet Bitcoin and software stocks are on track to be the day’s big winners. Nvidia stock is another left-field idea for a safer bet, it’s better placed than chip rivals if AI progress slows.

On top of the tech turmoil, Brent crude prices have jumped to $107 a barrel after Saudi Arabia shut a key oil pipeline as fighting in the Middle East escalates. The 10-year Treasury yield is at 4.97%, and the Federal Reserve is expected to raise interest rates on Wednesday.

Against that backdrop, the AI slowdown calls may just be the excuse the stock market needed.

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