CNBC’s Jim Cramer on Monday warned that the artificial intelligence boom’s circular financing frenzy echoes the dot-com bubble, saying “I lived through 2000. I don’t want the sequel.” On Sunday, the Wall Street Journal reported that Nvidia was discussing a $250 billion backstop for OpenAI to help finance a planned 10-gigawatt AI data center campus in Ohio; CNBC confirmed the report on Monday, and Nvidia declined to comment. The proposed guarantee would support the project’s lease and construction debt, not the Nvidia chips deployed inside. Shares of Nvidia fell more than 4% on Monday, pulling many semiconductor stocks down. Cramer noted the circular nature: Nvidia has invested in several companies that are also major customers, including a $30 billion investment in OpenAI in March and a $10 billion investment in Anthropic last year. He compared this to the late 1990s, when telecom equipment makers helped customers finance purchases, leading to heavy losses when buyers could not pay. Cramer stressed he still views Nvidia as exceptionally strong and is not predicting a repeat of the dot-com crash, but said investors can lose confidence when suppliers rely on customers whose spending depends on continued capital access. OpenAI confidentially filed for an IPO in June but has not announced a timeline; it was valued at more than $800 billion by private investors in March. Cramer added that risks extend beyond Nvidia, as many companies count on data center earnings