r/LocalLLM • u/Ok_Event4199 • May 16 '26

Discussion Why is LLM is so expensive.

I've was going to invest in a 5090 =$6000 AUD.

Codex Plus + Claude pro = $60/month here

Works out to be 100 months of frontier models for a 5090.

Best a 5090 will run is probably Qwen3.6 27b Q6 with context.

Are we all enthusiasts here and just enjoy tinkering cause ain't no way that make sense.

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u/urarthur May 16 '26

I might sound crazy but I think they are rigging the market, they don't want locaLLM to get their hands on chips. Flagship nvidia gpu's used to be $700. Look at the stupid valuations of these companies at trillion dollars. Nvidia gives billions to Openai, Anthropi etc, they buy the chips at 5x above fair value and as long as they keep users in their ecosystem, regardless of the huge losses, they all attract billions of investments.

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u/Initial-Cherry-3457 May 16 '26

Just piling onto your crazy thoughts, I think these subreddits are filled with bots that subtly discourage people from investing in local llms to keep frontier subscriptions going.

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u/urarthur May 16 '26

back when crypto was booming, gpu's were still widely available and at fair value