When high-flying tech stocks trade at fairly cheap valuations, as many do now, some investors may view it as a golden buying opportunity. But this time around, one market researcher says it's reason to be wary.

Tom Essaye, the founder of Sevens Report Research, said in a note on Wednesday that cheap AI stock valuations could signal that investors are growing fearful that the data center boom could come to a halt.

Typically, investors are willing to assign higher valuations to growth stocks because of their high future earnings potential. So the fact that some AI stock valuations are so low today means investors are skeptical that earnings potential will ever come to fruition, Essaye said.

He cited four example stocks and their recent price action and forward multiples. For comparison, the S&P 500 trades at a forward PE ratio of 21.5.

Nvidia

Upside last 12 months: 44%

Forward PE ratio: 21x earnings

Micron Technology

Upside last 12 months: 770%

Forward PE ratio: 10x earnings

Broadcom

Upside last 12 months: 51%

Forward PE ratio: 24x earnings

SanDisk

Upside last 12 months: 4,490%

Forward PE ratio: 14x earnings

If AI adoption and effectiveness fall short of expectations, as investors appear to be worried about, it could signal a pullback in investment, dramatically hurting sales for firms tied to the AI buildout.

"Think of it this way: GOOGL (to use one as an example) cancels building 10 data centers because it's going to cost too much money and the return isn't there," he wrote. "That will result in massive order cancellations at NVDA, MU, AVGO, SNDK, etc., because no one needs the chips, networking, memory, or processor power," he added.

A recent example of investor uneasiness, Essaye said, is the recent decline in Oracle stock. Shares of the company have tumbled about 25% since June 1 as it's poured money into the AI buildout.

While Essaye isn't necessarily sounding the alarm that the market is nearing a top, he drew a parallel to the dot-com bubble era, which peaked in 2000.

"To be fair, this fear has been around for several months, and it isn't appearing yet. However, it's not without precedent because this is exactly how the dotcom bubble burst," he said.

"While people connected to the internet, their connection wasn't nearly as profitable as quickly as everyone assumed," Essaye continued. "Because of that, the buildout stopped."