"AI eats Software": Why SaaS stocks are crashing on Wall Street
In the midst of the AI boom, software manufacturers' stocks are plummeting. Shares of Adobe, Oracle & Co. have halved, Microsoft is weakening.
(Image: Artit Wongpradu/Shutterstock.com)
Microsoft's unusual phase of weakness is more than a footnote. Because the real tech drama is currently unfolding a tier behind the “Magnificent Seven” – among that software aristocracy that has seen massive stock price gains for over a decade. Oracle, Adobe, Salesforce, ServiceNow, DocuSign, Workday, and SAP: the former stock market darlings are suddenly in free fall. Germany's most valuable company, for instance, has lost more than a third of its value compared to its highs from a year ago.
Software Sell-off: Price losses of up to 50 percent
The sell-off can hardly be classified as more than an ordinary correction; the price losses since the beginning of the year alone seem more like they're from a textbook for major stock market crashes. Salesforce, Adobe, and Oracle are all in double-digit losses in 2026. ServiceNow, Atlassian, and HubSpot are even losing 30, 40, 50 percent at times, as a price overview from Fiscal.ai on social media impressively illustrates. The narrative that has been playing out on Wall Street trading desks for months is: “AI eats software.” The recent sell-off was further intensified by new product announcements. When LLM provider Anthropic introduced an AI agent called “Claude Cowork” last week in January, which writes reports, creates spreadsheets, and extracts information from screenshots, it was the final proof for many investors that the productivity leap through AI is real.
The End of the Seat-Based Model?
The logic behind the fear is understandable. The classic Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) model is based on per-user licenses. More employees, more “seats,” more revenue. A system that scaled perfectly for years – until AI begins to replace or at least massively condense human work.
If autonomous AI agents handle tasks in the future that used to require entire corporate departments, why pay for dozens of Salesforce or Workday licenses? If AI reviews, formulates, and closes contracts, what's the need for widespread DocuSign subscriptions? And if generative image and design models deliver in seconds what teams of graphic designers used to do – how many Photoshop licenses does a company need from Adobe then? Investors' fear: productivity explodes, but software providers' revenues implode. AI is celebrated, but it could prove to be pure poison for the seat economy.
“No Reason to Own Software Stocks”
The stock market hates uncertainty and transition phases like the current one. If the business model actually shifts from “Per Seat” to “Per Outcome” – meaning payment based on results rather than users – it could change the entire revenue logic of the industry.
“Many buy-side investors currently see no reason to hold software stocks – no matter how cheap they are or how much they have been pressured before,” wrote tech analyst Jordan Klein of Mizuho Securities in a client note last week. “They assume there are currently no catalysts for a re-rating,” Klein sees higher valuation multiples not in sight currently.
Panic or Exaggeration?
Software is currently trading at price-to-earnings ratios at 10-year lows. A decade ago, the scalable SaaS business model was considered the holy grail; in the age of the AI hype, it is currently almost treated as an obsolete model. The market is now pricing in almost the worst-case scenario: that the actual value creation shifts to model providers and hardware manufacturers, and software is degraded to an interchangeable shell.
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“It's rare for companies with such incredibly strong fundamentals (GS Score) to have such incredibly poor performance (GC Score),” wonders Swiss fund manager Thierry Borgeat of the fund boutique Arvy on social media about the current sell-off. “I can't remember ever seeing anything like it before.”
Biggest Transition Phase Since the Cloud Revolution
The truth probably lies somewhere in between. The software sector is at the beginning of perhaps its biggest transition phase since the cloud revolution. AI will not simply replace software immediately, but it is likely to redefine it. However, the major providers also possess enormous data sets, deep customer relationships, and critical infrastructure. Microsoft, SAP, or Salesforce also achieve sufficiently high sales outside their classic software business.
For example, the British major bank Barclays expects software stocks to “finally get a breather” in 2026, as valuations have reached attractive levels and customer spending is likely to remain stable. Meanwhile, the rating agency Morningstar identified nine undervalued tech stocks last week, including five software titles.
(dmk)
