Salesforce (CRM), the US cloud software giant focused on customer relationship management software, has issued current-quarter performance guidance that slightly missed the average consensus estimate of Wall Street analysts, further unsettling investors already worried that artificial intelligence might disrupt the entire software industry. Salesforce’s latest performance guidance fell short of expectations, and its RPO data missed Wall Street forecasts, triggering not just concerns about a single software company’s performance, but collective skepticism from investors toward the entire application software sector. Data tracked by Goldman Sachs from 13F filings shows that under the narrative of “AI disrupting everything,” hedge funds aggressively sold off software stocks in the first quarter while significantly increasing their semiconductor exposure. The weight of long positions in semiconductors rose to the highest on record, while the weight of software positions fell to its lowest since 2019.
Salesforce projects that total revenue for the second fiscal quarter ending in July will be approximately $11.3 billion at the midpoint, while Wall Street analysts had averaged an expectation of $11.4 billion. In the first fiscal quarter, the company reported total revenue of $11.133 billion, a year-over-year increase of 13%, beating market expectations; adjusted earnings per share were $3.88, significantly above the market consensus of $3.13. However, Remaining Performance Obligations (RPO), a key metric measuring future sales, stood at approximately $67.9 billion, an 11% year-over-year increase, falling short of the Wall Street average expectation of $68.9 billion. The outlook for the next fiscal quarter and the RPO metric failed to meet market expectations, highlighting that Agentforce, the AI agent tool actively promoted by the company, has yet to gain strong recognition from major customers.
Salesforce’s stock fell nearly 4% in after-hours trading and has declined approximately 33% year-to-date, significantly underperforming the S&P 500 and the Nasdaq 100. Company management expects Agentforce to contribute $1.2 billion in annual revenue, up from a previous forecast of $800 million, with overall usage of AI models within the software platform more than doubling from the previous quarter. Salesforce’s Chief Financial Officer stated that the company still expects revenue growth to accelerate in the second half of the year, driven by AI agents. However, Barclays analysts pointed out that Agentforce’s performance has clearly failed to boost overall metrics, raising uncertainty about whether this will be sufficient to generate a meaningful market reaction.
As AI agents like Claude Cowork and OpenClaw begin to directly perform tasks such as sales, customer service, coding, and data analysis, investors worry that enterprises will no longer pay for large numbers of SaaS seats, but will instead shift to an AI-native work layer that charges “per task or outcome.” The market demands that Salesforce more quickly prove that Agentforce can become a new entry point in the AI era, rather than being bypassed by AI-native agents. The current performance expectations and RPO metrics have failed to meet market hopes, highlighting that Salesforce’s AI-driven growth trajectory is not yet large enough to reverse the pessimistic narrative of “AI disrupting everything.”
