Episode summary
Salesforce Jumps Most Since 2020 on Outlook, Anthropic Deal | Bloomberg Intelligence
Bloomberg Intelligence
· · 22 min · Hosts: Paul Sweeney, Scarlet Fu · Guests: Anurag Rana, Kunjan Sobhani, Matthew Schettenhelm, Redd Brown
Summary
Salesforce rallied sharply after it lifted its outlook for revenue growth and deepened its partnership with Anthropic, but the analyst argued the bigger story was an organic turnaround in core enterprise demand. He said Salesforce’s bookings had been weakening for months, and that a slight uptick in forward-looking data, along with guidance for roughly 10% to 11% organic growth, helped explain the stock’s jump. He was skeptical that the Anthropic deal itself was the main driver, calling it more marketing than reality.
The discussion broadened to software, where the analyst said investors had been positioned for a prolonged “short software” trade versus semiconductors, but that view is starting to reverse. He argued that large enterprise software names such as Salesforce, SAP, ServiceNow and Workday remain more defensible because they control critical systems of record.
Nvidia’s results reinforced the AI spending boom, with the analyst saying the company’s roughly 70% fiscal 2028 revenue-growth outlook was far above Street expectations and reflected both strong demand and better supply access. He also said Nvidia’s more detailed disclosure on investments eased, though did not eliminate, circular-financing concerns. On Meta, a litigation analyst said the teen-safety settlement is significant but manageable, while a consumer reporter said Dollar General is seeing more higher-income shoppers trading down as consumers remain under pressure.
Key takeaways
- Salesforce’s rally was driven more by a slight improvement in organic bookings and guidance than by the Anthropic partnership, according to the analyst.
- The analyst said large enterprise software platforms like SAP, Salesforce, ServiceNow and Workday are better protected from AI disruption than smaller SMB-focused vendors.
- Nvidia’s fiscal 2028 revenue-growth guide of about 70% was far above expectations and reflected both demand strength and supply-chain investment, the analyst said.
- The analyst said Nvidia’s extra disclosure on investments helps reduce, but does not remove, concerns about circular financing.
- Meta’s teen-safety settlement is large but manageable, while school-district and individual suits are tougher legal cases, according to the litigation analyst.
- Dollar General is seeing higher-income shoppers trade down, a sign that consumer stress is broadening, the consumer reporter said.
Notable quotes
“there is a bifocation in enterprise tech spending with software and services being the casualty of it and servers hardware and AI infrastructure is where all the funding is going”
“The anthropic deal is another discussion but frankly speaking I think that's a little bit more marketing than reality”
“I would say all of this year and maybe you know the last few months of last year there's only one trade in the market by semis short software or buy memory and short software”
“We expect to grow revenue by approximately 70% in fiscal 2028”
“Meta's teen safeguards on Facebook and Instagram apply only to the US”
How the episode opens
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Remember earlier this year when these software stocks and particularly software as a service stocks were just dumped? I'm talking down 30 40 50% for some of these names like uh Crowd Strike uh and some of these other names are just rock solid for a long time. Well, they're bouncing back here today.
One of them is Salesforce. Uh it's up about 17 18% today. This company gave an outlook for strong revenue uh expansion and they reported they're deepening their partnership with Anthropic PBC.
That's all it took for this stock to bounce back uh as I thought it would. Honoragana, a senior technology analyst for Bloomberg Intelligence joins us here. So honor gravity Salesforce I'm looking at crowd strike as well a couple of these names that are up sharply today let's talk about Salesforce what did they report
Yeah so one of the things that we have talked about almost for I mean 18 months or so is that there is a bifocation in enterprise tech spending with software and services being the casualty of it and servers hardware and AI infrastructure is where all the funding is going and that has was going on for Salesforce for the longest period of time you know their bookings data or the forward-looking data was on the downward trajectory. Uh for the first time yesterday we saw organically there was a slight uptick in that and that was only by one percentage point. So think about it that organically they were supposed to grow roughly around 9% or so you know they grew 10 and they guided for 11.
From the episode’s captions: roughly the first two minutes, lightly cleaned. Keep watching on YouTube →
Topics
- salesforce earnings outlook
- ai deal partnerships
- nvidia guidance and supply constraints
- meta instagram facebook changes and child safety settlements
- retail earnings dollar tree and dollar general
Companies and tickers mentioned
- CRM
- NVDA
- META
- DLTR
- DG
- Salesforce Inc.
- Anthropic PBC
- Nvidia Corp.
- Meta Platforms Inc.
- Dollar Tree Inc.
- Dollar General Corp.
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Summary, takeaways and quote selection by Octagon. Quotes are short excerpts; the full conversation is in the episode.
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