Salesforce Introduces AI to Slackbot Amid Market Skepticism
Written by Emily J. Thompson, Senior Investment Analyst
Updated: Sep 03 2025
0mins
Should l Buy CRM?
Source: Reuters
Salesforce Inc's stock has fallen 3.01% and hit a 20-day low amid a broader market rally, with the Nasdaq-100 up 1.07% and the S&P 500 up 0.65%.
The company recently announced the enhancement of its Slackbot with generative AI, which is expected to improve user information retrieval and strengthen Slack's competitive position. However, the new feature will only be available to Business+ and Enterprise+ subscribers, potentially limiting its user base. Despite the AI boom benefiting many tech stocks, Salesforce's stock has declined 18% over the past year, reflecting market skepticism about its AI strategy and impacting investor confidence.
This cautious market reaction highlights the challenges Salesforce faces in convincing investors of its growth potential, especially as it navigates a competitive landscape with significant players like Microsoft. The success of the AI-enhanced Slackbot could be crucial for Salesforce's future performance.
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Analyst Views on CRM
Wall Street analysts forecast CRM stock price to rise over the next 12 months. According to Wall Street analysts, the average 1-year price target for CRM is 326.95 USD with a low forecast of 223.00 USD and a high forecast of 405.00 USD. However, analyst price targets are subjective and often lag stock prices, so investors should focus on the objective reasons behind analyst rating changes, which better reflect the company's fundamentals.
42 Analyst Rating
31 Buy
10 Hold
1 Sell
Moderate Buy
Current: 189.970
Low
223.00
Averages
326.95
High
405.00
Current: 189.970
Low
223.00
Averages
326.95
High
405.00
About CRM
Salesforce, Inc. is a provider of customer relationship management (CRM) technology. The Company helps organizations of any size reimagine their business for the world of artificial intelligence (AI). With Agentforce, its platform, organizations can bring humans together with AI agents to drive customer success on one deeply unified platform. With the Salesforce platform, it delivers a single source of truth, connecting customer data with integrated AI across systems, apps and devices to help companies sell, service, market and conduct commerce from anywhere. Agentforce is a new layer of the Salesforce platform that enables companies to build and deploy AI agents that can respond to inputs, make decisions and take action autonomously across business functions. Agentforce includes a suite of customizable agents for use across sales, service, marketing and commerce. Datablazer is a data-driven innovator, which leverages the Company’s platform to unlock insights and drive decisions.
About the author
Emily J. Thompson
Emily J. Thompson, a Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA) with 12 years in investment research, graduated with honors from the Wharton School. Specializing in industrial and technology stocks, she provides in-depth analysis for Intellectia’s earnings and market brief reports.
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- Microsoft's Earnings Fail to Boost Stock: Despite Microsoft exceeding Wall Street expectations in its earnings report, its stock plummeted 11% in one day due to slowing cloud revenue, marking the largest single-day drop since March 2020 and highlighting concerns about the future performance of tech stocks.
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See More
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- Investor Sentiment Shift: Following earnings calls from tech giants like Microsoft, Google, and Amazon, investor confusion about future directions led to Amazon losing over $300 billion in market cap, reflecting strong skepticism regarding its $200 billion AI investment plan.
- Capital Expenditure Comparison: Google announced an increase in capital expenditures to $175 billion to $185 billion, exceeding the expected $115 billion to $120 billion, indicating a proactive approach in AI despite challenges from slowing ad revenues.
- Changing Competitive Landscape: With Alphabet's ongoing investments and successes in AI, YouTube's user base has grown to 750 million, and Waymo's self-driving business is outpacing Tesla, suggesting a strengthening competitive advantage that may attract more investor interest.
- Mixed Market Reactions: Despite OpenAI and Anthropic's strong performance in AI, Microsoft's Copilot sales have been disappointing, highlighting investor concerns about its future growth and reflecting differing levels of confidence across companies.
See More
Salesforce Receives Buy Rating and Price Target Adjustments
- Rating Reaffirmed and Target Set: Stifel Nicolaus reaffirmed a Buy rating on Salesforce (NYSE:CRM) on February 5, setting a price target of $300, indicating confidence in its future growth potential.
- Target Price Downgrade: Piper Sandler adjusted Salesforce's price target from $315 to $280 on February 2 while maintaining an Overweight rating, reflecting a cautious outlook on the software sector.
- Market Outlook Analysis: Piper Sandler noted that narratives around 'seat-compression' and 'vibe coding' could limit valuation multiples, suggesting ongoing pessimism in the software industry.
- Investment Recommendations: While Salesforce shows investment potential, analysts recommend focusing on hyperscaler, consumption, and vertical sub-sectors, with Microsoft and ServiceTitan identified as more attractive investment options.
See More
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- Tech Stock Decline: Over the past three months, technology stocks have been on a downward trend, with significant losses among major players in the last week alone, indicating a shift in investor sentiment from growth to value stocks amid increasing volatility.
- Market Performance Comparison: Since Halloween, the Russell 1000 Value index has risen by 8.4%, while the tech-heavy Russell 1000 Growth index has fallen by 3.7%, reflecting a growing preference for value stocks as investors exhibit fatigue towards growth stocks.
- Microsoft Earnings Impact: Following Microsoft's fiscal second-quarter results that exceeded Wall Street expectations, the stock plummeted 11% in a single day due to signs of slowing cloud revenue, marking the largest drop since March 2020 and highlighting the market's sensitivity to tech stock performance.
- Concerns Over AI Technology: Growing concerns about AI technology potentially disrupting the software industry have led to a nearly one-third decline in the IGV Software index since its September peak, illustrating investor caution regarding the future of the tech sector and its economic implications.
See More
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- Software Stock Selloff: Wedbush analyst Dan Ives highlighted that Wall Street's selloff of software stocks like Salesforce, ServiceNow, and Microsoft is unprecedented, indicating severe investor skepticism about their relevance in the AI era, which could lead to declining performance over the next few years.
- Historic Decline: Ives noted that in his 25 years of experience, he has never witnessed such a structural selloff, with software companies being perceived as lacking space in the AI age, reflecting a significant drop in market confidence that could result in a loss of about 5% of customers.
- AI Impact Analysis: While Ives acknowledged that AI disrupts the software industry, he argued that considering software as obsolete is an extreme view, citing Palantir as an example of how software can still thrive in the AI era, demonstrating that there is still room for software to succeed.
- Market Reaction: The stock prices of Microsoft, Salesforce, and ServiceNow have dropped 16.75%, 25.87%, and 30.47% respectively over the past month, indicating a pessimistic outlook from investors regarding the future prospects of these companies and reflecting a waning confidence in the software sector.
See More
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- Tech Sector Decline: Over the past week, major tech stocks have suffered significant losses, with AMD down nearly 21% and Intuit down over 17%, indicating a sharp decline in market confidence that could lead investors to reassess their portfolios.
- AI Fatigue Emerges: As investor optimism around artificial intelligence wanes, tech stocks have continued to decline over the past three months, with the Russell 1000 Value index up 8.4% while the tech-heavy Russell 1000 Growth index is down 3.7%, reflecting a shift in market preference towards value stocks.
- Microsoft's Earnings Fail to Boost Stock: Despite Microsoft beating Wall Street expectations in its earnings report, concerns over slowing cloud revenue led to an 11% drop in its stock on the day of the announcement, marking the largest single-day decline since March 2020 and highlighting the fragile confidence in tech stocks.
- Software Industry Challenges: With the rapid advancement of AI technology, there are concerns that AI could replace many software providers at lower costs, resulting in the IGV Software index dropping nearly a third from its September high, signaling intensified competition within the industry.
See More
Tech Stocks Plummet, Investor Sentiment Dips Amid AI Concerns
- Tech Stock Rout: Over the past week, major tech stocks have suffered significant losses, with AMD down nearly 21%, Intuit down over 17%, and Micron down almost 13%, indicating a sharp decline in market confidence that could lead investors to reassess their portfolios.
- AI Fatigue: As investor optimism around artificial intelligence wanes, tech stocks have seen a three-month decline, with the Russell 1000 Value index up 8.4% while the tech-heavy Russell 1000 Growth index is down 3.7%, reflecting a shift in market preference towards value stocks.
- Microsoft's Earnings Fail to Boost Stock: Despite Microsoft exceeding Wall Street expectations in its earnings report, its stock plummeted 11% in one day due to slowing cloud revenue, marking the largest single-day drop since March 2020 and highlighting concerns about the future performance of tech stocks.
- Uncertain Software Industry Outlook: The IGV Software index has dropped nearly a third from its September high, as fears grow that AI technology may replace many software providers at lower costs, intensifying competition in the industry and prompting investors to navigate future uncertainties with caution.
See More
