NVIDIA, plunges late at night! "AI panic" is amplified, with institutions speaking out intensively!

On Thursday local time, the three major U.S. stock indices opened mixed. As of press time, the Nasdaq fell 0.89%, the Dow rose 0.21%, and the S&P 500 declined 0.4%.

Nvidia’s earnings report exceeded expectations again but was met with a冷 response, with the stock price drop expanding to over 3%.

Customer management software giant Salesforce’s better-than-expected earnings report eased investor concerns about the software industry.

Additionally, tech giants like Nvidia, Pinduoduo, and top investment firm leaders have spoken out intensively, agreeing that the market’s panic over AI has been significantly exaggerated. AI is not a “disruptor” of the software industry but an important “enabler.” The future mainstream trend is the integration, symbiosis, and iterative upgrading of both.

Popular Chinese concept stocks all declined, with the Nasdaq Golden Dragon China Index dropping over 2%. KE Holdings fell over 6%, Baidu Group, Li Auto, and Bilibili declined nearly 5%, XPeng Motors dropped over 4%, and Alibaba, JD.com, Ctrip, and New Oriental fell over 2%.

Salesforce’s Performance Surpasses Expectations

One of the biggest victims of this round of software stock sell-off—customer management software giant Salesforce—released a quarterly earnings report that beat market expectations.

The report shows that for the fiscal quarter ending January 31, Salesforce’s revenue was $11.2 billion, up 12% year-over-year, slightly above the market expectation of $11.18 billion, and the fastest growth in two years. Adjusted earnings per share were $3.81, far exceeding the expected $3.04. Meanwhile, the remaining performance obligations (CRPO), which measure contracted revenue to be recognized within the next year, reached $35.1 billion, higher than the market forecast of $34.53 billion.

Salesforce remains optimistic about short-term prospects. The company expects first-quarter revenue of $11.03 to $11.08 billion, and adjusted EPS of $3.11 to $3.13, both above analyst expectations. The company also projects annual revenue growth of 10% to 11%, with organic growth expected to accelerate in the second half of the year.

Additionally, Salesforce announced a new $50 billion stock buyback plan and increased quarterly dividends to $0.44 per share. The company stated these measures “strengthen our commitment to creating significant value for shareholders.” CEO Marc Benioff explicitly said during the analyst call that buybacks are happening because “the price is very low right now.” The company also disclosed that its investment in AI startup Anthropic yielded $811 million this quarter, with additional investments, and now holds about 1% of the company.

Benioff emphasized in the statement that the company is steadily progressing toward its goal of $63 billion in annual revenue by fiscal 2030, a figure higher than the previous estimate of $60 billion and surpassing Wall Street’s current forecast of about $59.07 billion. He stated that AI agents are one of the growth drivers.

Since the beginning of the year, Salesforce’s stock has fallen 27%, and it is considered a victim of the AI boom.

Industry Leaders Collective Voice: AI Threat to Software Industry Exaggerated

Besides Salesforce, the entire software sector has been struggling. Oracle, Accenture, and others have seen declines of over 20% since the start of the year. However, industry consensus generally believes that the threat of AI to the software industry has been overstated.

After Nvidia’s earnings report on Wednesday, CEO Jensen Huang said the market has seriously misjudged AI’s threat to software companies. He stated that AI assistants will not replace existing software tools but will instead become users of these tools, helping software companies significantly improve development and operational efficiency. “Tools like Cadence, ServiceNow, SAP have fundamental and legitimate reasons for existence. AI will represent human users of these tools, and ultimately, work still depends on these tools, with feedback provided in a human-understandable way.”

Sequoia Capital partner and co-lead Alfred Lin also refuted the notion that “AI will disrupt the software industry.” He pointed out that artificial intelligence itself is a “collection of a large number of software,” and the software industry has always been evolving. Traditional software companies like Oracle remain highly competitive, demonstrating the industry’s resilience. Lin believes that AI’s long-term impact is overall positive for enterprises, acting as an “efficiency amplifier” rather than a force to replace humans or destroy existing business models.

Renowned growth investment firm Baidu also provided its outlook on the software industry from a market fundamentals and investment strategy perspective. Baidu believes that recent market reactions to AI news are much faster than assessments of company fundamentals. While changes in software construction methods are real, they will not damage all software business models. The core value of software companies lies not only in code but also in their comprehensive service systems, including business support, compliance services, tool integration, and user experience. This is a key reason why companies won’t replace software subscriptions with custom AI in the short term. Developing internal AI tools involves high maintenance costs and significant regulatory and operational risks, making partnerships with professional software providers more cost-effective. Baidu also pointed out that cases like OpenAI’s Frontier platform show that leading AI providers are empowering rather than replacing existing enterprise systems. Core business software such as customer management databases and financial programs will continue to exist long-term, accounting for about 50% of the enterprise software market. Their stock prices have already shown significant valuation dislocation amid the industry downturn.