US Stocks Fluctuate | IBM Preliminary Results Fall Short of Expectations, Software Sector Under Pressure

格隆汇 July 14｜IBM plunged more than 24% after releasing preliminary results that missed expectations, putting pressure on the entire software sector. ServiceNow and Figma fell over 7%, Workday dropped more than 6%, Intuit, Adobe, SAP, and Duolingo all declined over 4%, and Salesforce fell over 3%. On the news front, IBM expects second quarter revenue of $17.2 billion, below the analysts' average forecast of $17.9 billion. IBM CEO Arvind Krishna said some customers are shifting capital expenditure toward hardware areas such as servers, storage, and memory, which is squeezing software procurement. Adam Crisafulli, an analyst at Vital Knowledge, pointed out: “IBM’s preliminary results will deliver a devastating blow to the software and services sector.” Investors are concerned that a structural shift in capital expenditure could have a negative impact on the entire industry, while the trend of companies racing to secure hardware resources also brings another layer of concern.