MW Salesforce shares seesaw as full-year forecast comes up short

By Bill Peters

The software company is banking on artificial-intelligence 'agents' that can perform digital labor for humans

Shares of Salesforce Inc. fell after hours Wednesday before rebounding back into positive territory, after the customer-service and workplace-analytics software platform's full-year outlook came in below expectations.

The company, whose software helps brings together consumer data for corporate sales departments, said it expects sales of $40.5 billion to $40.9 billion for the fiscal year ahead, which concludes at the end of January. Analysts polled by FactSet expected $41.37 billion.

Over that period, Salesforce said it expects adjusted earnings per share of $11.09 to $11.17, compared with analyst estimates for $11.20.

The company's shares $(CRM)$ fell more than 6% after hours on Wednesday, before paring those losses and rebounding back into the green. They were down less than 1% at last check.

Salesforce reported earnings as it banks more on artificial-intelligence "agents" that can perform digital labor for humans - or potentially compete with them - amid signs that the company has become more mature and could potentially see slower growth in an ever-crowded workplace-assistance software industry. Those "agents" make up a segment the company calls Agentforce.

Salesforce has tried to incorporate more AI into its other services. But analysts have had questions about the costs, the eventual payoff and the implications of China-based DeepSeek, which purportedly offers a lower-cost form of the technology.

During the fourth quarter, Salesforce reported $9.99 billion in sales, up from $9.29 billion in the same quarter that ended last year. It reported adjusted earnings per share of $2.78.

Those results topped Wall Street's expectations. Analysts polled by FactSet expected Salesforce to report adjusted earnings per share of $2.61 for the fourth quarter, on revenue of $10.04 billion.

"No company is better positioned than Salesforce to lead customers through the digital labor revolution," Chief Executive Marc Benioff said in the company's earnings release on Wednesday.

"With our deeply unified platform, seamlessly integrating our Customer 360 apps, Data Cloud and Agentforce, we're already delivering unprecedented levels of productivity, efficiency and cost savings for thousands of companies."

-Bill Peters

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February 26, 2025 17:00 ET (22:00 GMT)

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