sales force CEO Marc Benioff has laid out a strategy to weather the sharp downturn in stock prices, focusing on delivering strong products to customers and continuing to buy back shares.
“We remain focused on the success of our customers,” Benioff said Wednesday on “Mad Money.” “We intend to continue to grow our revenues and provide significant cash flow.”
Salesforce stock has struggled this year amid growing concerns that generative AI platforms from companies like Anthropic and OpenAI could disrupt traditional software providers. Despite the better-than-expected earnings, the stock fell another 1.5% in after-hours trading on Wednesday as investors focused on softer-than-expected guidance.
Benioff said Salesforce posted better-than-expected sales and profits, dismissing concerns that it was lagging behind in what he jokingly called the “Saaspocalypse.”
“You can tell we had a record quarter,” he said. “I’ve never seen so many big deals happen.”
Benioff said Salesforce accelerated its share buybacks rather than retreating during the stock market decline. The company has now repurchased $27.1 billion worth of stock. On the earnings call, Chief Financial Officer Robin Washington said the share buybacks reduced Salesforce’s diluted share count by 10% in the quarter compared to the same period last year, and boosted first-quarter adjusted earnings per share by 23 cents.
“You can look around for big opportunities in the market, but Salesforce is probably the biggest opportunity,” he said. “We are very pleased to be able to repurchase our shares.”
Benioff also argued that AI will enhance Salesforce, not destroy it, pointing to integration with tools powered by Slack and Anthropic.
“That Slack bot is powered by Anthropic,” he said. “Bringing Anthropic into Slack allows us to adapt an incredibly successful product and provide great advice.”
