New York, January 7, 2026, 15:08 ET — Regular session
- Salesforce shares rose 1.6% to $267.13 in afternoon trading, after swinging between $261.52 and $267.81.
- U.S. stocks were mixed as investors digested fresh labor-market data and recalibrated rate expectations.
- Traders are watching Friday’s U.S. payrolls report and the pace of Salesforce’s AI monetization into 2026.
Salesforce (CRM.N) shares rose 1.6% to $267.13 in afternoon trading on Wednesday, recovering some ground after early volatility, with about 3.7 million shares changing hands.
The uptick came as technology shares extended gains from the prior session, helping keep the S&P 500 and Nasdaq in positive territory even as investors tested how much more they want to pay for growth. “The economic news sort of fueled a little bit of profit taking,” Robert Pavlik, a senior portfolio manager at Dakota Wealth, said. 1
Data released on Wednesday showed U.S. private payrolls rose by 41,000 in December, undershooting forecasts, while job openings in November fell more than expected. Economists and traders have been looking to Friday’s nonfarm payrolls report for the next signal on the labor market and the Federal Reserve’s path. 2
For Salesforce, the backdrop matters because its core customers are big employers and big spenders — and because the stock trades like a long-duration asset, sensitive to shifts in rates. The company has leaned hard into “AI agents,” software designed to perform tasks with less human input, as it tries to justify premium pricing and defend share in enterprise applications.
In its latest quarterly update in December, Salesforce raised its fiscal 2026 revenue outlook to $41.45 billion-$41.55 billion and pointed to stronger demand for its Agentforce and Data 360 products. Marc Benioff called them “momentum drivers” after the company said the offerings reached nearly $1.4 billion in annual recurring revenue, a subscription-sales measure tracked by investors. 3
Other large-cap software names were also higher on the day, including Microsoft, Oracle, ServiceNow and Adobe.
Salesforce is also set to pay a quarterly cash dividend of $0.416 per share on January 8, according to a company statement. 4
But the setup is not clean. If enterprise buyers slow purchases or push out renewals, AI pilots can take longer to turn into paid subscriptions, and rivals with broad stacks — from Microsoft to Oracle — have been aggressive in bundling AI features.
What comes next is less about Salesforce’s chart than the calendar: Friday’s U.S. jobs report, then the next round of earnings season check-ins for signs that AI demand is turning into steady, billable revenue rather than talk.
