New York, February 3, 2026, 18:30 EST — After-hours
- IBM shares dropped 6.5%, slipping to $294.31 in after-hours trading, roughly $20 down for the session.
- A selloff hit software and professional-services shares amid concerns that new AI tools might automate high-value jobs.
- Traders have their eyes on IBM’s dividend record date set for Feb. 10, along with the company’s preliminary first-quarter earnings scheduled for April 22.
Shares of International Business Machines Corp (IBM.N) dropped 6.5% to $294.31 in after-hours trading on Tuesday, as U.S. stocks moved beyond the regular 9:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. session.
IBM, a major player in the Dow, quickly reflects moves like this. After climbing last week on strong earnings, the stock is now pulling back some of those gains.
The immediate spark came as software and services stocks took a hit following Anthropic’s launch of new add-on tools for its Claude Cowork “agent” — an AI program designed to perform tasks, beyond simply answering questions.
IBM started the day at $312.22, climbing to an intraday peak of $315.71 before dropping sharply to a low of $284. Trading volume reached roughly 11.5 million shares by the close.
Investors said the latest tools intensified the sell-off in data, analytics, and professional-services shares. “Sometimes the market just shoots first and asks questions later,” noted Mike Archibald of AGF Investments in Toronto. Jonathan McMullan at Schroders described the emerging discussion as making “long-term valuations harder to defend.” Reuters
IBM and Salesforce stood out as the biggest drags on the Dow Jones Industrial Average during the regular session, MarketWatch reported.
The decline follows IBM’s beat on Wall Street estimates for fourth-quarter revenue and profit, powered by strong software sales. CFO Jim Kavanaugh attributed slower growth at Red Hat, IBM’s hybrid-cloud division, partly to last year’s U.S. government shutdown. He also announced that starting in the first quarter, IBM will no longer report its “AI book of business” as a separate metric. Reuters
IBM’s CEO Arvind Krishna revealed in the earnings report that the generative AI segment has surpassed $12.5 billion in revenue. The company also announced a quarterly dividend of $1.68 per share, payable March 10 to shareholders on record as of Feb. 10.
A Form 4 filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission revealed Vice Chairman Gary Cohn sold 19,111 shares at $303.755 each. This transaction followed his receipt of 35,410 shares from performance-based awards, leaving him holding roughly 106,165 shares.
The risk now is that the tape might stop focusing on company-specific results and begin repricing entire business models. If investors continue to downgrade firms that charge per user or per consultant, even IBM could take a hit on days without major news.
Macro noise is adding to the mess. The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics announced it will push back the January employment report due to the partial federal government shutdown, throwing a wrench into this week’s data schedule and fueling more volatility.
IBM investors should watch for two key upcoming dates: the dividend record date on Feb. 10 and the preliminary Q1 earnings report set for April 22. The next trading session will reveal if Tuesday’s AI-fueled sell-off was just a brief dip or signals a longer trend.
