OTTAWA, Feb 15, 2026, 11:03 EST
- Stifel trimmed its price target on Shopify but stuck with a Hold rating. D.A. Davidson, for its part, repeated its Buy call.
- Shopify is set to kick off a $2 billion share buyback on Feb. 17, coming off a robust Q4 performance.
- Investors continue to probe if “agentic commerce” ends up a win for Shopify, or if it ends up moving around the company entirely.
Stifel slashed its price target on Shopify but left its Hold rating untouched, while D.A. Davidson stuck to its Buy recommendation—evidence of Wall Street’s split view after the e-commerce software company’s latest numbers.
This debate has turned urgent for investors, who’ve been hitting subscription software stocks hard on worries that fresh artificial intelligence tools might upend the ways people search, shop, and pay. Shopify gets split opinions in this crowd: some call it a likely winner, but others view it as a tollbooth—one that new tech might let merchants sidestep entirely.
The fight comes down to “agentic commerce”—AI bots that hunt down products and buy them for users—and who gets the final say at checkout. Shopify’s aim: keep those sales on its own payments system.
Shopify last changed hands near $112.70. U.S. and Canadian exchanges were shut on Sunday. Despite a slight uptick late in the week, the stock is still trading far under last year’s peak.
Shopify reported a 31% jump in holiday-quarter revenue, reaching $3.67 billion. Gross merchandise volume also increased 31% to $123.84 billion. Free cash flow landed at $715 million for the quarter, giving the company a 19% margin. The board has cleared a share buyback plan that could total up to $2 billion, set to kick off Feb. 17 without a set end date.
Shopify turned in another quarter of double-digit growth, and The Globe and Mail zeroed in on the buyback reserve—a detail that might help shore up sentiment should the stock’s swings persist.
In a Yahoo Finance piece, analysts pitched the recent dip as a potential entry point for those thinking long term, pointing to Shopify’s AI-powered commerce strategy as a reason the stock could claw its way back.
A Motley Fool contributor, in a piece that’s been making the rounds via Nasdaq, highlighted Shopify’s push into AI-powered merchant tools and its collaboration with Alphabet to develop a universal commerce protocol—a bid to standardize how AI agents interact with brands online. But despite those tech advances, the author flagged ongoing “SaaS” (subscription software) jitters still weighing on valuations. https://www.nasdaq.com/articles/shopify-sh…
After earnings, Zacks dialed back the enthusiasm. The firm pointed to valuation worries and questions around margin mix, suggesting investors might be better off waiting for a more attractive entry rather than jumping in now.
Shopify President Harley Finkelstein told analysts on the earnings call that “the AI era has now reached commerce,” doubling down on the AI angle. D.A. Davidson’s analyst described the quarter as “an excellent result,” even as software stocks sold off. https://www.reuters.com/business/retail-co…
The downside is clear enough. Should AI agents from major platforms herd buyers into walled gardens—or bypass Shopify’s checkout entirely—Shopify might see its take rate and payments growth squeezed. The company already flagged that its first-quarter free cash flow margin will slip to the low-to-mid teens, with ongoing investment in product and AI weighing on margins.
Shopify’s $2 billion buyback is giving some investors a bit of comfort, at least for the moment. Still, the larger uncertainty looms: does Shopify drive the new era of AI shopping, or will that surge take off without it?
