Is AI Threat Overestimated? JPMorgan Bullish on Salesforce Comeback with 29% Upside

According to a report by Marketwatch, the market has recently been concerned that artificial intelligence (AI) could impact the existing business of Salesforce, a leader in customer relationship management (CRM) software. However, JPMorgan (JPM) believes investors may be overestimating the related risks. With core business growth expected to rebound and multiple AI products gradually contributing to operations, the firm has given Salesforce (CRM-US) an "overweight" rating and set a target price of $250.

JPMorgan analyst Samik Chatterjee noted that this target price represents approximately 29% upside potential for Salesforce's stock by December 2027. Following the report, Salesforce's stock closed up 4.16% on Thursday at $201.37 per share.

Limited AI Impact, Core Business Expected to Accelerate

The market's biggest concern is whether generative AI and autonomous agent tools will weaken demand for traditional software among enterprises. However, Chatterjee believes that while Salesforce may face some competitive pressure from AI in certain areas, the actual impact will be limited to a small portion of the company's overall business.

In contrast, he expects Salesforce's core business to accelerate again in the coming months. The company itself also has the ability to use AI to create new revenue, which can offset some of the potential impact.

Three Platforms to Become Long-Term Growth Engines

Chatterjee is particularly bullish on Salesforce's Headless 360, Data 360, and Agentforce platforms, believing these products will become the company's next growth drivers.

Headless 360 primarily provides tools for AI agents, helping enterprises more flexibly update and adjust systems. Chatterjee believes the long-term commercialization potential of this product is worth watching.

Data 360 can help enterprises integrate and utilize internal data, further supporting the development of AI models and applications. As enterprises accelerate AI adoption, Data 360 is expected to become an important engine for driving Salesforce's revenue growth to reaccelerate.

Agentforce, which allows customers to build autonomous AI agents, is currently in the early stages of development and may not yet fully contribute to performance in the short term.

However, Chatterjee emphasizes that as human-machine interaction interfaces gradually shift from screens to AI agents, Agentforce will become key to maintaining Salesforce's long-term competitiveness.

JPMorgan Bullish on Achieving '50 Rule' by Fiscal 2030

Chatterjee estimates that Salesforce could achieve the '50 Rule'—where the sum of the company's annual revenue growth rate and profit margin reaches 50% or more—by fiscal 2030 at the earliest.

He believes that Salesforce's current stock price reflects a pessimistic scenario of operational decline and does not fully account for the potential of core business recovery, AI product commercialization, and continued improvement in profitability.

The next point of observation for the market will be Salesforce's earnings report scheduled for August 26, at which time investors will further examine whether core business growth has rebounded and the latest developments in AI products such as Agentforce.