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Reach shares crash 19% as Google AI answers crush search traffic
Edgen Stock·Jul 22 2026, 08:37Share to
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[1] Reach shares slump 19% as AI answers hits Google search traffic (https://www.proactiveinvestors.co.uk/companie ...)[2] Google’s AI Search Data Is Growing, But The Gaps Remain (https://www.searchenginejournal.com/googles-a ...)[3] Google was a lifeline for publishers. Now some are thinking of cutting it off. (https://www.msn.com/en-us/technology/artifici ...)[4] Majority of Marketers Are Already Optimizing for AI-Generated Search Answers as Google Query Volume Hits an All-Time High, SEO Essex Analysis Finds (https://www.tmcnet.com/usubmit/2026/07/21/104 ...)[5] The Great AI Content Grab (https://brandequity.economictimes.indiatimes. ...)
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Jul 22 2026, 09:57
Small businesses ditch Salesforce for AI-built apps, saving up to $100K
**At least five US startups have replaced Salesforce and HubSpot with AI-coded alternatives in the past six months, threatening the growth model of enterprise software giants.** At least five US startups with 20 to 70 employees have terminated Salesforce or HubSpot contracts over the past six months, replacing them with custom applications built using Anthropic's Claude Code, Replit and Lovable — saving as much as $100,000 a year. "We just recently canceled our Salesforce contract because we have an internal CRM that was vibecoded," Fred Turner, chief executive officer and founder of health insurer Curative, said on the "20VC with Harry Stebbings" podcast. The contract cost Curative $600,000 a year. Greenleaf Management, a 55-person real estate firm in Atlanta, saved about $100,000 annually after replacing Salesforce with a custom app built on Replit and Claude Code, with monthly maintenance of roughly $300. The Seattle Seawolves, a professional rugby team with 70 staff, cut software spending by about $100,000 and reported a 25% revenue increase since the March season start. Hank AI, a 24-person medical software company, replaced a $40,000-a-year Salesforce contract with a Claude Code-built alternative costing about $500 annually. Atonom, a 45-person Utah startup, swapped a $40,000 Salesforce contract for a Lovable-built CRM with an estimated $1,200 yearly operating cost. The trend threatens the long-term growth narrative of enterprise software giants that have relied on sticky multiyear contracts and high switching costs. Salesforce, ServiceNow and HubSpot have seen their stocks fall 20% to 50% since the start of 2026 on investor fears that AI coding tools will let companies build their own software rather than buy it. Salesforce Chief Executive Officer Marc Benioff has pushed back, saying the company still sees "incredible demand" and that its products have "just got better with agents." **Large enterprises test the waters** The shift is not limited to small companies. Sanofi, the French drugmaker with about 75,000 employees, is reducing its use of ServiceNow by building AI agents with Claude Code and Cursor that handle equipment failure reports. Chief Digital Officer Emmanuel Frenehard said the company aims to move 80% of the workload currently handled by ServiceNow, other software and outsourcers, targeting at least $10 million in annual savings. He acknowledged the effort has faced "considerable resistance" internally. Curative plans to cut about 80% of its total SaaS spending this year, redirecting the budget to AI tools. The company's monthly spending on Anthropic has grown from tens of thousands of dollars to millions over the past six to seven months, Turner said. He pointed to Gwen, a bespoke AI agent that negotiates contracts with healthcare providers, as an example: completing one contract previously cost $1,500 to $2,000 on average; Gwen's average cost is about $70. **SaaS vendors defend their turf** Salesforce President Srini Tallapragada told investors last fall that enterprise customers "have tried to do it themselves, but they realize you can't vibe code enterprise-grade reliability and security." ServiceNow reported a 97% contract renewal rate in the first quarter, which it said shows customers are expanding their use of the platform rather than leaving. But the defense has not fully reassured investors. OpenAI executives told investors earlier this year that they expect the company's future products to replace software from Salesforce, Workday, Adobe and Atlassian, according to The Information. Some large enterprises are shortening contract terms with traditional software vendors while increasing budgets for AI providers like Anthropic. IT consulting firm Loka Chief Executive Officer Bobby Mukherjee said a small number of clients have reduced annual software costs by 40% to 80% through AI-built alternatives, though he generally advises against full replacement. "The smarter approach is usually to build on top of existing systems," he said, adding that "no serious person is predicting the death of HubSpot or Salesforce." The real barrier to mass migration is data migration. Enterprise software's "true total cost of ownership" is typically four times the listed price, Mukherjee said, but the accumulated custom workflows — tracking product catalogs, pricing and customer commitments — make switching costly and slow. Engine, a travel management app with about 1,000 employees and a Salesforce customer for nearly a decade, estimated a migration would take at least a year and has no plans to leave. For investors, the question is whether AI coding tools will improve enough to make the switch viable for mid-market and enterprise clients. If they do, the structural advantages that have supported SaaS multiples for more than a decade — high switching costs, expanding seat counts and annual price increases — could face their most serious challenge yet. This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute investment advice.
Jul 22 2026, 09:57
VIX-VIXEQ gap hits record as S&P 500 breadth diverges 52 days
The gap between the VIX and individual stock volatility hit a record, with VIX at 17.5 and VIXEQ above 50, showing complacency masking stress in momentum stocks. "The divergence between market price and breadth has never been higher," said Jonathan Krinsky, technical analyst at BTIG, in a Monday note. There have been 52 trading days this year when the S&P 500 moved in one direction but a majority of stocks went the other way, tying 2000 for the third-highest count this century. With July not yet over, 2026 is on track to break the record. The pattern was also elevated in 2023 and 2024 when tech stocks dominated, but the dynamic has shifted as chip makers flipped from powering the market to entering their own bear trend. Krinsky warned that as relationships between stocks normalize, "it's likely to be a result of everything catching down to the recent pullback in AI names, rather than AI names catching up to everything else." The S&P 500 sat 1.5% from its all-time high after nearly two months of sideways action, while Oracle closed at a multiyear low Monday and the tech equal-weight index logged a record 31-day bearish streak. ## A Record 52 Days of Breadth Divergence The breadth divergence has been building for months. Citadel Securities strategist Scott Rubner noted that investors are unusually concerned about specific stocks and sectors — mostly momentum names like chip makers that have gyrated with waxing and waning AI optimism. The VIXEQ measure, derived from a similar calculation for each stock in the S&P 500 weighted by market value, has surged above 50 while the VIX itself sits below its long-term average of about 20. Individual stock volatility is always higher than index volatility, but the gap between the two just reached an all-time high. The Cboe Volatility Index, which uses options prices to estimate expected choppiness in the S&P 500 over the next 30 days, remains below its long-term mean — a level that typically suggests calm. The VIXEQ reading above 50 tells a different story. ## Chip Stocks Flip From Leaders to Laggards The rotation has been most acute in semiconductors. Earlier this year, software stocks became toxic as AI models' coding capabilities spooked investors. More recently, chip stocks flipped within days from powering the market to entering their own bear trend. The Magnificent Seven are lagging too. The Direxion Nasdaq-100 Equal Weight Index ETF (QQQE) has been bearish for 31 straight days — a record streak, according to Bluekurtic Market Insights. The U.S. 10-year Treasury yield stood at 4.63%, while gold climbed 1% to $4,118.90 and crude oil rose 3.6% to $87.38, reflecting cross-asset unease. Semiconductor stocks including Intel, Applied Materials, Lam Research, Marvell Technology, ASML, and KLA Corp. have been among the hardest hit, with the sector's bearish MACD signals persisting for weeks. For portfolio managers, the message is clear: the narrow leadership that powered the S&P 500 to record highs is cracking. If Krinsky's scenario plays out, the broader market catches down to AI names rather than the reverse, making defensive positioning and sector diversification increasingly urgent ahead of the upcoming Big Tech earnings reports. The next major test comes as seven of the largest U.S. companies by market capitalization prepare to report quarterly results, with any disappointment in AI-related revenue growth potentially accelerating the rotation. This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute investment advice.
Jul 22 2026, 09:54
Semiconductor rebound lifts S&P 500, Nasdaq 1.3% ahead of Big Tech earnings
**U.S. stocks snapped a three-day losing streak as a 5.2% surge in semiconductor shares reignited confidence in artificial intelligence spending.** The S&P 500 rose 0.9% to 7,509.20 and the Nasdaq Composite climbed 1.3% to 25,837.21, driven by a broad recovery in chip stocks ahead of major technology earnings this week. The Dow Jones Industrial Average added 385 points, or 0.7%, to 52,224.64. "Investors are buying back into semiconductors ahead of earnings because they have fear of missing out that these companies could report outsized beats," said Lindsey Bell, chief investment strategist at 248 Ventures in Charlotte, North Carolina. "But when stocks rally sharply ahead of earnings, it makes it more difficult for them to run in response." The PHLX Semiconductor Index surged 5.2%, its biggest one-day gain in a month, after falling more than 20% from its June record. Sandisk jumped 14.3%, Micron Technology added 12.2% and Seagate Technology rose more than 10%. Intel gained 8.6%, Advanced Micro Devices climbed 7% and Applied Materials advanced 7.2%. Dutch AI infrastructure provider Nebius Group skyrocketed 18.8% after Nvidia disclosed a strategic equity stake of more than 9%. Nine of the 11 S&P 500 sectors finished higher, with technology leading at 2.35% and energy up 1.15%. Consumer staples fell 1% and communication services lost 0.85%. Advancing stocks outnumbered decliners by a 1.65-to-1 ratio on the Nasdaq and 1.44-to-1 on the New York Stock Exchange. The S&P 500 recorded 10 new 52-week highs and seven new lows. Trading volume was light, with 16.14 billion shares changing hands compared with the 19.56 billion 20-day average. The stakes are high for the coming days. Alphabet reports earnings Wednesday, followed by Tesla, Intel and IBM later this week. Investors are zeroing in on Alphabet's capital expenditure guidance as a bellwether for whether the AI infrastructure build-out will maintain its torrid pace — a pullback could reignite the selloff that erased hundreds of billions from chip valuations this month. Treasury yields ticked higher alongside equities, a pattern that Mark Malek, chief investment officer at Siebert Financial, said suggests dip-buying may be masking underlying inflationary pressures. "The markets are behaving right but for the wrong reasons," he said. The 10-year yield rose as investors priced in persistent price pressures even as stocks rallied. Oil benchmarks extended their advance, with Brent crude closing at $91.01 a barrel, the highest since June 10, after two Saudi crude tankers reversed course in the Red Sea following threats from Yemen's Houthi movement. West Texas Intermediate rose 2% to $84.91. The dollar index edged higher, adding to headwinds for multinational earnings. Among individual movers, 3M rallied 7.3% after lifting its full-year profit forecast, while Hasbro jumped 8.8% on raised revenue and profit guidance. Danaher sank 11%, the biggest decliner in the S&P 500, after trimming its core revenue growth outlook. MSCI tumbled 10% after raising its full-year operating expense forecast despite a quarterly revenue beat. This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute investment advice.