What Happened?

A number of stocks jumped in the afternoon session after software stocks extended their rally, carrying momentum from one of the sharpest sector reversals of 2026. 

The iShares Expanded Tech-Software ETF closed May up 21%, its best monthly performance since October 2001, after Snowflake's Q1 results and Dell's Q1 print over two consecutive evenings combined to break the "SaaSpocalypse" narrative that had driven enterprise software stocks 20-40% below their highs. Snowflake's revenue grew 34% to $1.39 billion, AI accounts jumped from 9,100 to 13,600 in a single quarter, and Dell confirmed $16.1 billion in AI server revenue (up 757%) against a $51.3 billion committed backlog. The combined message was that AI is accelerating enterprise software demand, not displacing it. 

Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang's Computex keynote in Taipei framed agentic AI (autonomous systems executing tasks across enterprise infrastructure) as the defining platform shift ahead, directly validating the demand case for the software layer that governs, secures, and orchestrates those agents. ServiceNow rose 10%, bringing its two-session gain to 26% from the May 28 close of $108. Okta held its 30% post-earnings surge, with its identity platform increasingly positioned as infrastructure for enterprise AI agent deployment. MongoDB sustained its post-Q1 momentum after 25% revenue growth and a fourth consecutive quarter of Atlas growth at or above 29%. CrowdStrike held near its 52-week high of $731 ahead of its June 3 earnings.

The stock market overreacts to news, and big price drops can present good opportunities to buy high-quality stocks.

Among others, the following stocks were impacted:

• Automation Software company Pegasystems (NASDAQ: PEGA) jumped 6%. Is now the time to buy Pegasystems? Access our full analysis report here, it’s free.
• Design Software company Unity (NYSE: U) jumped 6%. Is now the time to buy Unity? Access our full analysis report here, it’s free.
• Compliance Software company Workiva (NYSE: WK) jumped 6%. Is now the time to buy Workiva? Access our full analysis report here, it’s free.

Zooming In On Unity (U)

Unity’s shares are extremely volatile and have had 55 moves greater than 5% over the last year. In that context, today’s move indicates the market considers this news meaningful but not something that would fundamentally change its perception of the business.

The previous big move we wrote about was 4 days ago when the stock gained 6.1% on the news that Snowflake's impressive earnings results provided the clearer evidence that the "SaaSpocalypse" — a rolling selloff that had erased approximately $2 trillion from software market values since late 2025 on fears that AI would make subscription software obsolete — had been overstated for platforms sitting at the centre of AI workflows. 

Snowflake surged 35%, its best single day ever, after reporting that AI accounts on its platform jumped from 9,100 to 13,600 in a single quarter, product revenue grew 34%, and full-year guidance was raised by $180 million. The read-through was immediate. ServiceNow gained 5%, Palantir rose nearly 6%, Oracle and Microsoft each added roughly 3%, and a broad wave lifted the iShares Expanded Tech-Software Sector ETF (IGV). The SaaSpocalypse thesis rested on a simple fear: that autonomous AI agents would replace per-seat software licences, hollowing out established SaaS business models. Snowflake's results inverted that logic directly. Instead of AI displacing its platform, AI drove more consumption of it. 

CFO Brian Robins described Cortex Code as creating a "step function change" in AI revenue potential, and said it was the single largest driver of the full-year guidance raise. Enterprises are not replacing data platforms with AI; they are using AI to generate more workloads that run on those same platforms.

Unity is down 27.3% since the beginning of the year, and at $32.18 per share, it is trading 35% below its 52-week high of $49.47 from December 2025. Investors who bought $1,000 worth of Unity’s shares 5 years ago would now be looking at only $343.31.

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