Between 22 and 28 July, every one of the seven publicly traded companies that sell software for winning, marketing to and servicing customers rose together — between 6% and 16.2% — with no company news behind most of it. That was money leaving semiconductors. The iShares Semiconductor exchange-traded fund is up roughly 80% for the year but has fallen by a double-digit percentage over the past seven weeks as investors returned to software names made cheap by fears that artificial intelligence would destroy them.

The week of 3-7 August is where the information is. The same seven names ranged from -12.3% to +22.5%, and the dispersion tracks how each one charges for its product.

The usage-priced side delivered

Twilio, which sells programming tools that let developers embed voice, text and email into their own apps and bills by volume, reported second-quarter revenue of $1.499bn, up 22% and a fourth consecutive quarter of acceleration. Organic growth was 17%, dollar-based net expansion reached 116%, and full-year organic guidance went to 13-13.5% from 9.5-10.5%. Non-GAAP earnings of $1.47 a share beat roughly $1.32 expected, and BTIG raised its target to $285 from $245 while Needham went to $280 from $250. The business CONFIRMS the move. The valuation does not: price-to-gross-profit has gone from 8.69x on 3 May to 13.54x, a 56% re-rating while organic growth moved 16% to 17%, and Twilio's own third-quarter guide steps organic growth back down to 11-12%. Ten of the 28 points of messaging growth were carrier pass-through fees, which carry no margin — gross margin fell 160 basis points to 49.1%.

Zeta Global, which runs a marketing platform that predicts consumer intent from opted-in data and charges on consumption, grew revenue 43.5% to $442.8m, 28% organically, its twentieth straight beat-and-raise. Its largest customers grew 17% in number to 197 and 17% in spend to $1.8m each. It also disclosed a multiyear agreement with Gap in which Zeta becomes the system of record, replacing Salesforce and three other vendors, with full-year revenue guidance raised to a $1.818bn midpoint. At 27.5x forward earnings against consensus for 41% revenue growth, valuation is INCONCLUSIVE rather than stretched.

The seat-priced side broke — except where it didn't

HubSpot, which bundles marketing, sales and service software for mid-market businesses on a per-seat and contact-tier basis, beat on revenue and earnings but guided third-quarter revenue about 1.8% below consensus, citing budget sensitivity. It cut quarterly customer additions to 5,000-6,000 from 7,000, blaming larger buying committees and longer sales cycles; Bernstein, Oppenheimer and Piper Sandler all downgraded, Bernstein to a $220 target from $381. Revenue growth decelerated to 19.8% from 23.4%. At 3.75x gross profit — down from 4.44x in May, the cheapest in the group — the de-rating CONFIRMS the fundamentals.

Pegasystems, which sells workflow and customer-decisioning software to banks, insurers and governments, missed on earnings at $0.35 against $0.43 expected, with annual contract value growth halving to 7%. Management called it a "max confusion moment" caused by unprecedented uncertainty over AI pricing, said the first half significantly underachieved and that recovery "will be very difficult." Operating margin fell to 4.0%. Its share price has been below trend since 30 January; the business justifies it.

Then Salesforce, which sells the industry's largest per-seat customer-relationship suite. Its reported revenue growth has accelerated three quarters running — 8.6%, 12.1%, 13.3% — with current remaining performance obligations of $33.6bn up 14%, Agentforce annual recurring revenue past $1bn and AI and data revenue at $3.4bn, on a record 34.8% non-GAAP operating margin, up 250 basis points. Its multiple has not moved through the rebound: 4.60x gross profit in May, 4.75x now, 13.6x forward earnings, a 9.3% free-cash-flow yield, shares down 20% over twelve months, and its price only crossed above its downtrend line on 4 August. This is the group's clearest divergence between business and tape — a POSSIBLE DISLOCATION, with the caveat that the seat-count risk is real: Klarna publicly abandoned Salesforce for an AI-assembled stack.

Freshworks, which sells support and IT-service software to companies under about 20,000 employees, is the quiet counterexample: net dollar retention steady at 105%, employee-experience recurring revenue of $567m up 24% against customer-experience revenue of $400m up 4%, more than 7,000 customers paying for its AI product, and management reporting no sales-cycle damage at all. Braze, which orchestrates marketing messages for consumer brands, is the one name with no catalyst — it last reported on 27 May, grew 30.2% but remains GAAP-unprofitable at a -13.0% operating margin, and its 5.13x-to-5.71x multiple expansion is rotation alone.

The setup

Where it stands — Usage-priced Twilio and Zeta beat and raised; seat-priced HubSpot and Pegasystems cut; Salesforce accelerated without re-rating.

Would confirm — Twilio's Q3 organic growth printing above its own 11-12% guide, and Salesforce cRPO growth holding at or above 14%.

Would invalidate — HubSpot restoring 7,000 quarterly customer adds, or Pegasystems annual contract value growth returning to double digits.

Watch next — Salesforce reports fiscal Q2 in early September; Braze reports fiscal Q2 in late September.

Valuation — Salesforce 22.2x trailing, 13.6x forward earnings; Twilio 32.1x trailing, 42.2x forward; HubSpot 3.75x gross profit, cohort-low.