Northland downgrades Salesforce as AgentForce fails to accelerate growth

As previously reported, Northland downgraded Salesforce (CRM) to Market Perform from Outperform with a price target of $264, down from $396. The firm’s prior Outperform thesis that Agentic AI would enable App software makers to charge multiples of their current ARPU and that AgentForce positioned Salesforce to participate in the projected acceleration has failed to materialize, the analyst tells investors. One year since the firm’s prior upgrade, constant currency cRPO growth, which it calls “the key metric CRM management points investors towards,” has remained range bound between 10% and 11%, failing to accelerate to the mid-teens level the firm had projected at the point of its previous upgrade, the analyst noted.