Salesforce, Inc. (CRM) – Agentforce and Sales Cloud to Drive CRM Growth Beyond 12%, Says BofA

We recently published a list of 10 AI Stocks Surging on News and Ratings. In this article, we are going to take a look at where Salesforce, Inc. (NYSE:CRM) stands against other AI stocks surging on news and ratings.

According to Daniel Ives, global head of technology research at Wedbush Securities, the US- China agreement is once again creating a bull market environment for tech.

“If you are a tech investor, this is a dream scenario,” Ives noted on CNBC’s “Worldwide Exchange.”

On Monday, the U.S. and China announced that they would temporarily reduce tariffs on each other for 90 days. Following the news, Wall Street’s three major indexes surged sharply on the same day, with the S&P 500 marking its highest level since early March.

READ ALSO: 10 AI Stocks in Focus Amid U.S.–China Tariff Pause and 10 AI Stocks Making Moves This Week

The U.S. said it will cut tariffs imposed on Chinese imports to 30% from 145% while China said it would cut duties on U.S. imports to 10% from 125%. Investors saw this as a big positive surprise.

“It’s a relief rally because there was a lot of anxiety and angst about tariffs between the U.S. and China. They are going to scale it down to much more reasonable levels so the fall-out from tariffs will probably be more manageable and limited.”

-John Praveen, managing director at Paleo Leon in Princeton, New Jersey.

“No one had these low China tariff rates on their bingo cards. This is a big positive surprise. Risk remains that tariffs go back up from current levels as the pauses end, though taking worst-case scenarios off the table is reassuring.”

-Jeff Buchbinder at LPL Financial.

Unfortunately, the rally in US stock futures paused as investors focused on a key inflation report and lingering economic concerns.

“The challenges are not over. The de-escalation was a lot stronger than even the best hopes, but you have to remember that the US economy still faces average of effective tariffs of more than 13%.”

-Frederique Carrier, investment strategy head at RBC Wealth Management.

For this article, we selected AI stocks by going through news articles, stock analysis, and press releases. These stocks are also popular among hedge funds. The hedge fund data is as of Q4 2024.

Why are we interested in the stocks that hedge funds pile into? The reason is simple: our research has shown that we can outperform the market by imitating the top stock picks of the best hedge funds. Our quarterly newsletter’s strategy selects 14 small-cap and large-cap stocks every quarter and has returned 373.4% since May 2014, beating its benchmark by 218 percentage points  (see more details here).

Salesforce, Inc. (CRM) – Agentforce and Sales Cloud to Drive CRM Growth Beyond 12%, Says BofA

A customer service team in an office setting using the company’s Customer 360 platform to communicate with customers.

Salesforce, Inc. (NYSE:CRM)

Number of Hedge Fund Holders: 162

Salesforce, Inc. (NYSE:CRM) is a cloud-based CRM company that has gained popularity after it unveiled its AI-powered platform called Agentforce. On May 12, Bradley Sills from Bank of America Securities maintained a “Buy” rating on the stock with a price target of $350.00. Sills’ buy rating stems from the company’s steady growth in its Sales Cloud business.

He noted how Sales Cloud is an important component of Salesforce’s growth strategy, and that factors such as increased adoption of its AI-powered platform Agentforce and upselling opportunities with Revenue Cloud and Industry Cloud could boost growth from a steady 9-10% to a sustainable 12%.

Being the core of Salesforce’s CRM platform, Sales Cloud has the potential to lead the market. The company is also likely to experience significant industry growth on the back of its integrated platform, business intelligence capabilities, and AI innovations.

Overall, CRM ranks 5th on our list of AI stocks surging on news and ratings. While we acknowledge the potential of CRM as an investment, our conviction lies in the belief that some AI stocks hold greater promise for delivering higher returns and doing so within a shorter time frame. There is an AI stock that went up since the beginning of 2025, while popular AI stocks lost around 25%. If you are looking for an AI stock that is more promising than CRM but that trades at less than 5 times its earnings, check out our report about this cheapest AI stock.

READ NEXT: 20 Best AI Stocks To Buy Now and 30 Best Stocks to Buy Now According to Billionaires.

Disclosure: None. This article is originally published at Insider Monkey.