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Technology & Semiconductor Equity Commentary
UiPath is a low-quality stock growing barely 10%, and no such stock deserves a re-rating. A thesis that relies on a re-rate admits the fundamentals can't justify a big jump and hopes investors will simply pay more for more of the same. The promised re-rating still has not shown up. x.comÂ
UiPath looks expensive against its cash earnings at $16.01. It trades at 57x cash earnings and 50x next year's, versus the roughly 30x software companies usually get. Fair value is $9.34 to $11.89, about 30x next year's cash earnings give or take 12%, so the stock sits 35% above the high end. This is a levels-only read off reported earnings and revenue estimates, not fundamental work. x.comÂ
UiPath's late-July selloff to about $10.20 came from tech-wide risk sentiment and weakness at peers Pega and IBM, not company news, leaving it at about 15x forward earnings. UiPath has moved from legacy RPA to agentic automation, opening a new growth market, and now delivers full-year GAAP profitability, double-digit revenue growth, gross margins above 80% and positive free cash flow. The $10 level is key support, and sizable short interest could fuel sharp rallies on any positive catalyst. … Show more
UiPath shares are unlikely to go up because a 34% short float, especially heavy for a stock priced around $12, will hold the price down. Holders should move on. x.comÂ
Holding ServiceNow into earnings looks unwise after OpenAI released an agentic automation tool meant to replace UiPath and ServiceNow, sending UiPath down 13%. x.comÂ
UiPath offers good risk/reward because its investor day confirmed the narrative of rising AI demand, higher retention and growing opportunity, even without the acceleration the market wanted. That lack of acceleration was already known after earnings. The stock's continued weakness reflects healthy market mechanics rather than a broken thesis, and the aim is to buy the best risk/reward, not the best stocks. x.comÂ
UiPath may carry the highest business-model risk of any SaaS company because LLM agents with computer use compete directly with its robotic process automation. Rivals include Anthropic and OpenAI themselves. Its base is sticky for now, with 97% gross retention, regulated large-enterprise customers and long contracts, giving it time to sell AI tools. Still, it would be very surprising if gross retention stays in the high 90s, and the 2x EV/ARR multiple reflects the threat. x.comÂ
UiPath is one to avoid until Maestro drives a growth inflection, which has not happened yet. x.comÂ
UiPath looks close to a bottom after building a large three-year base, undercutting support and reclaiming it, with bullish divergence on both 5- and 14-period RSI. Last month it partnered with Databricks to connect enterprise data directly into its agentic automation workflows, and it also has a robotics angle. x.com x.comÂ
C3.ai has turned out to be a scam for its shareholders, judging by how its stock-based compensation as a share of revenue has fared over the years against SaaS peers Snowflake, Palantir, GitLab and UiPath. x.comÂ