From AI winners to casualties: the UK stocks swept up in the volatility

You may have spotted the big collapse in share prices of software and data companies in early February 2026.

This followed the release by ChatGPT rival Claude, a chatbot owned by Anthropic, of a specialised AI tool for the legal industry.

This saw many companies which were previously perceived as AI winners go into reverse; but just how much ground did they lose?

Initially, selling was limited to companies directly impacted like Relx and Thomson Reuters which provide premium subscription services to law firms to help them access case law, citations and regulatory materials.

However, it quickly dawned on investors that Claude had released a whole suite of enterprise AI agents which can operate across functions ranging from marketing, sales and even wealth management.

Companies operating outside legal services like enterprise software providers Salesforce and Sage, platforms like Autotrader and Rightmove plus data analysis companies like Experian and the London Stock Exchange were also caught up in the sell-off.  

Markets are now concerned that AI could effectively cut these businesses out of the picture.

Why did investors believe these companies would benefit from AI?

The table shows the share price performance of a select group of companies between late 2022, when ChatGPT made its debut, and the middle of 2025, when investors started to question the positive AI investment narrative.

The strong share price performances through that period show investors were willing to bet on companies which controlled unique, structured data that was hard to replicate.

Management teams explicitly framed AI as an accelerator of existing strategies which could increase productivity for professional users, provide unique insights and support the narrative of durable pricing power.

However, investors had not reckoned on the speed of AI’s progress with enhanced capabilities appearing every few weeks.  

In late 2025 Alphabet’s Gemini 3 large language model was considered the first model to successfully bridge the gap between a chatbot and a digital personal assistant.

By the time of the launch of Claude’s specialised AI applications in February 2026, investors were already questioning the strong run up in share prices of companies previously believed to be AI winners.

What has happened to share prices?

As the table shows, almost all the gains from 2022 had been lost by the end of February 2026.  

While investors are clearly more cautious than they were in 2022, some share prices remain (just) in positive territory. These include customer relationship management company Salesforce, whose shares are around 20% higher.

Other companies remaining in positive territory include the London Stock Exchange, Relx, accounting software company Sage and education group Pearson.

At the other end of the spectrum, Autotrader, Rightmove, MONY, Thomson Reuters, Intuit and Experian are all trading below where they were in October 2022.

This is in sharp contrast to companies such as AI chip designer Nvidia, whose equipment is powering the AI revolution, and flash memory chip makers including Micron Technology, which have continued to perform strongly on increased demand for the infrastructure required to back AI’s expansion.

What has happened to valuations?

Examining the key price to earnings (PE) valuation measure; for the businesses in question these have compressed significantly over the last four years. Something which is often termed a ‘derating’. This can be a function of a falling share price or of one which is failing to keep pace with an increase in earnings.

As the table shows, the average forecast PE across our group of stocks has fallen to 16 times from 26 times in 2022.

Following the fall in PE ratios, comparison website MONY sits on single digit forward PE ratio while Autotrader, Rightmove, Pearson and Salesforce are on or below a forward PE of 15 times.

Salesforce has seen the steepest fall in PE, which has dropped by 60% to 14.6. However, for context, the shares were one of the biggest gainers in the 2022 to 2025 period, gaining 63%.

Disruption from AI continues to impact companies which were previously perceived to be beneficiaries. The landscape is moving fast and companies which can adapt and incorporate AI while still offering a distinctive service or dataset which cannot be replicated by a machine should be best placed to withstand any changes.