Snowflake Shares Slide Despite Strong Long-Term Outlook

Snowflake (SNOW) fell 8% in early Thursday trading following its third-quarter results and forward outlook. Despite the pullback, Wall Street sentiment remains largely positive, with the stock still up more than 70% year-to-date.

Analysts say the reaction is more tied to near-term expectations than fundamentals.

Growth Slows Slightly but Still Outperforms at Scale

Citizens analysts, led by Patrick Walravens, noted that growth decelerated modestly from 32% to 29%, but emphasized that Snowflake continues to innovate at a remarkable pace:

370+ new features added YTD across analytics, AI, data engineering, applications, and collaboration
Snowflake Intelligence, its new enterprise AI agent, already hit a $100M revenue run rate shortly after becoming widely available
Total addressable market expected to expand from $170B (2024) to $355B (2029)

Citizens maintained a Market Outperform rating with a $325 price target.

Analysts Highlight Accelerating AI Revenue and Partnerships

Canaccord Genuity analysts Kingsley Crane and Daniel Reagan pointed to Snowflake’s AI momentum as the key takeaway:

Snowflake reached the $100M AI run-rate milestone one quarter early
A new $200M Anthropic (ANTHRO) partnership adds further go-to-market strength
Only other comparable disclosure: Databricks’ >$1B AI run-rate as of September

Canaccord reiterated a Buy rating and raised its price target from $260 to $270.

Cantor also reiterated Overweight, increasing its target to $278, noting that pressure on the stock stemmed from a modest product revenue beat (~2.7%) and operating margin visibility.

Wedbush Remains Strongly Bullish: AI Is a Multi-Year Tailwind

Wedbush reaffirmed its Outperform rating and $270 price target, keeping Snowflake on its Ives AI 30 list. Analysts see Snowflake as a “key second-derivative winner” of the AI revolution, benefiting from:

Expanding AI use cases
Strong customer growth
Faster-than-expected AI workload adoption
Accelerating RPO and strengthening pipeline heading into Q4

Competitive Landscape: AI Data Cloud Rivals Remain Steady

Snowflake’s major AI and data-cloud competitors include:

Microsoft SQL Server (MSFT)
MongoDB Atlas (MDB)
Oracle Database (ORCL)
Amazon Redshift (AMZN)
Google BigQuery (GOOG, GOOGL)

Most competing stocks were flat (±1%) in early Thursday trading.
Databricks—another major competitor—is expected to pursue an IPO in 2026.