Software: Is the ‘SaaS-pocalypse’ overplayed amid tech’s AI scare?

Yahoo Finance Video and Julie Hyman

Wed, February 18, 2026 at 1:30 AM GMT+9

In this video:

^IXIC

-0.23%

^DJI

+0.01%

^GSPC

-0.09%

XLK

-0.34%

As AI fears continue to rattle markets (^DJI, ^IXIC, ^GSPC) and the tech landscape, Wall Street has dubbed these concerns as the “SaaS-pocalypse.”

Citizens JMP Securities CEO Mark Lehmann shares his assessment on how he views this transitory phase for the tech ecosystem and software companies.

To watch more expert insights and analysis on the latest market action, check out more Morning Brief.

Video Transcript

00:00 Speaker A

I’m really curious to get your take on, um, what my producer wants me to call the SaaScap the cap- I can’t even say the name right. SaaSpocalypse? Is that what we’re calling it?

00:11 Mark

Uh, it’s the first I’ve heard of it, but I I I kind of like it. I I mean, like you said, uh yes, I do have a few years on Wall Street, so I’ve seen a few cycles. Um, they’re all dramatic. They all are, to use my daughter’s word, scary. Um, but they usually lead to bigger, better companies and I think that’s the same case here.

00:37 Speaker A

Okay, walk me through how that happens.

00:40 Mark

Well, we’ve had transitions over time. as I go back to the '90s, you have this transaction transition to database, uh, companies. We had companies some viewers of the show have never heard of like Sybase, Oracle and Informix. We all know what happened to Oracle. A lot fewer of us know what happened to Informix and Sybase. We had the move from on-pre off on-prem to cloud, obviously that happened 20 plus years ago. We had many transitions over time. A lot of companies did extraordinarily well and a lot of companies failed. And I don’t think this is going to be much different. There’s going to be a lot of successes here. There’s going to be some people who make some extraordinary bets, but there’s going to be some companies who cannot make the transition to what’s going on, uh, in AI. Um, and that’s why the market is so dislocated particularly in the last month.

01:28 Speaker A

Mark, what about this argument that, you know, that AI is different, right? which I know as somebody who’s been around is something you’ve heard before about different waves of technology, but that it is different in the in this in the magnitude of the dislocation, right? In that it is a replacement instead of really a dislocation on a broader scale. Do you buy that?

01:54 Mark

Well, in a lot of ways I do. I I I it it’s all the changes that we’ve had in technology is the great disruptor. Let’s call it over the last 35 years. Um, that’s true and the disruption is even greater each time because the magnitude as well as the the dislocation like we just said. Um, is it the replacement? I don’t think so. I think for some companies and for some industries it is. I mentioned a few of them a moment ago that didn’t make those transition.

02:27 Mark

I think that’s the same thing here. There will be some companies who embed this better than others. There’s be some companies who flourish because of this. And then there’s going to be some companies who are just not either needed or don’t make that transition. So, I agree with you, it is the great disruptor. It is the great transition. Is it a great replacement? I don’t think so.

Terms and Privacy Policy

Privacy Dashboard

More Info