
Oracle, a purveyor of prophecies…err, software, shed almost 5%, continuing a retreat from its earlier, inflated valuation. One begins to suspect the oracles were simply very good at marketing. Similar establishments, such as ServiceNow and Salesforce, also experienced a downward adjustment in perceived worth. The arrival of new, shiny, artificial intelligences from Amazon.com—those little clockwork minds—seems to have unsettled the sector. Even Microsoft, a company that once cornered the market on digital scrolls, lost a bit of its lustre, dipping almost 3%. It appears even the most established empires can be caught unawares by a clever new innovation…or a particularly persuasive sales goblin.