Key Takeaways
- Benchmark raised Snowflake’s price target from $190 to $200 (Buy rating) ahead of earnings, citing expected product‑revenue and operating‑income beats.
- RBC Capital lowered its target from $245 to $220 (Outperform) while maintaining a positive view, noting a “tricky but favorable” outlook for Q1.
- Both firms highlight Snowflake Intelligence, Cortex Code, and Observe as drivers of AI adoption across >9,000 accounts.
- Cloud consumption and generative‑AI workloads are projected to boost usage of Snowflake’s AI Data Cloud.
- RBC points to strong channel checks and growing Cortex Code adoption as factors that could deliver solid Q1 results with flat‑to‑slightly‑accelerating product revenue.
- Snowflake positions itself as an AI‑enabled cloud data platform that lets enterprises build, share, and run data, applications, and AI workloads.
- The article cautions that, while Snowflake shows promise, other AI stocks may offer higher upside with lower risk, and points readers to additional research on short‑term AI opportunities.
Snowflake Inc. (NYSE:SNOW) continues to attract analyst attention as it prepares to report its first‑quarter results. On May 19, Benchmark lifted its price target on the stock from $190 to $200 while retaining a Buy rating. The upgrade is grounded in the firm’s expectation that Snowflake will surpass market forecasts for both product revenue and operating income. Benchmark’s analysts point to the momentum generated by Snowflake’s newer AI‑focused offerings—Snowflake Intelligence, Cortex Code, and Observe—as key catalysts. These tools are reportedly helping the company expand AI adoption across more than 9,000 customer accounts, a figure that underscores the breadth of its enterprise reach. Moreover, Benchmark anticipates that rising cloud consumption and the explosion of generative‑AI workloads will further drive utilization of Snowflake’s AI Data Cloud, reinforcing the revenue upside implied by the higher target.
Just a few days earlier, on May 15, RBC Capital took a more cautious stance, trimming its price target from $245 to $220 while maintaining an Outperform rating. The adjustment was part of a broader research note previewing Q1 results for a range of software companies. RBC characterized Snowflake’s near‑term outlook as “tricky but favorable,” acknowledging macro‑economic headwinds that could pressure growth but also highlighting several supportive factors. The firm cited strong channel checks and an accelerating uptake of Cortex Code—Snowflake’s code‑assistant and data‑engineering tool—as reasons to believe the company could deliver solid first‑quarter performance. Specifically, RBC expects product revenue to show either no deceleration or a modest acceleration, a scenario that would help offset any potential slowdown in other segments.
Snowflake’s core proposition remains its AI Data Cloud, a cloud‑native platform that enables organizations to ingest, store, process, and share data while simultaneously building and deploying applications and AI models. By separating compute and storage, the architecture allows users to scale workloads independently, a feature that has proven attractive to enterprises looking to elastically handle varying data volumes and AI experiment cycles. The platform’s recent emphasis on AI—through Snowflake Intelligence (a natural‑language interface for data querying), Cortex Code (which assists developers in writing SQL, Python, and Scala code within the Snowflake environment), and Observe (a monitoring and observability suite)—aims to lower the barrier for enterprises to integrate AI into their data pipelines. The combined effect, according to analysts, is a widening addressable market as more companies shift workloads to the cloud and seek to harness generative AI for analytics, automation, and product development.
While the article acknowledges Snowflake’s growth prospects, it also tempers enthusiasm by noting that other AI‑focused equities may present greater upside potential with comparatively less downside risk. The author directs readers interested in uncovering an “extremely undervalued AI stock” that could benefit from Trump‑era tariffs and the broader onshoring trend to a separate free report. This caveat serves as a reminder that, despite Snowflake’s solid fundamentals and favorable analyst sentiment, the AI sector remains highly competitive and valuation‑sensitive.
In summary, Snowflake is currently navigating a mixed analyst landscape: Benchmark’s upward revision reflects confidence in near‑term earnings beats powered by AI product adoption, while RBC’s downward tweak signals caution about macro uncertainties but still sees enough underlying strength to keep a positive rating. The company’s AI Data Cloud, bolstered by tools like Snowflake Intelligence, Cortex Code, and Observe, is positioned to capture expanding cloud and generative‑AI demand across its large enterprise base. Investors should weigh these divergent views alongside broader market conditions and the relative attractiveness of alternative AI opportunities when assessing Snowflake’s investment thesis.