Real Estate Services Stocks Sink in Latest ‘AI Scare Trade’

(Bloomberg) — Real estate services stocks sank on Wednesday as investors assessed the companies’ vulnerability to the newest crop of artificial intelligence applications and tools that threatens to disrupt several industries.

Shares of CBRE Group Inc. and Jones Lang LaSalle Inc. plunged 12%, and Cushman & Wakefield Ltd. dropped 14%. For CBRE and Cushman & Wakefield, the moves marked the biggest drop since 2020 in the midst of the Covid-driven market selloff.

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“We believe investors are rotating out of high-fee, labor-intensive business models viewed as potentially vulnerable to AI-driven disruption,” Keefe, Bruyette & Woods analyst Jade Rahmani wrote in a note to clients Wednesday.

Still, the analyst also notes that the selloff “may overstate the immediate risk to complex deal-making, even as the long-term AI impact remains a ‘wait-and-see’.”

The selloff delivers another jolt through a commercial real estate industry that has struggled to regain its footing since the pandemic upended office demand and higher interest rates crushed deal volumes. While the boom in AI has fueled pockets of strength — particularly in data centers and high-end office leasing — investors are weighing whether advances in AI could ultimately pressure parts of the business by automating tasks and streamlining deal processes.

Companies such as CBRE and Jones Lang LaSalle have sought to cushion the downturn by expanding into property management, valuation and investment sales across sectors ranging from hotels and warehouses to apartments and life-science labs.

On Wednesday, the group was the latest to get caught up in what Rahmani calls the “AI scare trade,” after investors rushed to dump shares of software firms, private credit companies, wealth managers and insurance brokers within the span of just over a week.

The drop in the stocks seems “excessive given limited news flow today,” Barclays’ Brendan Lynch said. The analyst noted that some of the weakness stems from fears that AI will disrupt the job market and commercial real estate demand. “These are pertinent risks, but that hasn’t changed since yesterday.”

The fears came to the fore last week after AI startup Anthropic released tools aimed at automating work tasks in areas ranging from legal services to financial research. At the same time, analysts and investors have warned that some of this steep selling reflects a knee-jerk reaction and could be overestimating some of the risk.