On the day SpaceX prices the largest stock-market debut in history, the market underneath it has a case of nerves. The cause is not rockets. It is AI.
Several warning lights are flashing at once. Together they amount to the first serious test of a trade that has carried global markets for two years.
The clearest signal is in software. Wall Street has spent 2026 living through what traders at Jefferies dubbed the ‘SaaSpocalypse’, a rolling selloff that, by some tallies, has erased as much as $2tn from the S&P software index since its late-2025 peak.
The fear is specific. If AI agents can do the work of a team of sales reps, a company needs far fewer software seats, and the per-seat licensing model that built modern software starts to wobble.
The private-equity giant Apollo has turned that fear into policy. It now screens software deals for AI-displacement risk, holds zero private-equity software exposure, and keeps software below 2 per cent of its assets.
