Many in the finance world had written off Atlassian as a canary in the coalmine for the tech industry amid an AI revolution, but the Australian-American software giant has left them with egg on their faces this morning.The NASDAQ-listed tech powerhouse that develops products for software development, project management and team collaboration has made headlines several times this year for the wrong reasons.Its co-founder and CEO Mike Cannon-Brookes, also known for being a climate activist and net zero champion, saw his net worth dive by $7.2 billion at the start of the year amid a brutal global tech sell-off sparked by fears AI will make his company obsolete.Investors had punished the company, largely over fears that AI makes traditional Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) companies like Atlassian obsolete.In early February, companies like Anthropic and OpenAI released “AI Agents” that can autonomously manage tasks and write code. Investors fear these agents will replace the human software developers who are Atlassian’s primary users.Atlassian also makes money based on how many “seats” (users) a company pays for. If a firm uses AI to do the work of 10 people with just 2, for example, Atlassian loses 80 per cent of its revenue from that client.Atlassian’s large corporate customers may, in the future, not need as many IT staff given AI can now do many tech workers’ roles, such as coding.The company then laid off roughly 10 per cent of its global workforce – some 1600 employees, including nearly 500 in Australia – in March. Mr Cannon-Brookes said the primary objective was to “self-fund further investment in AI and enterprise sales” while strengthening the company’s financial profile.He told investors then that he “couldn’t be more bullish” about the opportunities ahead.Atlassian stuns everyone It turns out Mr Cannon-Brookes’ optimism was well placed.This morning, the company revealed how things were going in its quarterly results shortly after the closing bell in New York, and it has taken many by surprise.The results showed the company is thriving, despite concerns about AI — sending its share price soaring by a seismic 35 per cent in extended trading on Friday morning.The massive surge completely undoes a share price slump that has seen the company’s value drop by 28.81 per cent since the start of the year.‘It’s paying off’: Cannon-Brookes’s $355m moveMr Cannon-Brookes said the strong results were proof the company’s bold moves are working.“Q4 closes out a year that proves our long-term strategy is paying off,” he said in a statement. “In the AI era, context is the edge but it’s hard to build and can’t be hired.”He also flagged he would be buying $US250 million ($355.5m) worth of shares in his own company on the open market.Atlassian posted a total fourth-quarter revenue of US$1.77 billion ($2.71 billion), up 28 per cent compared to the same period last year.Driven by strong demand, it swung back into the black with a June quarter net profit of US$139 million ($213 million) — a huge reversal from the US$24 million loss recorded a year ago.Mr Cannon-Brookes said Atlassian’s AI agent, Rovo, had grown its users by more than 50 per cent quarter-on-quarter.For the full 2026 financial year, total revenue surged 26 per cent to US$6.57 billion ($10.08 billion). Stripping out one-off costs, full-year underlying profit reached a massive $US1.53 billion ($2.35 billion), up from $US976 million in the previous financial year. The company closed out the quarter sitting on a cash reserve of $US1.24 billion. Atlassian hasn’t turned a full-year bottom-line profit since 2016, largely because it pays staff so much in company shares — a massive expense on its official books.Instead of traditional profit figures, the tech giant has always asked investors to judge its success using custom financial measures that strip out those share payments and one-off costs.However, after changing how it handles employee share packages, Atlassian has now told the market it expects to deliver an official, full-year profit this financial year.Despite the stellar finish to the financial year, Atlassian warned investors that revenue growth is set to drop by half next financial year — slowing from 26 per cent down to 13 per cent.The results come as the company is taking an exciting new step in Australia as it builds a $1.4 billion tower for its staff in Sydney.The building — dubbed Atlassian Central — is a joint project between the tech behemoth it is named after and property developer Dexus, which holds the base build construction costs. Reaching its highest structural point in a recent “topping out” milestone, the hybrid timber and steel tower now stands as the tallest timber hybrid building in the world at approximately 180 metres tall — roughly 100 metres taller than the previous record holder.Oil price shoots up as stocks tread waterAtlassian’s results came amid a choppy session on Wall Street overnight.Oil prices barrelled higher again, extending their volatile run, while global stockmarkets had a mixed day ahead of key US employment data. With traders awaiting developments surrounding the Strait of Hormuz, the main oil contracts rose, Brent crude adding nearly four per cent, while the main US contract WTI added nearly three per cent. Reports that a potential agreement bars US and Israeli vessels from entering the Strait have dampened expectations, said Again Capital’s John Kilduff. “This situation is just far from settled and you can only give hope so much of a chance, so the market is taking back some of the optimism about the situation,” Mr Kilduff said. The rebound in oil prices weighed on US equity markets, with the Dow retreating from a record close and the Nasdaq ending flat. Adding to the caution, US investors are looking ahead to Friday’s monthly government jobs report.