FILE PHOTO: The company logo for Snowflake Inc. is displayed on a banner to celebrate the company's IPO at the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) in New York, U.S., September 16, 2020. REUTERS/Brendan McDermid/File photo
(Reuters) -Snowflake's shares surged more than 28% on Thursday after the data analytics provider raised its annual product revenue forecast, signaling growing demand for cloud-based data storage and analytics.
The company, whose shares have fallen 35% this year, is on track for its best day since going public in 2020.
Its value is set to increase by over $12 billion to a market cap of $43.3 billion if gains hold.
The Bozeman, Montana-based company's results come months after Sridhar Ramaswamy took over as CEO, having previously spearheaded Snowflake’s AI strategy as SVP of AI, and analysts have been since watching how the firm's AI efforts are progressing under the new leadership.
Snowflake announced a partnership with Anthropic on Wednesday, which will allow its customers to enhance their AI applications using Anthropic's large language models on Snowflake's cloud-based data platforms.
The multi-year deal will also allow Snowflake's AI agents to analyze data and generate visualizations, among other functions, the company said.
The company expects product revenue of $3.43 billion for 2025, compared with its previous forecast of $3.36 billion.
"It does not sound like the macro is getting dramatically better, but the better sales execution and new product momentum are helping Snowflake to deliver these results," Barclays analysts wrote in a note.
At least 20 analysts hiked PT for the stock, while at least three upgraded their ratings on the stock. The median view stood at $185, representing an upside of 43.3%.
The company's shares were trading 147.32 times their 12-month forward profit expectations, compared with 67.01 for Datadog and MongoDB's 91.04.
(Reporting by Priyanka.G and Akash Sriram in Bengaluru; Editing by Tasim Zahid)
