Why did the anthropic announcement make IBM’s shares drop?
Recently, the world of technology and stock exchanges was shocked by a big shock. IBM’s market value evaporated about $30 billion to $40 billion in one day. The trigger was not because of bad financial reports, but a blog upload from an AI company called Anthropic.
What exactly happened and why is this so influential? Here’s the summary.
1. What is COBOL and Why is it Important?
To understand this problem, we must know COBOL. This is an “old school” programming language that has been around for decades. Although ancient, Cobol is the backbone of the world financial system.
Almost all major banks, government agencies, airlines, and ATM systems around the world are still running above the COBOL code on the mainframe machine (giant computer). So far, IBM is the market ruler who helps maintain and modernize the ancient system.
2. Anthropic claims that shake the market
Anthropic announced that their AI, Claude, now has the incredible ability to read, understand, and rewrite the very complicated COBOL code.
For decades, modernizing COBOL is a job that:
Very expensive: requires fewer specialists.
Very long: migration projects usually take years.
High risk: a little wrong, the banking system can be paralyzed.
Anthropic claims that Claude can change the work that used to take years to just a matter of months.
3. Why did IBM shares fall 13%?
Investors see anthropic claims as a direct threat to IBM’s “rice plate”. If large companies can use AI to take care of their own COBOL code cheaply and quickly, they may no longer need expensive consulting services from IBM.
The fear of the loss of IBM’s dominance in managing the old infrastructure (legacy systems) is what triggers mass stocks to drop their share prices drastically.
4. Response from IBM
IBM did not remain silent. They argue that modernizing corporate systems is not as easy as turning the palm of the hand or simply translating a programming language code.
According to IBM, there are layers of security, physical infrastructure, and deep integration that still require their human expertise and systems. Translating code is just one small part of a very large ecosystem.
Conclusion
This event shows how strong the influence of AI is in driving the global economy today. A new technology announcement can now erase the value of the giant company in just a matter of hours. The battle between the sophistication of AI and the stability of the old system has just begun.
