Oracle's Stock Bounces as Ellison Scraps Sale Plan, but Cyber and Power Risks Loom

Oracle shares gain 2.6% to EUR 126.04 on a Wall Street rebound, but the stock is down 24% this year amid AI buildout and security risks.

Oracle shares climbed 2.6% to EUR 126.04 on Friday, riding a broader Wall Street rebound triggered by a weaker-than-expected U.S. jobs report that, according to AP, eased anxiety in bond markets. The S&P 500 added 0.9% while the Nasdaq Composite advanced 1.2%. The gain offers shareholders a breather, though the stock remains down 24% since the start of the year.

No company-specific news drove Friday's move. Even so, the advance lands at a delicate juncture for the enterprise software giant, which is juggling breakneck AI infrastructure spending against the slower, less glamorous work of keeping its legacy products secure and its project timelines intact.

A Founder's Signal on Insider Selling

One development that has caught the market's attention came on September 12, when Executive Chair and CTO Larry Ellison terminated his existing Rule 10b5-1 stock sale plan outright. No shares were sold under it, and the company said the co-founder has no further intention of offloading his holdings. For investors weighing management's conviction, the move carries weight.

On the product front, Oracle said it will make a managed storage service built on NetApp ONTAP generally available for its cloud infrastructure within twelve months — an expansion that deepens its offering for enterprise customers.

The Data-Center Clock Is Ticking

What ultimately determines whether Oracle re-rates higher is whether it delivers promised AI data-center capacity on schedule. The company has set ambitious targets in cloud and AI infrastructure, but the buildout devours capital. Any lag in bringing computing power online threatens planned revenue and erodes investor confidence.

The stakes go beyond construction deadlines. If Oracle brings its announced megaprojects online on time, it strengthens its hand against established hyperscalers. Meaningful delays, by contrast, invite steep cost overruns and penalty claims that would squeeze margins in the high-margin cloud segment.

Force Majeure in New Mexico

The physical execution risk came into sharp focus on September 24, when Oracle sent a force majeure notice to a unit of Blue Owl. STACK Infrastructure, a Blue Owl subsidiary, is developing the Project Jupiter campus in New Mexico, which is slated to provide capacity for OpenAI. The notice was aimed at deferring payments should the project slip, with concerns centering on potential delays to the site's power supply.

Oracle, Blue Owl and STACK Infrastructure all stressed that they remain aligned and that financial obligations are unchanged. Management also said Project Jupiter's timeline is being met and that the formal notice does not alter delivery expectations. Even so, Reuters Breakingviews noted the episode lays bare the operational risks running through the broader data-center boom. Should power-connection delays pile up, a chain reaction could put a serious dent in planned growth in the lucrative infrastructure business.

An Old Flaw, Exploited at Scale

While the market fixates on megawatts and high-performance chips, Oracle's established software estate has drawn unwelcome attention. On September 25, Google disclosed that the hacking group ShinyHunters is once again exploiting a security vulnerability in Oracle's PeopleSoft enterprise software on a mass scale. The attackers even claimed to have reached data belonging to the FBI through the flaw, though Reuters reported the assertion could not be verified.

The incident strikes at a sensitive spot. PeopleSoft runs HR and finance processes at countless corporations and public agencies. When attack surfaces keep reopening in applications that core, customer trust takes a lasting hit. For shareholders, it is a pointed reminder that the traditional license and software business demands constant administrative vigilance — and that losing control there brings not just costly security patches but drawn-out reputational damage.

Growth Abroad, Skepticism at Home

Oracle is also pushing into overseas markets. Under a rental agreement, Tencent secured access to roughly 100,000 modern AI processors that are unavailable in China, as the Financial Times reported. The arrangement underscores the depth of demand for scarce AI hardware, yet it does little to offset pressures elsewhere.

Investors, for their part, appear more cautious than the executive suite. The stock closed Thursday at EUR 122.88, down 26% year-to-date and 55% below its 52-week high — a gap that signals the market wants hard results rather than announcements. A company planning vast data centers, supplying coveted hardware to foreign markets and simultaneously defending its legacy software against cyberattacks risks spreading itself too thin.

What to Watch Next

As long as support near current levels holds and construction stays on schedule, the valuation leaves room for a gradual recovery. But if operational confidence cracks under further power-supply delays or if build costs spiral, a fresh slide to new lows becomes a real possibility. The next fixed point for the strategic direction is Oracle's virtual annual shareholder meeting on November 18, 2026, at 9:00 a.m. Central Time, where governance matters and the long-term financing of the expansion plans are likely to take center stage.