New York/London – A strong sell-off among U.S. and European data analytics, professional services, and software companies deepened on February 3, with some investors pointing to Anthropic’s recently updated artificial intelligence (AI) chatbot as the main culprit.
AI developer Anthropic released a plugin for Claude Cowork agents on January 30th that automates tasks across legal, sales, marketing, and data analysis.
The move raised concerns about impending AI disruption of the data professional services industry, once seen as a big beneficiary of the AI era, traders and analysts said.
Thomson Reuters, which owns the Westlaw legal database, fell nearly 18%. The daily loss is the largest ever, and the stock is on pace to record its lowest closing price since June 2021.
“I think Anthropic has developed some plugins to address the legal space,” said Mike Archibald, portfolio manager at AGF Investments in Toronto.
“Obviously Thomson Reuters generates a significant portion of its revenue from that. Sometimes the market moves first and you question it later.”
Thomson Reuters, which is also the parent company of Reuters News, is scheduled to announce its fourth quarter results on February 5th. The company’s stock is now down 33% year-to-date after falling about 22% in 2025.
Britain’s Relux and the Netherlands’ Wolters Kluwer, which provide legal analysis services, fell 14% and about 13%, respectively. Relux stock is now down nearly half its February peak. 2025. The dramatic reversal highlights the pressure AI is putting on Europe’s software sector.
Other professional services firms also closed sharply lower. FactSet Research fell 10.5%, Morningstar fell 9% and LegalZoom fell 19.7%.
In London, Experian, Sage Group, London Stock Exchange Group and Pearson fell 6-12%. Traders and analysts said investor fears often outweigh company fundamentals.
“The selling pressure in software and data analytics reflects the deepening structural debate today, fueled by Anthropic’s legal automation tools against incumbents like Relx,” said Schroders analyst Jonathan McMullan.
“The speed at which AI is advancing, especially as AI tools enable companies to do more with fewer staff, makes it difficult to protect long-term reputations and threatens the traditional model of charging per software user.”
Advertising companies were also under pressure. Shares in New York-based Omnicom plunged 11.2% following the company’s results, while France’s Publicis also fell more than 9%.
Publicis, the world’s largest advertising group by market capitalization, is approximately EUR900 million (S$1.35 billion) in acquisitions in 2026, with a focus on AI-powered technology and data assets.
Other companies that rely heavily on advertising were also hurt, with Pinterest falling 5.6% and Snap closing 8.4% lower.
“Artificial intelligence is increasingly able to do exactly the same things as the programming and knowledge-based services that underpin these business models, so parts of this sector have been under pressure for some time,” said Giuseppe Cersale, a fund manager at Antilia. Reuters
