SAP: EU Tax Break and Antitrust Relief Offset by Chip Price Hikes and Cloud Slowdown
Published on 06/25/2026 at 05:15 | Redaktion boerse-global.de
The software giant’s stock is caught in a tug-of-war between a pair of promising regulatory developments and an operating environment that keeps getting tougher. At €134.76, the shares are barely above their 52-week low of €130.82, having shed nearly half their value since last July’s record high of €266. The year-to-date decline stands at 33%, and the stock languishes 27% below its 200-day moving average of €184.26. Yet analysts see a path to a 60% rebound.
Brussels is handing SAP two potential lifelines. On Wednesday, the European Commission proposed a sweeping corporate tax simplification plan that would save cross-border groups some €8 billion a year, with €3.3 billion coming from reduced administrative burdens alone. The measures include a withholding tax exemption on cross-border payments and lighter reporting duties. Separately, an EU antitrust investigation into SAP’s maintenance and support practices — which threatened a fine of up to 10% of the company’s €34.2 billion in 2024 revenue — appears close to resolution. The Commission is reviewing concessions that offer customers more freedom in choosing service providers and greater licensing flexibility. SAP does not expect any material financial hit, and if no client objections arise, the probe will end without a penalty.
Those tailwinds are being outweighed by immediate headwinds. TSMC this week hiked prices for advanced chip nodes from 7nm and above by 5% to 10%, a move that feeds directly into the cost of cloud infrastructure that SAP relies on. The tech-fear index VXN has climbed, and US technology stocks came under pressure ahead of Micron’s quarterly results, souring sentiment for European heavyweights. Meanwhile, SAP’s own cloud momentum shows cracks. While the first quarter of 2026 saw the cloud backlog surge 20% to €21.9 billion and currency-adjusted cloud revenue jump 27%, management has warned that specific one-off effects flattered that period and that the second quarter will see slower growth.
Should investors sell immediately? Or is it worth buying SAP?
The stock’s technical picture looks stretched. The relative strength index at 37.1 signals oversold territory, but that alone does not guarantee a reversal. What does offer a floor is a hefty buyback programme: SAP is purchasing up to €2.6 billion of its own shares on the open market through July 27, part of a multi-billion-euro ongoing effort.
The disconnect between market pricing and analyst expectations is stark. Berenberg reaffirmed a buy rating on Wednesday with a €215 target, implying gains of nearly 60%. The consensus from May 2026 stands at €206.88, with seven analysts recommending purchase and only one advocating a hold. Institutional investors are betting on a recovery in the cloud growth narrative, even as the market prices in considerable risk.
All eyes now turn to July 23, when SAP reports second-quarter results. The key metric will be the cloud gross margin, which will show whether pricing pressure from higher hardware costs is squeezing profitability. A clean exit from the antitrust case and the eventual adoption of the tax reforms would remove two major overhangs, but the immediate challenge remains convincing investors that the growth story can regain altitude.
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