Meta Muse Sparks AI Agent Frenzy! US Stock Market Landscape Set for Reshaping as Winners and Losers May Emerge

Title context: Meta Muse Sparks AI Agent Frenzy! US Stock Market Landscape Set for Reshaping as Winners and Losers May Emerge Text: The US stock market is entering an era shaped by the rise of artificial intelligence (AI) agents. Meta's (META.US) Muse has now topped the App Store, surpassing ChatGPT to become the most-downloaded free app. As investors struggle to understand the implications of the AI agent frenzy, Muse's performance triggered a broad stock market rally on Mondaychipmaker stocks surged, rebounding from the sharp volatility of the prior week; the Nasdaq Composite also hit a record high and extended its gains in Tuesday trading. Since its emergence four years ago, investors have been debating how AI will transform the economy and market landscape. But as AI agents see expanding adoption, their impact is beginning to permeate businesses and industries of all kinds, and a future reshaped by more autonomous AI systems seems imminent. For ordinary people, AI agents can help with tasks ranging from booking flights and negotiating insurance rates to filing taxes. In the market, investors have only one question: Who will benefit from the coming wave of AI agent tools? Below are the areas that investment professionals are watching as potential winners and losers in this new era. Winners 1. Hyperscalers and hardware makers eToro investment and options analyst Bret Kenwell said that in an AI agent-driven world, hyperscalers and chipmakers are clear winners. Hyperscalers create these agents, while chipmakers help provide the underlying AI infrastructure. Monday's market performance reflected this trendMeta shares surged 11%, and Intel Corporation shares jumped 12%. Meta's stock gain pushed the entire "Magnificent Seven" group to new highs. Interactive Brokers senior economist Jose Torres said it is still impossible to determine which AI agent makers will become long-term winners. "I do expect that competition among agents will lead to some kind of divergence in performance among the Magnificent Seven as well as the semiconductor industry, as investors separate the winners from the losers," he said. This week, Meta's Muse AI continued climbing the App Store rankings, also shifting market attention from GPU makers like NVIDIA Corporation (NVDA.US) to CPU suppliers. Intel Corporation's stock surge on Monday was the most obvious example, while AMD (AMD.US) and Qualcomm (QCOM.US) also posted large single-day gains, rising 10% and 9%, respectively. 2. Shopify If you're looking for a specific winner directly tied to Meta's Muse AI, look to Shopify (SHOP.US). On Monday, the online shopping platform's shares rose 7%; on Tuesday, they rose another 7%. This followed an announcement by Meta and Shopify of a partnership allowing the Muse AI agent to browse stores on the e-commerce site and complete purchases on behalf of consumers through the Shop Pay service. More broadly, e-commerce platforms could be winners in the agent era, because AI agents can reduce friction in the consumer shopping process and potentially drive sales growth. Last year, Walmart Inc. (WMT.US) announced a partnership with OpenAI to integrate agentic shopping features into its platform, pushing the company's stock to a record high. In January, Walmart Inc. reached a similar agreement with Alphabet Inc. Class C (GOOGL.US) Gemini AI, underscoring that retailers are increasingly focused on using AI tools to drive consumers to their own websites. 3. Industrials Jose Torres said the industrials sector, which has performed strongly during the AI boom, may continue to do well as more people use AI agents. And in the process of building more AI infrastructure, raw materials such as copper and silver have been key constraints. The State Street Industrial Select Sector SPDR ETF is up 7% year to date. Over the past five years, the fund has surged 68%, driven mainly by market enthusiasm for AI. 4. Sectors with a large number of AI-vulnerable jobs Jose Torres said areas of the market that are highly vulnerable to AI-driven job displacement could also be winners if the companies involved turn to AI agents to reduce headcount and cut costs. He noted that finance, customer service, and other industries that rely heavily on large numbers of junior employees doing primarily repetitive work face higher AI replacement risk. Bret Kenwell said industries such as marketing, law, and accounting face similar risks, though he noted the negative impact will mainly be limited to companies that are not adequately prepared for the AI era. "You can generate an image with a prompt instead of having someone spend half a day revising it. Now it's customer service or call centers, handled through chat Siasun Robot&Automation and AI voice; and administrative work," he said. Losers 1. Software stocks Bret Kenwell said the software industry could take a hit as people shift to using AI agents. He noted that earlier this year, the software sector experienced severe turbulence amid market concerns that widespread AI adoption could affect demand for software-as-a-service (SaaS) companies. The iShares Expanded Tech-Software Sector ETF fell more than 30% from its peak in the first half of this year. Bret Kenwell added that the market's earlier existential concerns about the fate of SaaS companies have eased somewhat, with many hard-hit stocks rebounding and posting strong gains year to date, but new AI agents could once again shake market confidence in the sector. "It's just another headline that could disrupt the market, whether you're looking at Booking.com, Salesforce, Inc., or Adobe," he said. 2. E-commerce platforms and transaction intermediaries Piper Sandler senior analyst covering Meta, Tom Champion, said that in a world where consumers begin using AI agents, he believes e-commerce platforms and other services that act as intermediaries for online transactions could be hit. He pointed to Amazon.com, Inc.'s (AMZN.US) ban on Muse making purchases on its platform as an example. Such a measure protects the value of Amazon.com, Inc.'s business. "Suppose you own an e-commerce platform, and suddenly an AI agent can go directly onto that platform on behalf of a consumer. Well, I mean, the value of that website or platform itself would decline," Tom Champion said. Amazon.com, Inc. has been investing in in-house tools for precisely this reasonthe company wants to protect advertising revenue and keep real consumers visiting its website rather than letting AI assistants act on their behalf. As tools from other tech giants continue to rise, Amazon.com, Inc. has blocked Muse from being used on some of its websites as a countermeasure. He added that gig-economy stocks could also be affected, such as platforms like DoorDash, though in theory AI agents could buy goods directly from merchants. 3. Consumer discretionary stocks Jose Torres said the spread of AI is itself a negative factor for consumer discretionary stocks. He sees several reasons: AI-driven job losses could prompt more people to cut spending; an overall decline in employment would push down wage inflation, as more workers compete for a shrinking number of jobs. He said both trends could hit stocks that rely on consumer spending, adding that the consumer discretionary sector has been lagging this year. Data shows the consumer discretionary sector has been the worst-performing stock sector in the S&P 500, down about 5% year to date, while the broader index is up 13%.