Oracle Shares Drop 5.8% on 134.33% Trading Volume Spike Ranking 18th in Market Activity

Oracle shares fell 5.8% on August 19, with a trading volume of $3.91 billion—a 134.33% increase from the previous day—ranking 18th in market activity. The decline marked a pullback for the stock, which had surged nearly 50% in June and July amid optimism around its AI-driven cloud infrastructure growth.

The selloff followed reports of job cuts in Oracle’s cloud infrastructure division and the departure of longtime Chief Security Officer Mary Ann Davidson as part of a corporate restructuring. Analysts highlighted uncertainty about the sustainability of AI-fueled stock rallies, with concerns mounting over slowing progress in the field. Despite these challenges, Oracle’s cloud infrastructure remains a key growth focus, bolstered by a recent partnership to develop 4.5 gigawatts of data center capacity for OpenAI.

Investor sentiment will pivot on Oracle’s fiscal Q1 earnings report in September, which will test its ambitious revenue growth targets. CEO Safra Catz has projected cloud infrastructure revenue growth exceeding 70% in fiscal 2026, up from 50% in 2025. Mizuho analyst Siti Panigrahi raised Oracle’s price target to $300, citing its “differentiated” cloud architecture and potential for a re-rating following an analyst day in October.

The strategy of buying the top 500 stocks by daily trading volume and holding them for one day from 2022 to 2025 generated a 1.98% average 1-day return and a 7.61% total annual return. However, the approach delivered modest risk-adjusted returns, with a Sharpe ratio of 0.71 over the period.