International Business Machines Corp. (IBM): First Take: Ticks down 2026 guidance on mainframe pushouts post 2Q pre-announcement

Research evidence excerpt

International Business Machines Corp. (IBM): First Take: Ticks down 2026 guidance on mainframe pushouts post 2Q pre-announcement

Equity Research

22 July 2026 | 4:22PM EDT

International Business Machines Corp. (IBM): First Take: Ticks down

2026 guidance on mainframe pushouts post 2Q pre-announcement

Key stock takeaways: We expect the stock to trade modestly higher following IBM’s James Schneider, Ph.D.

+1(212)357-2929 |

lowered 2026 guidance, which is the incremental disclosure post the company’s jim.schneider@gs.com

Goldman Sachs & Co. LLC

negative pre-announcement on July 14. We believe the modestly reduced outlook

Luya You

reflects client demand re-prioritization toward server and hardware purchases (and +1(212)902-5297 | luya.you@gs.com

away from mainframe) amid rising memory and component prices - and this is having Goldman Sachs & Co. LLC

Anmol Makkaran outsized impact on Software given the attach of Transaction Processing term +1(212)357-1366 |

licenses to mainframe. However, we believe investor expectations were for a larger anmol.makkar@gs.comGoldman Sachs & Co. LLC

cut to the company’s revenue outlook. We think management commentary on Khalil Fenina

updated expectations for the timing of delayed mainframe purchases, software +1(212)357-6392 | khalil.fenina@gs.com

performance for the remainder of 2026, remediation efforts for weaker Data & Goldman Sachs & Co. LLC

Automation sales, and color on Consulting demand will be impactful for the stock.

2Q revenue results are below the Street, in line with negative pre-announcement

on July 14: In line with its negative pre-announcement on July 14, IBM reported

2Q26 revenue of $17.2 bn. Total revenue from continuing operations was up 1% in

nominal terms. Software revenue growth of 5% was well below the Street at 11%,