Tech CEOs respond to stocks being shellacked this week

Yahoo Finance Live anchors discuss how tech stocks are trading.

Video transcript

BRIAN SOZZI: All right, let's stay on these tech stocks here.

JULIE HYMAN: Well.

BRIAN SOZZI: Tech stocks are looking optimistic in the premarket, even as the route this week has wreaked havoc on shares of big caps like Apple, Google, and Amazon. We got perspective on the current state of the tech sector from two top CEOs in the industry, Airbnb's Brian Chesky and Sonos CEO Patrick Spence. Here's what they had to say.

BRIAN CHESKY: I think that, obviously, this is like a correction that I haven't probably seen since I came into Silicon Valley in 2008. And maybe it's more profound than the changes that we've seen in 2008. I started Airbnb with my friends, and we really got going, like, in 2008. 2009, we joined Y Combinator. The economy was so bad that I remember Paul Graham saying there might be no investors at Demo Day. And what I tell people is, this might be the end of a moment, but there's always the next moment.

PATRICK SPENCE: I do think it feels more to me like 2000 and the dot com bust where it quickly went from growth at all costs to those companies that were building real businesses, right, and had profitable growth. And so that, to me, has been my general sense of it.

BRIAN SOZZI: Well, either way you slice it, whether the bubble is burst or is this some just large correction, as Wedbush Dan Ives shot me over here this morning, I mean, all these stocks have been obliterated. All the FAANG stocks, Microsoft has been hit. Salesforce have been hit. And you have to wonder, when do buyers start to step into here, into companies? When you look at a Salesforce, you look at a Microsoft, you even look at an Apple that are generating massive sums of cash, they're out there buying back their stock. In most cases, they're paying dividends. Maybe this is some short-- type of short-term bottom. Unclear, but again, all these stocks have been eviscerated.

BRAD SMITH: I mean, I think we could see that today. You look at some of the pre-market activity that we're seeing in volume. What are the biggest movers, at least, in their volumes that we're seeing right now? Intel, Tesla, Apple, AMD, all of this coming into the bell. And so we'll see if the trading session actually continues to watch those names move higher and if there is some buying activity, even though there's a sell in May, go away. We might see some buying.

BRIAN SOZZI: Julie, you like making predictions. Is this the bottom? This is the bottom in tech, right?

JULIE HYMAN: You know I don't like--

BRIAN SOZZI: I'm going two for two here. I'm trying to get there.

JULIE HYMAN: I've been looking back, right? I've been looking at the last six days since the close last Wednesday, what we have been seeing. So the NASDAQ 100 is down some 13%. In that period of time, Zscaler the worst performer in that period, it's down 34%. Crowdstrike is down. Illumina, Okta down 27%. Airbnb down 26% in that period of time. So really, we have seen the selling accelerate over the past week or so, I guess, is my point.

And our Jared Blikre, who is not just a wizard with charts-- he's also a wizard with Excel and with spreadsheets-- he shared with me that 75% of the NASDAQ 100 is in a bear market, has fallen at least 20% from its highs. That figure for the S&P 500 is 60%. Like, just incredible, the number of stocks that have seen these huge drops. You would think, yes. I don't know if today is, like, the turning point.

BRAD SMITH: Sure.

JULIE HYMAN: It's a buying-- we're seeing buying out there. Who knows what's going to happen next week?

BRAD SMITH: There's a popular meme that's out there that's been circulating throughout all of the dips that we've watched, where it's like the dip, and then you've got somebody behind someone else. And they're saying the dip of the dip, and then the dippity, dip, dip. And I mean, at this point, it's, where and who has not bought in on prior dips? You know, what more is there to be spent by some investors, but institutions who they're going to continue to see some cash get put to work here, we'll see if there is some leeway into--

JULIE HYMAN: Follow through.

BRAD SMITH: Follow through in the market here today, yeah.

BRIAN SOZZI: Those guys have great hair. Spence and Chesky, you see those guys? Wow, I'm totally jealous. I wish I had their hair, like, and their money, let's just be honest.