(Reuters) - Shares of C3.ai Inc, BigBear.ai and SoundHound AI extended a rally on Monday as artificial intelligence becomes a new buzzword on Wall Street with the viral success of ChatGPT chatbot, attracting interest from retail punters.
Software firm C3.ai rose 11%, analytics firm BigBear.ai jumped nearly 21% and conversation artificial intelligence company SoundHound surged 40%.
Tickers for the three small-cap companies were among those that were being bandied about on the investor-focused social media platform, stocktwits.com.
"Any company that mentions ChatGPT or something about AI, sees this rally ... it's just the hot buzzword of the month," said Dennis Dick, a trader at Triple D Trading.
The success of OpenAI's ChatGPT, which drew multi-billion dollar investment from Microsoft Corp (NASDAQ:MSFT), has left investors scouring for companies that develop AI-related technologies.
ChatGPT is estimated to have reached 100 million monthly active users in January, just two months after launch, making it the fastest-growing consumer application in history, according to a UBS study last week.
C3.ai and SoundHound have more than doubled in value this year while BigBear.ai has surged more than 700%.
The surge in prices was due to long buying as investors moved into AI stocks as opposed to any significant short covering, said Matthew Unterman, director at analytics platform S3 Partners in New York.