Oracle clawed back some of this year’s losses tied to fears of AI disruption, posting its best day since last September.On Monday, the cloud company’s shares jumped 12.7% to $155.62 after Oracle pitched AI tools for utilities at its Customer Edge Summit in Austin, a corner of the AI market where the promised payoff is easier to measure.Oracle’s Utilities Opower platform helped residential utility customers save $369 million in 2025, the company said in materials released Monday. On its website, the cloud-services giant says the product has delivered 3 billion personalized communications, 100 million high-bill alerts and 41 terawatt-hours of energy savings from 2009 through May 2025.But more than just AI, Oracle was pitching utility plumbing.Oracle said the new tools are designed to help utilities handle routine problems more efficiently, from billing issues to grid disruptions. The pitch was straightforward and aimed at companies looking for practical fixes.Power-hungry AIThis comes at a time when utilities are being squeezed from both directions – customers still care about affordability, while the AI boom is driving a new scramble for electricity.U.S. power consumption hit a record in 2025, and the Energy Information Administration expects fresh records in 2026 and 2027.Data centers could consume 9% to 17% of U.S. electricity generation by 2030, according to an EPRI analysis published in February.In that context, software that promises better management of infrastructure and logistics starts to look less like a niche product and more like part of the industry’s survival kit.Being part of SaaSFor Oracle, the bounce also came with some baggage.Even after Monday’s rally, the shares were still down about 21% this year and roughly 54% below their September 2025 closing high.In February, the company said it expected to raise $45 billion to $50 billion in 2026 through a mix of debt and equity to build more cloud capacity.Oracle also got a lift from improving investor sentiment Monday, as the broader market saw hope in a future peace deal between Iran and the U.S.Software stocks went into selloff mode this year after shockwaves from the Citrini report sparked concerns that AI could render some SaaS business models obsolete.In recent months, though, tech executives have called those fears “overblown.”Related: Oracle stock dividend under threat amid massive AI push