Tuesday, 02 January 2024 12:17 GMT

Why Applied Digital Stock Is Slipping In Premarket Ahead Of Q1 Print


(MENAFN- AsiaNet News)

Shares of artificial intelligence infrastructure company Applied Digital Corp. (APLD) shed about 0.60% in Thursday's premarket session. The retreat occurred amid the broader market's indecision, as the key market indices traded in record territory, and trader anxiety concerning the quarterly results, due after the market closes.

According to Fiscal, the Dallas, Texas-based company is expected to report a loss per share of $0.13 and revenue of $45.46 million for the first quarter of the fiscal year 2026. This compares to the year-ago loss of $0.15 and revenue of $60.7 million.

Applied Digital stock is up a whopping 266% so far this year, riding on the momentum seen in AI stocks, with much of the gains coming since the start of August. In late August, the company announced that it broke ground on Polaris Forge 2, a $3 billion, 280-megawatt (MW) AI Factory near Harwood, North Dakota. At that time, CEO Wes Cummins stated that Polaris Forge 2 represented the next stage in Applied Digital's rapid growth and its position as a leader in delivering high-performance AI infrastructure. 

Shortly after, the company announced that it had finalized a new lease agreement with CoreWeave for an additional 150MW at its Polaris Forge 1 Campus, bringing its total anticipated contracted lease revenue to approximately $11 billion. This included the  $7 billion in revenue from the initial two approximately 15-year leases executed in May this year. 

Applied Digital's stock came under pressure in late September when it announced plans to sell 8.39 million shares of its common stock. Earlier this week, the company announced that it had received the initial funding from its previously disclosed perpetual preferred equity financing facility, valued at up to $5 billion, with Macquarie Asset Management.

Roth Capital analysts said in a report published in late September that they see few surprises in the company's first-quarter print, with some possible swings around the "lumpiness" of one-time technical fit-out revenue, the Fly reported. The analysts believe that the company could win another high-performance computing colocation agreement by the end of the year or into early 2026 for its 280MW Harwood site. The research firm upped its price target for the stock to $43 from $24 and maintained its 'Buy' rating.

On Stocktwits, retail sentiment toward Applied Digital tempered to 'neutral' as of early Thursday from 'bullish' the day before, with the message volume also dropping to 'normal' levels.

APLD sentiment and message volume as of 5:20 a.m. ET, Oct. 9 | source: Stocktwits

Wall Street analysts, on average, have a price target of $25.11 for the stock, according to Koyfin, implying over 10% downside from Wednesday's close.

For updates and corrections, email newsroom[at]stocktwits[dot]com.

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