Palantir (PLTR) Stock in December 2025: Q3 Earnings Beat, $10B Army Deal and 2025

Published: December 1, 2025

Snapshot: Where Palantir Stock Stands Today

Palantir Technologies Inc. (NASDAQ: PLTR) enters December 2025 as one of the most polarizing names in artificial intelligence and defense software.

Current price: around $168 per share
Market cap: roughly $400 billion
52‑week range:$63.40 – $207.52
12‑month gain: ~150%+
Since 2020 direct listing: up about 1,700% ^[1]

On November 3, Palantir set a new all‑time high near $207.52 after a blowout Q3 earnings report. ^[2]

Then the hangover hit: shares dropped about 16% in November, their worst month since August 2023, as investors rotated out of richly valued AI names. ^[3] Even after that pullback, the stock is still up more than 120% in 2025 and is one of the defining AI trades of the year. ^[4]

The key question now: does Palantir’s growth justify its valuation, or is PLTR being priced as the next big AI bubble?

Q3 2025: Hypergrowth With Record Margins

Palantir’s Q3 2025 results are the foundation of the current bull case.

Headline numbers

According to Palantir and multiple earnings summaries:

Revenue:$1.181 billion, up 63% year over year, and above estimates of ~$1.09 billion ^[5]
GAAP EPS: about $0.18 per share; diluted/adjusted EPS:$0.21 vs. $0.17 expected ^[6]
Adjusted operating margin: roughly 51%, a record for the company ^[7]

That combination of 60%+ top‑line growth and 50%+ adjusted margins is extremely rare for a software company at Palantir’s scale.

U.S. commercial is the “juggernaut”

The real star is U.S. commercial, driven by Palantir’s Artificial Intelligence Platform (AIP) and its “boot camp” go‑to‑market strategy:

U.S. revenue: up 77% year over year to $883 million
U.S. commercial revenue: up 121% year over year to $397 million
U.S. government revenue: up 52% to $486 million ^[8]

Palantir’s investor materials show:

U.S. commercial customer count: +65% year over year
U.S. commercial remaining deal value (RDV): +199% year over year ^[9]

Management raised full‑year 2025 guidance, calling for revenue growth around the low‑50% range and guiding Q4 revenue growth to about 61% year over year, with U.S. commercial expected to maintain triple‑digit growth. ^[10]

Bullish analysts argue this shows Palantir is transitioning from a niche defense contractor into a broad enterprise AI platform with compounding network effects. ^[11]

Big Defense Wins: $10B U.S. Army Deal and Global Expansion

Palantir’s government business remains its backbone — and 2025 brought some of its most important deals yet.

10‑year U.S. Army Enterprise Agreement

On July 31, 2025, the U.S. Army awarded Palantir a new Enterprise Agreement:

Up to $10 billion over ten years (ceiling, not guaranteed spending)
Consolidates roughly 75 separate contracts into one framework
Designed to standardize Palantir software across the Army and streamline procurement ^[12]

Defense officials described the deal as a centerpiece of a broader overhaul of U.S. Army software buying, reinforcing Palantir’s position as a core decision‑making platform for military operations. ^[13]

U.K. Ministry of Defence and space partnerships

According to 24/7 Wall St and sector research:

In September 2025, Palantir announced a U.K. defense partnership worth about £1.5 billion, extending its footprint beyond U.S. government agencies. ^[14]
Palantir has struck space‑focused AI partnerships with Voyager Space and Starlab Space, becoming the exclusive software data‑management provider for the planned Starlab commercial space station. ^[15]

Exiger and military supply chain AI

Palantir also partnered with Exiger to help the U.S. Army Materiel Command map and monitor complex supply chains, combining Palantir’s operating system with Exiger’s supply‑chain AI. ^[16]

Together, these deals position Palantir as a key vendor for Western defense and intelligence infrastructure, creating a long pipeline of potential follow‑on work — but also deepening its dependence on government budgets and geopolitics.

Commercial “Deal Frenzy”: AIP Bootcamps and 26 Partnerships

While government still drives just over half of revenue, 2025 has been the year Palantir proved it can sell AI software to mainstream industry.

A recent Benzinga analysis highlighted a “deal frenzy”:

26 partnerships across 15 sectors in 2025 alone, spanning manufacturing, healthcare, finance, energy, logistics and more. ^[17]

The company’s AIP “boot camps” — intensive workshops where customer teams build working AI workflows in days — are repeatedly cited as a major growth engine, driving rapid adoption of Palantir’s platforms. ^[18]

This broadening commercial mix is central to the long‑term bull thesis: Palantir isn’t just a defense contractor; it’s trying to be the operating system for enterprise AI.

So Why Did Palantir Just Have Its Worst Month in Two Years?

Despite strong fundamentals, November reminded investors that valuation still matters — even in AI.

AI sell‑off and bubble fears

CNBC and other outlets report that Palantir shares fell ~16% in November, their worst month since August 2023, as AI stocks broadly sold off on concerns that valuations had run too far, too fast. ^[19]

An Invezz piece described the drop as a 25% plunge from the early‑November high, framing it as a showdown over Palantir’s “AI premium” between CEO Alex Karp and prominent short‑seller Michael Burry, who has disclosed a large put position against the stock. ^[20]

At the same time, billionaire Ken Griffin’s Citadel cut its Palantir stake by roughly 32% in Q3, according to 13F tracking sites and CoinCentral, even as his firm gained hundreds of percent on the position. ^[21]

A classic “cult stock” correction?

A widely shared MarketWatch feature called Palantir “the market’s ultimate cult stock,” telling stories of retail investors who went all‑in — in some cases borrowing against their homes — and became millionaires as the stock soared over 1,600% since 2020. ^[22]

That article also highlights what makes institutional investors nervous:

Palantir trading at 170x+ forward earnings
Valuation driven heavily by retail enthusiasm and social‑media hype
Elevated expectations that leave little room for disappointment ^[23]

Sebring this with Seeking Alpha’s bear case — calling Palantir “one of the biggest AI bubbles” despite its strong fundamentals — you get a powerful narrative: elite growth story, cult stock behavior, bubble‑like multiples. ^[24]

Valuation Check: Priced for Perfection?

Using data from StockAnalysis and other aggregators as of December 1:

Share price: ~$168
Market cap: ~$401 billion
Trailing 12‑month revenue:$3.9 billion
Trailing EPS (GAAP):$0.43
Trailing P/E: ~390x
Forward P/E: roughly 180x based on 2026 EPS estimates ^[25]

That implies:

Price‑to‑sales: just over 100x trailing 12‑month revenue
Even if Palantir hits consensus EPS of $0.87 in 2026, the multiple is still extreme compared with most large‑cap software peers. ^[26]

Short interest is elevated but manageable: around 50+ million shares short, with less than one day to cover at recent volumes, suggesting shorts can exit quickly if a squeeze starts. ^[27]

In short: the market is paying up as if Palantir will remain a hypergrowth AI leader for many years. Any wobble in growth, margins, or AI sentiment could hit the stock hard.

What Wall Street Analysts Are Saying About PLTR

Consensus: “Hold” with big disagreement under the hood

Across about 20–30 covering analysts, Palantir’s average rating is “Hold”, reflecting a split between ardent bulls and valuation‑focused bears. ^[28]

Key data points:

Average 12‑month target price:
- ~$166.9 on StockAnalysis (slight downside vs. current price) ^[29]
- Around $200 on TickerNerd (implying modest upside) ^[30]
Target range: from $50 (RBC, “Underperform”) to $255 (Bank of America, “Buy”) ^[31]

Long‑Term Palantir Stock Forecast: 2025–2030

Forecasts are all over the map. Here are the main camps as of December 1, 2025:

Wall Street’s one‑year view (2026)

Median analyst target around $180–190, implying low double‑digit upside from current levels. ^[34]
Consensus expects revenue to climb from $4.25 billion in 2025 to $5.83 billion in 2026 (+37%), and EPS to rise from $0.65 to $0.87 (+33%). ^[35]

24/7 Wall St’s 2025–2030 model

24/7 Wall St runs its own multi‑year model and lands on a more cautious path: ^[36]

Internal 12‑month target (2026):$120 — about 29% downside from today
2030 price target:$192, only ~14% above the current price
Their revenue and EPS forecasts reach $8.5B revenue and $1.27 EPS by 2030, with net income just over $2B, but they assume the valuation multiple compresses meaningfully over time.

Aggressive bull scenarios

Motley Fool and other growth‑focused commentators argue Palantir could rise 50% or more by 2026 and potentially become one of the best AI stocks to own for the next decade, citing: ^[37]

Mission‑critical role of its platforms in government and critical infrastructure
Rapid adoption of AIP across industries
High switching costs due to Palantir’s ontology‑based data integration
Massive AI TAM, with some industry estimates projecting $5+ trillion in AI spending by 2035

Under these rosy scenarios, Palantir’s current valuation is seen as the price of owning a category‑defining AI utility early.

Macro Tailwind: The AI Super‑Cycle

The broader AI investment boom is central to Palantir’s story.

Industry forecasts cited by Nasdaq suggest the AI market could grow from ~$270 billion in 2025 to over $5 trillion by 2035, a nearly 20‑fold increase. ^[38]

Wall Street strategists such as those at JPMorgan and others see AI as a major driver of corporate capex and earnings growth through 2026 and beyond — which helps explain why software names like Palantir command premium multiples. ^[39]

However, recent moves by investors like Michael Burry and even Palantir co‑founder Peter Thiel’s fund trimming AI exposure (in Nvidia’s case) have fueled fears of a nascent AI bubble, increasing volatility around high‑flyers such as PLTR. ^[40]

Key Upside Drivers Investors Are Watching

For investors bullish on Palantir stock, the thesis generally rests on a few core pillars:

Sustained 30–40%+ revenue growth
Analyst models currently project high‑30s revenue growth into 2026, with Palantir’s own guidance and Q3 results suggesting momentum is still accelerating. ^[41]
Dominance in defense and national security software
The Army’s up‑to‑$10B deal, U.K. defense partnership, and various U.S. federal contracts reinforce Palantir as a default choice for sensitive, mission‑critical data operations. ^[42]
AIP bootcamps and enterprise AI expansion
AIP lets customers build working AI applications in days, not months, and has already produced dozens of cross‑industry deals in 2025. ^[43]
High margins and free‑cash‑flow generation
With adjusted operating margins already above 50% and scale benefits kicking in, Palantir has room to grow profitability even as it invests in R&D and sales. ^[44]
Option value from new platforms and sectors
Space partnerships, healthcare, energy transition, financial services and other sectors could add multi‑billion‑dollar adjacencies over time if Palantir becomes the standard AI operating layer. ^[45]

Major Risks and Bear Arguments

On the other hand, the bear case is not just noise — and November’s drawdown was a reminder of those risks.

Extreme valuation
Even supportive analysts acknowledge that 100x+ sales and ~180x forward earnings leave Palantir with very little margin for error. ^[46]
AI bubble and sentiment risk
If the broader AI trade cools, capital could rotate quickly out of expensive software names; Palantir’s recent 16–25% pullback on no negative company‑specific news is a preview. ^[47]
Customer concentration and government scrutiny
Heavy reliance on U.S. and allied governments creates exposure to defense budgets, politics and regulatory scrutiny, especially around privacy and civil liberties in large‑scale data programs. ^[48]
Competition from hyperscalers and other AI platforms
Cloud giants (Microsoft, Amazon, Google) and specialized AI platforms are rapidly building their own data+AI stacks, potentially compressing Palantir’s pricing power or forcing it into more niche roles. ^[49]
Heavy retail ownership and “cult stock” dynamics
Palantir’s passionate retail base can be a double‑edged sword, amplifying both rallies and drawdowns. MarketWatch’s “ultimate cult stock” profile underscores just how emotionally charged this name has become. ^[50]
High‑profile skeptics and hedge‑fund selling
Short positions from Michael Burry, stake reductions from Ken Griffin’s Citadel, and cautious institutional commentary all add to headline risk if sentiment turns. ^[51]

Is Palantir Stock a Buy Right Now?

For Google News and Discover readers scanning headlines, it’s tempting to look for a simple answer. But Palantir is a textbook case where the right answer depends heavily on risk tolerance, time horizon and diversification.

What the current data suggests:

Fundamentals: among the strongest in large‑cap software — 60%+ growth, expanding margins, and long‑dated defense and commercial contracts. ^[52]
Story: a rare combination of defense contractor, AI platform and cult retail favorite — with a very real chance to stay at the center of the AI boom for years. ^[53]
Valuation & risk: priced for perfection, with multiple credible narratives (bubble, AI super‑cycle, or something in between) competing in real time. ^[54]

If you follow the stock, the key things to watch into 2026 will be:

Whether revenue growth stays above ~40% as the base gets larger
How quickly commercial revenue approaches or surpasses government revenue
The pace of new contracts (especially outside the U.S.) and AIP deployments
Any signs of multiple compression as AI hype normalizes

Final Word (and Important Disclaimer)

Palantir’s 2025 story is clear:

Fundamentals and contracts say “maturing AI powerhouse.”
Valuation and volatility say “handle with care.”

This article is for informational and educational purposes only and is not financial advice or a recommendation to buy or sell any security. Always do your own research and consider speaking with a qualified financial professional before making investment decisions.

References

Palantir (PLTR) Stock in December 2025: Q3 Earnings Beat, $10B Army Deal and 2025–2030 Forecast