Rigetti Computing, Inc. (NASDAQ: RGTI) has become one of 2025’s most volatile – and closely watched – quantum computing stocks. After plunging about 42% in November on weak revenue and governance worries, the share price abruptly rebounded in early December, jumping more than 15% on December 4 alone. [1]
As of the morning of December 5, 2025, Rigetti trades around $30.06 per share, up roughly 17–18% over the last week and an extraordinary ~867% over the past year. The company’s market capitalization is just under $10 billion, despite trailing‑12‑month revenue of only about $7.5 million and negative EBITDA near $73 million, underscoring how much of the valuation rests on future expectations rather than current earnings. [2]
Below is a structured rundown of the latest news, forecasts and analyses on Rigetti stock as of December 5, 2025, suitable for readers tracking the name via Google News or Discover.
Key takeaways
- Price & performance: RGTI trades near $30 with a market cap close to $9.9 billion, up more than 800% from its 52‑week low but still nearly 50% below its high around $58. [3]
- Recent volatility: Shares dropped ~42% in November on an 18% revenue decline and a headline GAAP loss of $201 million in Q3 2025, then bounced 15%+ on December 4 amid renewed interest in quantum stocks. [4]
- Balance sheet: Despite weak revenue, Rigetti ended Q3 with roughly $559 million in cash and securities, later boosted to around $600 million after warrant exercises, giving it substantial runway for R&D. [5]
- Governance concerns: CEO Subodh Kulkarni currently holds zero shares after exercising and selling 1 million shares in May 2025, and insiders have sold nearly 406,000 shares over the last 90 days, raising questions about alignment with outside shareholders. [6]
- Wall Street view: Aggregators show a consensus “Buy”/“Moderate Buy” rating, with an average price target in the mid‑$20s and a Street‑high target of $51 from Needham, implying triple‑digit upside from recent levels – but some analysts have downgraded the stock on valuation and execution risk. [7]
- Technical & sentiment: Third‑party models see RGTI trading in a $21–27 band on average in 2025, with mixed short‑term technical signals and a short‑sale ratio above 25%, reflecting a tug‑of‑war between bullish momentum traders and skeptics. [8]
Rigetti stock today: price snapshot and trading context
According to multiple market data providers, Rigetti Computing shares: [9]
- Trade around $30.06 on December 5, 2025.
- Sit roughly 808% above the 52‑week low of $3.31 but about 48% below the 52‑week high near $58.15.
- Have delivered a ~866% one‑year return, vastly outperforming broader indices.
- Are associated with a market cap around $9.9 billion and about 330 million shares outstanding.
- Reflect trailing‑12‑month revenue of ~$7.5 million and EBITDA of about –$73 million, meaning the stock trades at a very high multiple of sales and remains loss‑making.
These numbers frame Rigetti firmly as a high‑growth, high‑risk quantum computing pure play, where investors are paying for optionality on future technology leadership rather than current profitability.
What drove the November plunge and December rebound?
November 2025: 42% drawdown on weak Q3 and governance worries
A series of headlines through November triggered a sharp re‑rating of RGTI:
- A Motley Fool analysis calculated that Rigetti’s stock fell about 42% in November 2025, erasing October’s nearly 49% gain and more than offsetting the September rally. [10]
- The key catalyst was Q3 2025 earnings, where Rigetti reported revenue of roughly $1.9 million, down about 18% year‑on‑year, and a headline GAAP net loss of $201 million. [11]
- Most of that $201 million loss was tied to non‑cash warrant revaluation and other accounting items; on a non‑GAAP basis, the Q3 net loss was about $10.7 million, or $0.03 per share, and the operating loss was around $20.5 million. [12]
At the same time, market focus shifted to insider and executive ownership:
- Public filings show that in May 2025, CEO Subodh Kulkarni exercised options for 1,000,000 shares and immediately sold them, leaving him with zero direct ownership in RGTI. [13]
- Media and blog coverage framed the November drop partly as a reaction to the optics of a “no‑skin‑in‑the‑game” CEO, especially for a company still years away from sustainable profits. [14]
- A MarketBeat review of recent SEC filings highlighted that insiders sold roughly 405,930 shares worth about $9.6 million over the last 90 days, while insider ownership fell to around 1.9% and institutional ownership sits near 35%. [15]
Several commentaries – including pieces syndicated to Yahoo Finance, 24/7 Wall St. and other outlets – distilled the bear case as a mix of shrinking revenue, massive accounting‑driven losses and perceived misalignment between management and shareholders, amplifying selling pressure. [16]
December 4, 2025: 15%+ bounce on renewed quantum hype
On December 4, 2025, RGTI reversed sharply higher, gaining roughly 15.4% in a single session. [17]
A widely shared Motley Fool piece – carried by Nasdaq and other platforms – tied the move partly to comments from Nobel‑winning physicist John Martinis, who warned that the U.S. might be only “nanoseconds” ahead of China in the quantum race, and to speculation that U.S. policy could further prioritize domestic quantum champions. [18]
More broadly, quantum computing stocks have been trading as a thematic basket all year. A separate analysis noted that pure‑play quantum names like IonQ, Rigetti, D‑Wave Quantum and Quantum Computing Inc. have seen trailing‑year rallies ranging from hundreds of percent to well over 600%, driven less by near‑term earnings and more by expectations around defense, AI and national‑security applications. [19]
Financial picture: early‑stage revenue, heavy losses, big cash buffer
Q1 2025: steep revenue drop but accounting‑driven profit
An Investopedia breakdown of Q1 2025 results shows: [20]
- Revenue fell 52% year‑on‑year to about $1.5 million.
- Rigetti reported earnings per share of $0.13, versus a loss a year earlier, but this profit came largely from around $62 million in non‑cash gains tied to changes in the value of derivative warrant and earn‑out liabilities.
- Operating expenses rose 22% to roughly $22.1 million, as compensation and tax costs increased.
The quarter underscored a theme that continues in Q3: headline profits or losses can be dominated by non‑cash fair‑value adjustments, while the underlying business still posts ongoing operating losses and modest revenue.
Q3 2025: modest revenue, large accounting loss, strong cash
Rigetti’s Q3 2025 figures, as summarized by The Quantum Insider, MarketBeat and other outlets, include: [21]
- Revenue: About $1.9 million, down roughly 18% from the prior year and below some analyst expectations.
- Operating loss: Around $20.5 million.
- GAAP net loss: Approximately $201 million, or $0.62 per share, largely driven by non‑cash warrant and derivative revaluations, not day‑to‑day operations.
- Non‑GAAP net loss: Roughly $10.7 million, or $0.03 per share, which actually beat consensus EPS forecasts (for a larger loss).
- Cash and investments: About $558.9 million in cash, cash equivalents and available‑for‑sale securities at quarter‑end, with subsequent warrant exercises lifting that figure to roughly $600 million by early November.
Zacks and other research notes point out that this large cash balance is a central pillar of the bull case: it gives Rigetti several years of runway to pursue its roadmap, even with continued operating losses. But they also warn that rising R&D and capital expenditure needs could erode that cushion if revenue growth does not accelerate. [22]
Strategy and partnerships: from Quanta to the Air Force and NVIDIA
While the income statement remains modest, 2025 has been a busy year for Rigetti on the strategic and partnership front.
Quanta Computer: $35 million equity stake and >$100 million each in planned investment
In February 2025, Rigetti announced a strategic collaboration agreement with Quanta Computer, a Taiwan‑based Fortune Global 500 server and notebook manufacturer. [23]
Key elements of the deal include:
- Both companies intend to invest more than $100 million each over five years to advance superconducting quantum computing technologies.
- Quanta plans to invest $35 million in Rigetti via a share purchase, subject to regulatory approvals.
- The partnership is designed to blend Rigetti’s full‑stack superconducting quantum technology with Quanta’s server manufacturing and cloud infrastructure expertise, potentially supporting large‑scale deployment in data centers.
Analysts have flagged this collaboration as an important industrial validation of Rigetti’s technology, though the financial impact will depend on future product milestones and commercialization.
Hardware orders and Air Force quantum networking contract
In late September and Q3 commentary, Rigetti disclosed: [24]
- Purchase orders totaling about $5.7 million for two 9‑qubit Novera™ on‑premises quantum systems. One system is destined for an Asian technology manufacturer exploring its own quantum hardware, and another for a California applied‑physics and AI startup focusing on error correction. Delivery is expected in the first half of 2026.
- A $5.8 million, three‑year contract from the U.S. Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL), in collaboration with Dutch startup QphoX, to develop hybrid superconducting‑optical quantum network nodes – an effort aimed at transmitting quantum states between devices and building scalable quantum networks.
These deals are relatively small in absolute dollar terms, but they are meaningful for a company with annual revenue in the single‑digit millions, and they help demonstrate early demand for on‑premises systems and defense‑oriented R&D projects.
Academic and international collaborations
Rigetti has also moved aggressively to broaden ecosystem ties: [25]
- A memorandum of understanding with India’s Centre for Development of Advanced Computing (C‑DAC) to co‑develop hybrid quantum‑classical systems, applications, workflow software and workforce training aligned with India’s national quantum mission.
- A partnership with Montana State University, whose QCORE center operates an on‑premises 9‑qubit Novera™ processor, making it the first academic institution to run its own Rigetti quantum computer.
- Plans to establish a subsidiary in Italy to tap into growing European quantum funding and talent.
- Support for NVIDIA’s new NVQLink platform, which connects quantum processors to AI supercomputers with low‑latency, high‑bandwidth links, positioning Rigetti at the intersection of quantum computing and AI acceleration.
Taken together, these initiatives portray Rigetti as a company trying to build a global footprint across defense, academia, and cloud/AI ecosystems, even as near‑term revenue remains limited.
Technology roadmap: toward 1,000+ qubits
Rigetti’s technology roadmap, reiterated in Q3 communications and echoed in analyst reports, calls for: [26]
- A 100+‑qubit chiplet‑based system with roughly 99.5% median two‑qubit gate fidelity by the end of 2025.
- A 150+‑qubit system with ~99.7% gate fidelity by late 2026.
- A 1,000+‑qubit system by late 2027, targeting ~99.8% fidelity.
Needham’s Quinn Bolton, who maintains a Street‑high $51 price target on RGTI, specifically cites this roadmap – coupled with early commercialization via Novera system sales and the AFRL networking contract – as evidence that Rigetti’s scaling path is credible, at least on paper. [27]
However, multiple commentators caution that quantum hardware roadmaps across the industry are inherently uncertain. Achieving high‑fidelity, large‑scale superconducting systems is technically challenging, and the commercial use‑cases that would justify multi‑billion‑dollar valuations remain largely unproven.
Analyst ratings and stock forecasts
Consensus ratings and average targets
Data compiled by Public.com and MarketBeat indicates that: [28]
- Around five analysts currently cover RGTI, with a consensus “Buy” or “Moderate Buy” rating.
- A majority classify the stock as Strong Buy or Buy, while a minority recommend Hold; there are currently no mainstream Sell ratings reported by these aggregators.
- The average 12‑month price target sits in the mid‑$20s (roughly $24–26, depending on the source), which is actually below the current share price in the low $30s, suggesting some analysts view the stock as having run ahead of fundamentals.
Diverging Wall Street views
The bullish camp:
- Needham’s Quinn Bolton projects that RGTI could rally to $51, implying ~110–115% upside from early‑December closing levels, and highlights Rigetti’s long cash runway, Quanta partnership and AFRL networking contract as key supports for that view. [29]
- A multi‑stock quantum analysis published via Nasdaq notes that several Wall Street analysts see potential triple‑digit percentage gains in 2026 for quantum pure plays including Rigetti – but in the same breath warns that structural headwinds could make 2026 “a rough year” for the sector if expectations aren’t met. [30]
The cautious side:
- A Barron’s report on a B. Riley Securities note shows analyst Craig Ellis downgrading Rigetti from Buy to Neutral, even while raising his price target from $35 to $42, citing a 156% year‑to‑date share surge and a market value above $14 billion at the time of the note. He points to short‑term risks around U.S. government funding timing, reliance on a small number of large contracts and a desire for more transparency on Quanta‑related milestones. [31]
- Zacks, in a piece titled “Can Rigetti Maintain Its Balance Sheet Strength While Scaling R&D?”, stresses that Rigetti’s strong cash position is a major advantage but also flags rising R&D spend and continued operating losses as possible drags if contract wins and cloud usage don’t ramp quickly. [32]
Other forecasting tools add more color:
- CoinCodex models suggest RGTI could trade in a $21.60–27.50 range in 2025, with an average price around $24.43, implying a single‑digit negative return from current levels, despite marking overall technical sentiment as “bullish” with most moving averages flashing Buy. [33]
- Intellectia’s dashboard shows a short‑sale ratio of about 25.5% as of December 2, 2025, and projects a near‑term –8% move over the next month, with a mixed bag of technical indicators (some bullish momentum metrics, several bearish oscillators). [34]
In short, fundamental analysts are broadly positive but increasingly valuation‑sensitive, while quantitative models send a more ambivalent signal, reflecting both strong momentum and elevated downside risk.
Market perception: “big‑time upside” and equally big risk
High‑profile opinion pieces have framed Rigetti as a classic high‑beta, story‑driven small cap:
- A 24/7 Wall St. article on “3 Small‑Cap Stocks With Big‑Time Upside” highlights RGTI’s valuation north of $8 billion as investors bet on full‑stack superconducting quantum computing eventually reaching meaningful commercial scale – but implicitly acknowledges the speculative nature of that bet. [35]
- In another widely shared analysis of quantum pure plays, Rigetti appears alongside IonQ, D‑Wave and others as a potential multi‑bagger if national‑security, AI and cloud use‑cases materialize – yet the same article underscored that quantum companies could also face severe drawdowns if funding or technical progress disappoints. [36]
This dichotomy shows up in trading data: despite strong institutional participation, short interest is elevated, insiders have been net sellers, and retail investors remain highly active in the name, amplifying day‑to‑day volatility. [37]
Governance and alignment: CEO shareholding under the microscope
No recent topic has generated more debate around Rigetti than executive ownership:
- SEC Form 4 filings reveal that CEO Subodh Kulkarni exercised options for 1,000,000 shares on May 21, 2025, then promptly sold all of them, leaving him with 0 shares in the company. [38]
- Commentary from Benzinga, TradingView and retail‑investing forums stresses that such a posture is unusual for a growth‑stage tech CEO, where personal equity stakes are often used to signal long‑term conviction. [39]
- MarketBeat’s institutional‑ownership breakdown further notes significant insider selling by directors during 2025, even as major institutions like Vanguard, Geode and JPMorgan have increased their positions. [40]
While executive compensation structures can be complex, many analysts now list governance and alignment as a non‑trivial risk factor alongside technology and execution risk.
Key risks to the Rigetti bull case
Based on recent reports and commentary, investors and analysts are watching several risk categories closely:
- Revenue growth and customer concentration
- Execution on the technology roadmap
- The ambitious goal of reaching 1,000+ qubits with very high gate fidelity by 2027 depends on successive successful hardware generations, yield improvements and error‑mitigation strategies. [43]
- Any delays or performance shortfalls could undermine confidence in the long‑term story.
- Cash burn vs. cash runway
- Despite the roughly $600 million cash pile, continuing operating losses and capital needs for manufacturing and R&D could significantly draw down reserves before the business turns cash‑flow positive. [44]
- Valuation risk
- With a market cap around $9–10 billion on single‑digit millions of annual revenue, Rigetti trades at a very high implied multiple of current sales, leaving limited margin for error if growth is slower than hoped. [45]
- Governance and insider posture
- The CEO’s lack of share ownership and recent insider selling could weigh on sentiment, particularly among investors who prioritize management‑shareholder alignment in early‑stage tech. [46]
So where does Rigetti stand now?
As of December 5, 2025, the Rigetti story looks like this:
- Business reality: A full‑stack superconducting quantum computing company with small but growing system‑sale and research‑contract revenue, heavy R&D spend and no near‑term path to profitability yet. [47]
- Strategic footprint: Deepening ties with Quanta Computer, AFRL/QphoX, NVIDIA, national research centers and universities, plus expansion plans in Europe and India. [48]
- Balance sheet: A substantial cash cushion that gives several years of runway but must be actively managed against rising R&D and infrastructure costs. [49]
- Market perception: A mix of optimistic long‑term analysts, skeptical governance‑focused commentators and traders responding to quantum‑hype headlines, leading to large month‑to‑month swings. [50]
For investors following RGTI, the stock currently sits at the crossroads of cutting‑edge physics and speculative capital markets. The latest batch of news and forecasts makes one thing clear: Rigetti is not trading on quarterly earnings alone, but on a complex blend of technology milestones, government and industrial partnerships, policy signals, and investor confidence in management’s ability to execute over many years.
References
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