NEW YORK, December 30, 2025, 10:17 ET — Regular session
- Palantir shares fall in morning trade as investors trim AI-linked software exposure.
- The Federal Reserve’s meeting minutes later Tuesday are the main macro catalyst in a thin year-end week.
- CEO Alex Karp’s hiring push outside traditional colleges is back in focus after a new report on its paid fellowship.
Palantir Technologies (PLTR.O) slipped in morning trading on Tuesday, down $1.27, or about 0.7%, at $182.91. The stock has traded between $181.78 and $185.11 so far in the session.
The pullback keeps the stock tethered to a broader retreat in high-growth tech shares as the final week of the year begins with a more defensive tone. Investors have been quick to lock in gains in names that surged on enthusiasm for artificial intelligence spending.
That sensitivity matters now because markets are thinly staffed and volumes are lighter around year-end, which can magnify moves. Palantir, which has become a popular way to play the “AI trade” in software, can swing with broader rate and risk appetite even on days without company-specific headlines.
Palantir fell 2.4% on Monday as heavyweight technology and other AI-linked stocks retreated, helping pull U.S. indexes lower, Reuters reported. With markets closed on Thursday for New Year’s Day, traders are watching the week’s Fed minutes and a weekly jobless-claims reading for fresh direction. “This is not the beginning of the end of tech dominance; it’ll turn out to be a buying opportunity,” said Hank Smith, head of investment strategy at Haverford Trust. Reuters
Wall Street opened muted on Tuesday, a day after posting its steepest one-day decline in nearly two weeks as technology stocks came under renewed selling pressure, Reuters reported. Reuters
Palantir sells software that helps organizations integrate and analyze data and deploy AI tools in operational settings, from government agencies to large companies. Traders often group it with AI beneficiaries — stocks bought on the expectation that companies will keep spending heavily to build and use artificial intelligence.
A separate focus has been CEO Alex Karp’s push to recruit outside traditional universities. Palantir paid 22 high school graduates about $5,400 a month this fall through its “Meritocracy Fellowship,” and the company’s shares climbed about 150% in 2025, Investopedia reported. Investopedia
The main near-term macro driver for rate-sensitive tech names is the Fed minutes from its Dec. 9-10 meeting, when policymakers cut rates to a 3.50%-3.75% range but registered three dissents, Reuters reported. The minutes are due at 2 p.m. ET. Reuters
Rate expectations matter for fast-growing software stocks because higher yields raise the discount rate investors apply to future profits, which can weigh on valuations. Clear signals that policymakers are comfortable easing further tend to have the opposite effect, supporting risk appetite.
For Palantir, traders are watching whether the stock holds the $180 area after this week’s selloff and whether the AI cohort stabilizes into the close. Monday’s decline put momentum names back in focus as investors reassess how far the year-end rally can run.
The final two sessions of the year can also bring portfolio reshuffling, as managers rebalance exposures and crystallize gains before January. In that environment, macro headlines can overpower company narratives for stretches of the day.
Investors will continue to look for signs that corporate customers are turning pilots into larger deployments of Palantir’s AI products, while government work remains a key underpin. Until a fresh earnings update or a major contract headline changes the story, PLTR’s day-to-day direction may hinge on the broader swing in tech sentiment.
