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The Vanguard S&P 500 ETF (NYSEMKT: VOO) came close to regaining its all-time high (hit just late last week) on Monday, closing up at 628.27 — but what went up is coming crashing back down this morning. In premarket trading, “the Voo” is already down 1%… and falling.
What’s driving the stock market’s decline? Crazy as it may sound, an earnings beat from Palantir seems to have sparked the selling.
Last night, defense technology company Palantir (Nasdaq: PLTR | PLTR Price Prediction) beat analyst forecasts for Q3 earnings with a $0.21 per share (adjusted) profit on sales of $1.2 billion (nearly $100 million more than forecast). The company boasted of 61% year over year sales growth (77% growth in the U.S., and 121% growth in U.S. non-government commercial sales).
And Palantir raised its guidance for the Q4 currently underway, saying sales will exceed $1.3 billion, beating forecasts for $1.2 billion in revenue. Full-year revenue should be roughly $4.4 billion, with more than $2.1 billion in adjusted income from operations and free cash flow between $1.9 billion and $2.1 billion.
Fantastic numbers, but apparently not fantastic enough to justify the 700x P/E that Palantir stock was fetching heading into earnings. Investors are selling off Palantir stock by more than 8% this morning, and seeing as Palantir is a big component of the S&P 500, that selloff is pulling the whole Vanguard S&P 500 ETF lower as well.
Worry spreads
Adding to investor misery, Goldman Sachs CEO David Solomon warned last night of a “likely … 10 to 20% drawdown in equity markets sometime in the next 12 to 24 months.” And Morgan Stanley CEO Ted Pick suggested he’s looking for a 10% to 15% stock market decline in the near future.
Spooked by the reaction to Palantir’s positive report, investors are starting to question whether stocks (like Palantir) that are associated with artificial intelligence might simply all be a bit too overvalued to respond positively to good news. Premarket, we’re also seeing shares of Nvidia (Nasdaq: NVDA), AMD (Nasdaq: AMD), and Oracle (NYSE: ORCL) start to give back some of their outsize gains. These three AI stocks are down 2%, 3%, and 3% premarket.
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