In our view, Palantir’s SPAC investments strategy seemed to be poorly timed and has not achieved its investment objectives thus far. Palantir has recognized $334mn in related losses so far and current stock market values suggest another $14mn hit in 4Q22 (we note a non-meaningful impact to PLTR’s EPS, though) – see more color inside. However, this strategy indicates to us the company’s aggressive approach to sales.
We expect Palantir to repeat another year of strong sales, as continued supply chain disruption and an increasingly expected recession calls for further operations optimization and data management. However, as corporate software budgets struggle, we expect Palantir to pursue that growth with lower pricing and margins (especially considering its current $2.4bn in net cash).
While we expect commercial sales to be above consensus in 2023e, our EBITDA is below consensus. We think this approach would be in line with Palantir’s long-term strategy to lock in customers for the economic recovery.
