Palantir Technologies (NASDAQ: PLTR) company deep dive, second edition — full rebuild. Two PDFs, Chinese (29 pp) and English (31 pp), each with 18 chapters plus 4 appendices, 14 charts and 17 data tables, figure-for-figure identical; every derived number walked step by step in Appendix D. Reference date: close of 27 August 2026 ($185.93).
Five core judgements
| # | Judgement | Key numbers |
|---|
| 1 | The growth engine is shifting from volume to price, and consumes almost no capital | net dollar retention 157% (four straight rises); FY2025 split: volume +34%, price +16.5%; each new dollar of operating capital returns ~$5/yr after tax |
| 2 | A 1.3% effective tax rate is dressing up earnings and the P/E | normalised at 21%: net income −20%, P/E 148x → 184x; the $3.45bn valuation allowance carries a two-sided break when released |
| 3 | Customer-count disclosure vanished the quarter after growth downshifted | growth printed 45% → 34%, then halted from Q1 2026; a three-step timeline verified across 15 releases |
| 4 | Insiders sold a net $896m in 12 months with zero buys — and the buyback was terminated in January 2026 | Class F pins <5% economics at 49.999999% of votes; two price signals from different filings, one direction |
| 5 | The funding side already rehearsed a fundamentals-free −41% deleveraging this year | Jan–Jun 2026 −41.0% while guidance was raised; β 1.91, IV30 47%, ~$63bn option notional |
Key data (processed, not copied)
| Metric | Reading | Basis |
|---|
| Revenue growth | +92.8%, twelve straight accelerating quarters | weighted peers +30.0% ex-MSFT — a ~63pp spread |
| Rule of 40 | 155 | nothing else in the set above 70 |
| Three order bases | RPO $4.9bn / TCV $3.37bn / RDV $6.24bn (+124%) | not interchangeable; RPO systematically understates the government book — taken apart in the report |
| Reverse-DCF implied growth | 32.9% for ten years, terminal 75% of EV | the price pays for persistence without precedent |
| Net cash | $9.4bn, zero debt | capex 0.7% of revenue; $1.76bn of cloud commitments are the invisible capex |
Three horizons and the target
| Horizon | View |
|---|
| Monthly | Earnings vacuum: options price ±13.5% for 30 days ($161–$211) |
| Quarterly | Three Q3 checkpoints: NDR ≥150, a third guidance raise (eight straight beats make in-line a negative catalyst), triple-digit US-commercial TCV/RDV |
| Annual | Accumulate, target $201 (+8.2%): bear $112 (25%) / base $196 (50%) / bull $302 (25%) on an EV/S engine that bypasses the tax distortion; the base case matches sell-side consensus $12.1bn; migration triggers set in advance |
What changed from the 13 Aug 2026 audited revision
Rebuilt end to end on the seven-stage line: a nine-tile dashboard with multi-period series, a price ladder with the market's implied position and the option ±1σ band, monthly/quarterly/annual horizons, a scenario-to-action operating framework. The rating moves from Neutral to Accumulate and the target from $167 to $201 — not price-driven (ten sessions apart), but engine- and evidence-driven: the scenario engine switched from P/S-per-share to EV/S-enterprise value (bypassing the 1.3%-rate distortion), while NDR at 157% and a second guidance raise confirmed the price lever. The difference is itemised in Chapter 18, and the previous edition's calls remain on the public scorecard — nothing deleted, nothing hidden.
Sources and verifiability
Primary sources: SEC EDGAR (CIK 0001321655) — 10-K, 10-Q, fifteen quarterly releases, DEF 14A and 59 Form 4 filings parsed trade by trade — XBRL companyfacts (full series from 2020), FINRA short interest, CBOE option chains; peers from Snowflake, Datadog, CrowdStrike, Microsoft, C3.ai and BigBear.ai filings. Every claim carries an [A]/[B]/[C]/[D] grade; twelve known limits are listed; every computed figure (normalised P/E, incremental returns, weighted peer growth, reverse DCF, the scenario engine) is reproduced in Appendix D.
How this was prepared, and its limits
Compiled independently by the TopX research team from public information, then reviewed and revised before release by professional investment managers and fund managers with asset-management experience. Reviewers take part in a personal capacity, do not represent their respective employers, and provide no investment advisory services through TopXEA; TopXEA holds no investment-adviser licence in any jurisdiction. Primary filings (SEC, exchanges, company disclosures) are the first-priority source, key figures require corroboration from at least two independent sources, claims carry [A]/[B]/[C]/[D] evidence grades, and known limitations are disclosed item by item inside the report. This is research content — not investment advice — and is not tailored to any investor; historical data and forward projections do not guarantee future results. Digital goods are non-refundable once delivered.
