Veteran trader makes bold move on Palantir after earnings

The history of the word “Huzzah” is somewhat sketchy.

While the term is used to express or approval or delight, its etymological roots are unclear. 

Related: Analysts overhaul Palantir stock price target after Q3 earnings

It may have been influenced by war cries from various languages; anthropologist Jack Weatherford says the word comes from the Mongolian “Huree” used by Mongol armies, and spread throughout the world during the Mongol Empire of the 13th century.

British soldiers in the 18th and early 19th centuries were known to give three hearty “huzzahs” before charging at the enemy with fixed bayonets.

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Whatever the origin story, TheStreet Pro’s Stephen Guilfoyle enthusiastically employed the word to describe Palantir Technologies’  (PLTR)  better-than-expected third-quarter results.

“Huzzah, Palantir!” he declared in his Nov. 5 column. “Huzzah to the retail investors who hopped on board and never stopped believing! You, the loyal masses, who have been on board since the beginning and those who have hopped on along the way, I salute you. Rock and roll.”

Founded by the tech investors Peter Thiel and Joe Lonsdale, the Denver company has established itself as key player in the defense industry, with a host of contracts with domestic and international companies and agencies that focus on its data-analytics and AI technologies.

Alex Karp, chief executive of Palantir Technologies.

Bloomberg/Getty Images

Wall Street veteran calls Palantir ‘a champion’

Palantir, which was added to the S&P 500 last month, also boosted its full-year revenue forecast for the third time this year, thanks in part to outsized gains from its nonmilitary business.

“Every once in a while, from the realms of high-tech startups, low-priced stocks and scoffed-at enterprises ridiculed for being over-valued or being misunderstood, rises a champion,” said Guilfoyle, whose career goes back to the floor of the New York Stock Exchange in the 1980s. 

“Every once in a while, a company or stock like Palantir Technologies is crowned such a champion.”

Related: Analysts overhaul Palantir stock price target after Q3 earnings

“This is such a time, though I don’t know if there has ever been a company or stock quite like Palantir,” he added. “What a quarter. Demand is impressive. Profitability and sales are better than expected. Cash flows are robust. The cash position is huge.” 

Alex Karp, the company’s co-founder and CEO, said in a statement that “we absolutely eviscerated this quarter, driven by unrelenting AI demand that won’t slow down.”

“The world will be divided between AI haves and have-nots,” he said. “At Palantir, we plan to power the winners.”

During the earnings call with analysts, Karp said that “given how strong our results are, I almost feel like we should just go home.

“But we’ve been saying since we went public in a [direct public offering] that we would build infrastructure to make America and its allies a dominant force in the world.

“And even we are shocked by the 44% growth in the U.S. off of a $2 billion base,” he said. “So, this is not some speculative small base, 44% growth.”

Allied countries, Karp said, have begun “to realize that AI is the way in which to make their defenses superior in the face of brutal, heinous, immoral and often terroristic enemies, where you need a superior form of fighting that’s both safer for you and more dangerous for the adversary and controls how you hit them and when and where and allows you to maximize your results.”

Palantir shares are up a stunning 214.6% year-to-date and the stock has climbed 186% from a year ago.

Palantir CEO: investors ‘near and dear to my heart’

“Besides making America even stronger and better and our allies stronger, better and all of us more lethal, besides protecting Palantirians and most ex-Palantirians, our individual investors are near and dear to our and certainly my heart, and I love it that you guys are winning,” Karp said. 

“There’ll always be ups and downs in building a business, but we’re definitely fighting for you guys,” he added.

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Guilfoyle noted that Palantir’s balance sheet reflects no debt of any kind.

“Palantir still has (because I have said it before) a pristine, fortress-like balance sheet,” he said. “Possibly the cleanest, strongest balance sheet I have ever seen for a firm this size.”

Analysts for several investment firms issued research notes after Palantir posted its results, including D.A. Davidson’s Gil Luria, who raised his price target to $47 from $28 and affirmed a neutral rating on the shares.

The company reported a “very strong beat” while raising its fiscal 2024 outlook, with revenue growth accelerating due to persistent U.S. demand for AI solutions, Luria said, according to The Fly. 

Palantir remains well positioned to benefit from surging enterprise interest in AI applications, the analyst said.

Guilfoyle said he had come across six highly rated analysts who have opined on Palantir: three had hold or hold-equivalent ratings and three had sell or sell-equivalent ratings.

“Gotta love these guys,” he said. “We’ve been kicking their tails from one end of Wall Street to the other all [year. No] … make that for several years, and they just don’t admit that they got this one wrong.”

Last but not least, Guilfoyle said, his $48 price target had been breached.

“So what do we do?” he asked. “We make a ‘token sale,’ so we don’t look like fools if the stock comes in, and we figure out our new target price for the balance of our long position. If indeed the shares do eventually come in, we repurchase the amount sold in that token sale.”

His new target on PLTR: $56.

Related: Veteran fund manager sees world of pain coming for stocks