Nebius Prepares for Earnings Reckoning With $643 Million AI Bet and $46 Billion Backlog

When Nebius reports first-quarter earnings on Wednesday, May 13, the market will be looking past the headline revenue figure. The real question is whether the Dutch neocloud provider can translate its staggering $46 billion contract backlog into operating cash flow — and how its recent $643 million acquisition of Eigen AI will reshape the business model.

The stock is trading near an all-time high of roughly $196, a dramatic climb from under $27 just a year ago. That rally rests on three blockbuster deals: a $19.4 billion supply agreement with Microsoft, a $2 billion strategic investment from Nvidia, and the company's largest-ever contract — a $27 billion commitment from Meta signed in March. The Meta deal alone includes $12 billion in dedicated AI computing capacity over five years starting in early 2027, with an additional $15 billion option for future clusters.

The Eigen AI Pivot

Nebius announced the acquisition of Eigen AI, a 20-person MIT alumni startup, for $643 million — a mix of up to $98 million in cash and 3.8 million Class A shares with vesting conditions for key personnel. That works out to roughly $32 million per employee, but the deal is about technology, not just talent.

Eigen specializes in post-training optimization for open-source models, including post-training quantization, KV-cache optimization, and custom CUDA kernels. The two companies have already released optimized versions of DeepSeek, Llama, and Qwen that achieve output speeds of up to 911 tokens per second in benchmarks. The technology will be integrated into Nebius' Token Factory platform, which offers scalable inference endpoints and fine-tuning pipelines for open-source models.

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This marks the second acquisition in three months, following February's $275 million purchase of Tavily, an AI agent search provider. Both deals push Nebius away from pure infrastructure-as-a-service toward higher-margin platform services with direct customer relationships. The Eigen founding team will also establish a new Nebius presence in the San Francisco Bay Area.

The Numbers That Matter

Analyst consensus expects first-quarter revenue of roughly $389 million — a 600% jump year-over-year — though the secondary source pegs the estimate slightly lower at $375 million, representing a 578% increase. The company is not yet profitable, with a projected loss per share of $0.77 compared to $0.41 a year earlier.

The more critical metric is operating cash flow. Management plans to use contract-bound funds to cover about 60% of 2026 capital expenditures, which are projected at a staggering $16 billion to $20 billion. The company is targeting an annualized revenue run rate of $7 billion to $9 billion by the end of 2026, up from $1.25 billion at the end of 2025. For the full year 2026, management sees revenue between $3 billion and $3.4 billion, following $530 million in 2025.

There was one bright spot in the fourth quarter of 2025: adjusted EBITDA turned positive for the first time, reaching $15 million compared to a loss of roughly $64 million a year earlier. The AI cloud segment posted an adjusted EBITDA margin of 24%.

Wall Street's Mixed Scorecard

Goldman Sachs raised its price target by $45 to $205 after the Meta deal, boosting revenue estimates for 2027 through 2030 by 30% to 54% while maintaining a buy rating. But not all analysts are equally enthusiastic.

Wolfe Research initiated coverage with a neutral rating and a fair value range of $80 to $170, citing a compelling demand story but lingering concerns about execution and financing. Cantor Fitzgerald started with an overweight rating and a $129 target. Freedom Capital Markets downgraded the stock to hold after it had surged 70% since its February recommendation. Eight of ten Wall Street analysts currently rate the stock a buy.

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Institutional investors have been increasing their positions. Millennium Management opened a new stake, UBS added shares, and Oppenheimer boosted its holdings by nearly 91% in the fourth quarter. Still, institutional ownership stands at just 22% — relatively low for a company at this growth stage.

What to Watch on Wednesday

The earnings call, scheduled for 8 a.m. Eastern time, will focus on two key areas: whether the AI cloud segment margin continues to improve, and how management plans to finance the massive capital expenditure program for the current year. A $4.34 billion convertible bond offering provides some cushion, but the gap between the $46 billion backlog and the $16 billion to $20 billion in planned 2026 CapEx will demand detailed explanation.

Investors will also be watching for early integration updates on Eigen AI and whether the annual recurring revenue trajectory points toward the $7 billion to $9 billion year-end target. With the stock at record levels and the market already pricing in aggressive growth, the margin for error is thin.

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