TLDR
- Rigetti (RGTI) closed Tuesday at $12.15, down 6.39%, then slid 6.83% more after hours to $11.32.
- Q3 revenue was $1.41 million, far below the $3.52 million analysts expected.
- The CFO said 2027 CapEx will look like 2026, not like 2024 or 2025.
- The CEO says investors should track technical milestones, not sales.
- Rigetti still guides for about $20 million in 2026 revenue, tied to the C-DAC deal.
Rigetti Computing (RGTI) closed Tuesday at $12.15, down 6.39%. After hours, the stock slid another 6.83% to $11.32, according to Benzinga Pro.
The drop followed a third-quarter report that missed on revenue and earnings. The spending outlook on the call did not help the mood.
Revenue came in at $1.41 million, down from $1.95 million a year ago. Analysts had expected $3.52 million.
The loss was 6 cents a share, wider than the 5-cent loss Wall Street expected. Operating loss was $33.2 million.
Non-GAAP net loss landed at $20.5 million.
CFO Puts a Price Tag on the Road Ahead
An analyst asked CFO Jeffrey Bertelsen about the jump in capital spending from the prior quarter. He pointed to larger dilution refrigerators and equipment for the Fab-1 facility.
He would not give a fourth-quarter CapEx number. He did say 2027 should look a lot like this year.
“As we march into 2027, I suspect you’ll see CapEx in 2027 relatively consistent with what you’ve seen here in 2026,” he said. Spending will not fall back to 2024 or 2025 levels.
The money backs a plan to reach 1,000 qubits within three years. An intermediate milestone is set for 2028.
CEO Points to Milestones, Not Sales
CEO Subodh Kulkarni spoke to Barron’s ahead of the report. He said quantum computing is still in the research phase.
“Sales are just for research applications,” he said. He called talk of sales growth right now “a little premature.”
Rigetti still guides for about $20 million in 2026 revenue, up from $7.1 million in 2025. That depends on the C-DAC system being accepted and booked in the fourth quarter.
The $8.4 million C-DAC deal is the company’s largest to date. Kulkarni said one big sale can swing a quarter.
He expects first commercial viability in roughly three years. Broader enterprise adoption would follow over the next decade.
He also pushed back on the term “logical qubits.” “We don’t use that word, Google doesn’t use that word, Amazon doesn’t use that word,” he said.
Rigetti released its 108-qubit Cepheus-1-108Q system in April after a three-month delay.
Benzinga Edge Stock Rankings show a negative trend for RGTI over the short, medium and long term. Its Momentum score sits in the 4th percentile.
