Why You Should Think About Palantir Differently Now
Palantir Technologies (PLTR) stock trades at 78.2 times sales, compared to 3.1 for the S&P 500. Investors paying that premium need to know exactly what they are buying, and the case Palantir makes has evolved. During the fiscal Q3 2024 earnings call, executives highlighted the fast-growing number of U.S. businesses signing on as customers. By the latest call in fiscal Q2 2026, the focus had shifted. So what does management talk up now?
Palantir Now Makes The Case For Sovereign AI
By sovereign AI, Palantir means an architecture where companies maintain full control over their own data and the artificial intelligence built upon it. During the fiscal Q2 2026 call, held August 3, 2026, executives reported immense demand from enterprises for this capability. They contrasted this approach with purchasing external services from AI labs, a process they described as paying outside vendors to move proprietary corporate knowledge into third-party models.
The pitch sounded quite different during the fiscal Q3 2024 call. At that time, leadership highlighted that Palantir’s U.S. commercial customer count grew to 321. Expanding that baseline served as a clear signal that more U.S. companies were adopting the software.
While Palantir still reports the customer count, the metric no longer takes center stage. Instead, the company links sovereign AI directly to increased spending per client. Customers that previously utilized only the Foundry software now want access to the broader sovereign AI stack. The core argument now rests on the size of individual customer commitments, rather than the sheer number of clients.
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Palantir’s Business Customers Are Spending Much Larger Sums
Sales to the U.S. businesses are growing much faster than the number of businesses buying. Palantir’s U.S. commercial customer count reached 653 in fiscal Q2 2026, up 35% from a year earlier. Over that same period, U.S. commercial revenue rose 149% to $764 million. These buyers belong to Palantir’s commercial segment, a division that generated $2.07 billion in fiscal 2025, accounting for 46.3% of the company’s total revenue that year.
Contract values follow a similar trajectory. U.S. businesses signed deals with Palantir worth $2.132 billion in total in fiscal Q2 2026, up 153% from a year earlier. Consequently, the average customer is committing significantly more capital than they were just a year ago. Executives labeled that contract total a record, forming the foundation of the case they now present.
Is Palantir’s Growth From Big Buyers Reassuring?
Thus far it is, because Palantir’s profit is rising alongside the larger enterprise spending. Revenue grew 92.8% from a year earlier in fiscal Q2 2026 to $1.94 billion. At the same time, the operating margin reached 47.1%, up from 26.8% a year earlier.
The main risk is how much Palantir relies on a few large buyers, government and business together. According to the company, Palantir’s top 20 customers accounted for an average of $124 million each over the twelve months to June 2026. That amounts to about $2.48 billion, or about 40% of Palantir’s total revenue of $6.16 billion over those twelve months.
The average U.S. business customer now spends substantially more than a year ago, and the latest corporate messaging reflects that reality. Looking ahead to Palantir’s next report, expected on or around November 2, 2026, the key metric to watch is whether U.S. commercial revenue continues to grow much faster than the customer count.
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