markets

Claire Yubin Oh12/22/25

Rocket Lab builds on Friday’s gain after landmark $816 million satellite contract and record Electron rocket launches in 2025

Rocket Lab is ending the year with a timely boost to its fortunes.

The company is up another ~4% in premarket trading on Monday, building on Friday’s ~18% gain, which came after the company announced an $816 million deal to design and manufacture 18 satellites for the US Space Development Agency on Friday, marking the company’s largest single contract to date.

Per Rocket Lab’s press release, CEO Peter Beck commented that “as the only commercial provider producing both spacecraft and payloads in-house for the SDA Tracking Layer, Rocket Lab is delivering a truly disruptive solution that combines speed, resilience, and affordability,” emphasizing the company’s vertically integrated manufacturing approach, with all of the major components of its satellites designed and produced in-house.

In a separate announcement on Monday, Rocket Lab also shared the successful launch of its 21st Electron rocket of the year and the seventh for Japanese Earth imaging company Institute for Q-shu Pioneers of Space, Inc., finishing the year with 100% mission success for its flagship spacecraft and establishing it as the world’s most frequently launched small-lift orbital rocket, according to the company. The company has plans for five additional Electron launches for iQPS in 2026.

Another name in the space arena, satellite peer AST SpaceMobile, is also trading higher after spiking at the end of last week. Following a 15% gain on Friday, ASTS is up another 4% early on Monday as optimism builds for its BlueBird 6 launch, pivotal to the company’s direct-to-smartphone strategy, scheduled to launch on December 23, 2025, at 10:24 p.m. ET.

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Nvidia’s strong results, guidance lift AI ecosystem

Data center stocks Applied Digital, IREN, CoreWeave, and Nebius as well as foundry giant TSMC and optical communications company Corning are catching a bid in after-hours trading thanks to strong results and guidance from Nvidia.

The chip designer’s massive outlook for Q1 sales — with the midpoint at $78 billion, versus a consensus estimate of $72.8 billion — underscores the magnitude of the near-term demand for AI compute and chips. As if the hyperscalers’ massive capex budgets hadn’t already done that!

To be sure, the advances in these stocks in after-hours trading are fairly mild, since most had been on fire in recent sessions in anticipation of a strong quarter.

Nvidia rises after better than expected Q4 results, big upside surprise in Q1 sales guidance

Nvidia rises after better than expected Q4 results, big upside surprise in Q1 sales guidance

The chip designer’s massive outlook for Q1 sales — with the midpoint at $78 billion, versus a consensus estimate of $72.8 billion — underscores the magnitude of the near-term demand for AI compute and chips. As if the hyperscalers’ massive capex budgets hadn’t already done that!

To be sure, the advances in these stocks in after-hours trading are fairly mild, since most had been on fire in recent sessions in anticipation of a strong quarter.

Nvidia rises after better-than-expected Q4 results, big upside surprise in Q1 sales guidance

The chip designer delivered its 13th consecutive bottom-line beat and 14th on the top line.

Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang is happy

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Max Knoblauch4h

Joby posts smaller loss, larger cash pile than expected in Q4, says it expects US early operations to begin this year

Air taxi maker Joby Aviation reported its fourth-quarter earnings after the bell on Wednesday. Shares climbed more than 3% in after-hours trading.

The company posted a loss of $0.14 per share, beating estimates of a $0.20 loss.

Joby ended the fourth quarter with $1.41 billion in cash (and cash equivalents), compared to Wall Street expectations of $1.01 billion.

Investors have closely watched Joby’s progress with FAA certification, which will be the determining factor for launching commercial air taxi services in the US. As of the end of Q4, Joby said it is 80% complete with the fourth stage of its five-stage certification process, up from 77% in the third quarter. Joby is 12% complete with the fifth stage, up from 10% in Q3.

Earlier on Wednesday, Joby announced it plans to partner with Uber to offer air taxi rides on the ride-hailing app in Dubai later this year. The companies already partner on Blade helicopter rides.

Joby also said it expects US early operations to begin this year, with the White House’s eVTOL (electric vertical takeoff and landing) Integration Pilot Program “set to select at least five sites for mature eVTOL aircraft to begin operating ahead of Type Certification.”

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Matt Phillips4h

The Trade Desk plunges on weak Q1 sales guidance

Ad tech platform The Trade Desk offered weak Q1 sales guidance as part of its Q4 earnings numbers, sending the stock down sharply after-hours on Wednesday.

The advertising software company reported:

Adjusted Q4 earnings per share of $0.59 vs. the $0.58 consensus estimate, per FactSet.
Q4 revenue of $847 million vs. the $840.6 million expectation.
Q1 sales guidance of “at least” $678 million vs. Wall Street’s $688.6 million expectation.

The Trade Desk specializes in helping client advertisers shift their ads from traditional linear television toward online streaming services. And the shares posted some impressive gains at times, rising more than 400% over five years starting at the end of 2019.

But the company’s shares have cratered in recent years, in part because of a daunting competitive threat from Amazon’s demand-side advertising platform. Through Wednesday’s close, the stock was down roughly 80% from where it was trading at the end of 2024.

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Max Knoblauch5h

Paramount misses on earnings and revenue in its fourth-quarter report

Paramount Skydance reported underwhelming fourth-quarter earnings after the bell on Wednesday, in the midst of its attempt to win the Warner Bros. Discovery bidding war.

For the last three months of 2025, Paramount reported:

An adjusted loss of $0.12 per share, compared to Bloomberg estimates of $0.07 earnings per share.
Revenue of $8.1 billion, missing Wall Street’s expectations of $8.15 billion.

Looking ahead, the company expects Q1 revenue of between $7.15 billion and $7.35 billion, below the $7.39 billion Wall Street consensus estimate.

Earlier this week, Paramount hiked its offer for Warner Bros. to $31 per share. Warner’s board, which has rejected Paramount’s acquisition attempts several times in recent months, said it’s reviewing the new bid.

If WBD determines the Paramount deal to be a superior offer, Netflix will have four days to match it, beat it, or exit the process. Paramount shares have fallen 24% since it made its initial offer for WBD in December.

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