Super Micro Stock Soars 13% After AI Server Demand Pushes Preliminary Revenue Billions Above Its Own Forecast

NEW YORK — Shares of Super Micro Computer jumped more than 13% in early trading Wednesday. The server maker said its revenue for the latest quarter came in billions of dollars above its own forecast, which it credited to strong demand for artificial intelligence systems.

The stock rose $4.32 to $36.79 shortly after the opening bell, up from Tuesday's close of $32.47. More than 5.7 million shares changed hands in the first minutes of trading, putting the company's market value at about $23.6 billion.

A multibillion-dollar beat

In a regulatory filing after the market closed Tuesday, the San Jose, California-based company said it expects revenue of $18.5 billion to $19.5 billion for its fiscal first quarter, which ended Sept. 30. It had previously guided for $14.5 billion to $15.5 billion. Analysts had expected about $15 billion, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.

At the midpoint, the new range is about $4 billion higher than the company's earlier forecast, an increase of roughly 27%.

Profitability also improved. Super Micro said gross margin for the quarter would be 12% to 12.5%, up from its earlier forecast of 10.4% to 10.8%. The company attributed the higher margin to customer and product mix and said overall demand for AI platforms drove the stronger sales.

The figures are preliminary and unaudited, and the company said final results may differ. Super Micro plans to report full results and hold a conference call on Nov. 3 after the market closes.

AI trade gets a boost

The update came at an important time for AI infrastructure stocks. Last week, rising bond yields, a hotter-than-expected U.S. inflation report and questions about how companies will pay for massive AI spending triggered a broad selloff in technology shares.

Super Micro's numbers, along with strong quarterly results from SpaceX released the same evening, helped lift sentiment across the sector. Dell Technologies rose about 7% in morning trading, and Hewlett Packard Enterprise gained about 5%. Asian chipmakers also rallied overnight after the Super Micro news.

Super Micro builds servers using processors and accelerators from Nvidia and Advanced Micro Devices. That makes its sales an important early indicator of how much customers are spending on data center hardware.

Big targets, thin margins

Wednesday's rise follows months of sharp swings. In August, Super Micro said it had received more than $60 billion in new orders in its fiscal fourth quarter, which ended in June. That was more than 1.5 times its total sales for fiscal 2026, which came to $39.1 billion. The company set a revenue target of $65 billion to $72 billion for fiscal 2027.

Filling those orders requires large amounts of cash for components. In June, Super Micro said it planned to raise $7 billion through stock and stock-linked securities to buy parts for new AI orders. The stock fell 28% the next day.

On Sept. 23, the company said it had begun shipping Nvidia's Vera Rubin NVL72 rack-scale systems, the chipmaker's newest AI platform.

Even with Wednesday's jump, the stock is down about 38% over the past 52 weeks. It trades at less than 10 times trailing earnings, far below most AI hardware peers. That reflects investor concerns about Super Micro's low profit margins and its history of accounting and governance problems.

Margins remain a central issue. Large AI server contracts tend to have thin profits because hyperscale customers negotiate hard on price, and Super Micro competes directly with Dell and HPE for those deals. The improved gross margin in the preliminary results is likely to get close attention when full results come out.

What's next

Investors will look for details on Nov. 3, including how much of the quarter's revenue came from shipments delayed from earlier periods, how quickly the order backlog is turning into sales, and whether the stronger margins can last.

Some analysts have also pointed to risks from ongoing U.S. export control reviews of advanced AI hardware, which could affect shipments to some customers.

For now, the preliminary numbers have supported the idea that demand for AI computing hardware remains strong, even after last week's market turmoil.