Why American Superconductor Stock Shorted Out Today
Key Points
American Superconductor beat on both sales and earnings last night.
Guidance fell short, with Q1 sales growth likely to slow, and earnings to decline.
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American Superconductor (NASDAQ: AMSC) stock tumbled 9% through 12:20 p.m. ET Thursday despite beating analyst earnings forecasts last night.
Heading into the company's Q4 2025 report, analysts forecast the green energy stock (American Superconductor builds control systems for wind turbines, and optimizes power lines for transmitting wind and solar power) would earn $0.19 per share on sales of $82.1 million. AMSC actually earned $0.30 per share, and sales totaled $86.4 million.
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American Superconductor Q4 earnings
Why are investors dumping American Superconductor stock today? I'm honestly not sure. Sales surged 34% year over year to set a "recent" record, and maintain the same 34% growth rate for all of 2025. GAAP profits of $0.10 per share -- although not as strong as the $0.30 non-GAAP number noted above -- nonetheless tripled year over year, while the non-GAAP number more than doubled.
Oh, and for the full year, AMSC ended up with GAAP profit of $3.12 per share -- nearly 20 times its 2024 profit. (Albeit, most of this came from tax benefits.)
Best of all, AMSC pointed out that its backlog of work awaiting fulfillment grew 40% to $280 million, outpacing sales growth, and promising to keep the growth engine going.
What's next for American Superconductor?
Now here's the bad news: After delivery bang-up Q4 earnings, American Superconductor forecast Q1 2026 sales of $85 million, slightly ahead of expectations but only half the growth rate of last year. Worse, management warned that non-GAAP earnings will be only $0.17 per share -- far less than the $0.23 per share Wall Street had AMSC pegged for.
If you ask me, that's the most likely explanation for why AMSC stock shorted out today: sales growth will soon slow, and an earnings miss is likely in Q2.
Should you buy stock in American Superconductor right now?
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Rich Smith has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends American Superconductor. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.
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