Prediction: Rigetti Computing Stock Will Be Worth This Much in 1 Year

Rigetti Computing (NASDAQ:RGTI) is one of the leading developers of quantum computers. They have the potential to outperform traditional computers in data-intensive areas like science and cryptography, because they can use a concept called superposition to simulate multiple solutions to a problem at the same time.

But, unfortunately, even Rigetti's best quantum systems still make too many errors to reliably solve complex problems in the real world. Therefore, the company is generating very little revenue while continuing to invest heavily in research and development, resulting in substantial losses at the bottom line.

That isn't a very attractive situation for investors, which explains why Rigetti stock has plummeted by 81% from its all-time high (as of the market close on Nov. 12). Here's where I predict it will be trading in one year from now.

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Rigetti is making progress, but commercialization at scale could take years

Rigetti has an entire in-house supply chain, enabling it to bring new quantum systems to market much faster than most of its competitors. It has its own chip fabrication facility, its own quantum programming language, and its own cloud platform where it can monetize its systems by renting computing capacity to other enterprises for a fee.

Rigetti built one of the industry's largest multichip quantum computers, called Cepheus-1-108Q. It has a single-qubit gate fidelity of 99.9%, meaning it makes one error per every 1,000 quantum operations. However, its 2-qubit gate fidelity is just 99.5% -- and while that improved from 99.1% earlier this year, it still implies five errors for every 1,000 operations. Getting two qubits to work together in harmony is one of the industry's greatest challenges, because they are highly sensitive to interference.

Solving complex real-world problems might require an error rate of 1 in 1 million, or even 1 in 1 billion, so while Cepheus-1-108Q is quite good by industry standards, it still has a long way to go.

Rigetti is aiming to demonstrate a much larger, 1,000-qubit system with a 2-qubit gate fidelity of 99.9% within three years, but that still might not be enough to demonstrate true real-world utility. In fact, according to Cathie Wood's Ark Investment Management, it could take somewhere between 20 years and 40 years for the industry to produce truly disruptive systems.

Rigetti's revenue declined in the third quarter

Rigetti generated just $1.4 million in revenue during the third quarter of 2026, which was a 27% decline from the year-ago period. The company says it's still on track to generate $20 million in revenue overall in 2026, which would be an 85% increase from the previous year.

It's typical of a start-up to produce lumpy sales, but Rigetti is bringing in a tiny amount of money in the context of its $3.7 billion market capitalization, which creates a huge valuation problem that I'll discuss further in a moment.

But the bigger problem might be Rigetti's mounting losses. The company's operating expenses grew by 62% year over year to $34 million during the third quarter, with research and development spending accounting for most of that total. Since costs dwarfed revenue, it resulted in an operating loss of $33.2 million, up 61%.

Rigetti had $497 million in cash and equivalents on hand as of Sept. 30, so it can afford to sustain its losses for now. However, given how long it could take to develop truly useful quantum systems, the company might have to tap investors for more money at some point in the future.

I think Rigetti stock will be trading much lower in a year

Based on Rigetti's modest revenue and its substantial market cap, its stock is trading at a sky-high price-to-sales (P/S) ratio of 269. It's a whopping 43 times as expensive as the Nasdaq-100 index, which has a P/S ratio of 6.2, meaning it looks heavily overvalued compared to a group of America's highest-quality technology companies.

Even if we value Rigetti based on Wall Street's 2027 revenue estimate of $43.5 million, its forward P/S ratio is still 81.

RGTI PS Ratio data by YCharts

Therefore, even if Rigetti stock plummets by 90% over the next 12 months from its Nov. 12 closing price of $10.33, it will still be more expensive than the Nasdaq-100 by this metric. I'm not predicting a decline of that magnitude, because many investors are likely to hold onto their quantum computing stocks for the technology's long-term potential.

However, the path of least resistance is likely to the downside, so I think a stock price of around $5 in one year is certainly possible.

Anthony Di Pizio has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.