- I'll throw the British South Sea Trading Company into the ring for that title of most overvalued company ever.
It had the king himself on the board. The company value represented a decent fraction of the national gdp at the time. All without actually never producing anything of actual value. It was just bribes and speculation all the way through. It's wild.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Sea_Company
Extra History did a more easily digestible series, which was how I learned about it in the first place. https://youtu.be/k1kndKWJKB8
- For people who are unclear what Palantir actually does
Palantir is a tech platform that consumes data from their clients in return for providing high level data-driven insights. They assign FDEs (or consultants) to really learn the details of a customers data. Foundry allows them to get single pane view of the data in an org and they actually have both the tech and engineering skills to do the dirty data cleaning jobs.
For an extravagant fee, you give them your data, they clean it for you, and then those same FDEs can tell you interesting things that you should have known, had you actually done proper data architecture in the first place.
Does it add value, yes. Is the value worth the fee? Like snowflake, they throw some very very good parties.
- The reason Palantir is valued as highly is because it is a Peter Thiel company, and he also owns the Vice President of the United States.
The thesis is "The current US administration is making enormous profits from their powerful positions. Whether of not I agree with this, I want some of that money too".
I'm not sure why this isn't mentioned because it's the number one factor driving the price.
by arghandugh
4 subcomments
- One illuminating factor as to why: watch their CEO Alex Carp overdose on cocaine while on stage in public.
https://bsky.app/profile/ronfilipkowski.bsky.social/post/3m7...
by whycombinetor
4 subcomments
- This is the first time I've seen an ad presented as a bullet point in a list of otherwise-salient bullet points. Nefarious.
by conartist6
0 subcomment
- Putting this here for visibility, but go upvote the people who actually did the sleuthwork: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46190013
It seems like the financial outlet made a maths error and then was amazed by the absurdity of the incorrect result they got.
Specifically their whole outrage is based on having accidentally calculated what would need to happen for Palantir's revenues to grow 1500x as opposed to 15x. The corrected statistic would be the Palantir requires 11.4% revenue growth year over year not 35%.
by jqpabc123
1 subcomments
- TSLA has to be in the mix with a PE over 300.
- For the sake of democracy and freedom of human expression, I hope that their software is a bloated, bureaucratic mess and can’t power the efficient dystopia which Alex Karp wants.
by Quothling
2 subcomments
- To me it would depend a lot on how US/EU relations continue to grow/break. If digital sovereignty ends up putting Palantir in a position where they won't be able to seel their intelligence tools to European secret police organisations, then it's probably overvalued. If relationships work out fine, then they'll basically be the Microsoft of mass survailance, which may make them overvalued but surely not the most overvalued company that ever existed?
- Can someone actually explain what the magic sauce is in what Palantir does? I understand it pulls data together?
by richardatlarge
1 subcomments
- Michael Burry shares his own thoughts on the subject, toward the end
https://pca.st/episode/17966c7b-a56e-46f7-ab2d-03d86dbad650
- Palantir is only the 15th most overvalued:
https://www.macrotrends.net/stocks/stock-screener
- Today the fast growing US stocks are those that discount the further concentration of wealth to the current private-government elite. They believe that in the coming years they will flourish at the expense of the middle/lower class.
by Jean-Papoulos
3 subcomments
- >Palantir would need to grow its revenues roughly 15-fold (yes, 1,500%) over the next quarter century, implying sustained annual revenue growth in the 35% range over this time frame.
That's actually a pretty reasonnable ask for a tech company, if you believe Palantir can grow to the level of FAANG.
by epolanski
1 subcomments
- Palantir has terrific sales and lobbyists. I'd never bet on them, nor against them.
by nrhrjrjrjtntbt
0 subcomment
- What an ad ridden mess. Even one of the summary bullets is an affiliate link.
- Can somebody explain how the software actually adds value? How is it really that amazing? Or is it just a buzz word?
by danpalmer
2 subcomments
- Like Tesla, Palantir is an ideological investment for many, and likely why it's so over valued. Retail investors buy these stocks because they're buying into a world view. Tesla's is obvious (and it's not about green investments). Palantir's is a little less so, but they have built up an image that's right wing (but mostly not culture war), military-coded, and layered on American exceptionalism. They sell to the CIA, they sell to ICE, they help private healthcare companies milk their customers. This is all part of a world view that many people are in favour of, and Palantir represents it well. Andruil will likely do well for similar reasons once they go public.
This is not really to fault them. I see the company as far more mature than Tesla. They've cultivated a brand that works well for them. This is also not intended to be a criticism of Palantir investors, there are many reasons to invest, and even if you subscribe to the above that is of course your right! Many people invest for ideological reasons, myself included, and that's fine.
by tessierashpool9
0 subcomment
- If they keep their shit together and ride the surveillance wave then I don't see what should keep them from increasing 15fold by 2050. Their technology is not at all dependent on AGI, which is why I don't understand why they are always thrown in together with OpenAI et al.
by lazzlazzlazz
0 subcomment
- The cope and envy in the comments here are among the worst I've read on Hacker News. The anti-tech hysteria has even made it here. Sad days.
by wavefunction
0 subcomment
- they're gonna build the american social-discredit system for many filthy dollars
by red-iron-pine
0 subcomment
- More than Tesla? good luck
- Palantir is a shit show
- it may well be terrible software, but Palantir are effectively an arm of the new Trumpian state, so guaranteed access (and ownership?) to the largest public sector projects of the largest economy in the world. It's got a good chance of becoming the Samsung of the US, so any value is not an overvalue
- [dead]
- As long as the AI hopium flies
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