Bloom Energy fell 5.4% Friday despite enormous trading volume ahead of its addition to the S&P 500, showing that the mechanical demand created by index inclusion was not enough to overcome profit-taking in one of the market’s hottest AI infrastructure stocks.
Shares closed at $265.63 after opening at $284.32 and briefly touching $285.10. Roughly 73 million shares traded, more than five times Thursday’s volume.
Bloom enters the S&P 500 before trading begins Monday, replacing Molson Coors Beverage as part of the index’s quarterly rebalance.
That move was not new information.
S&P Dow Jones Indices announced the change on September 4, when Bloom closed at $252.87. The shares jumped nearly 10% the following trading day as investors anticipated demand from index funds required to own the incoming stock.
Friday’s decline therefore looks less like investors rejecting the S&P 500 promotion and more like selling into the final wave of rebalance-related demand.
The stock still finished about 5% above where it traded when the addition was announced.
The larger issue is valuation.
Bloom’s market value has moved above $75 billion after a roughly fourfold increase over the past year, while management expects only $3.9 billion to $4.2 billion of revenue in 2026.
At the midpoint of that range, the equity is valued at roughly 19 times current-year sales.
That multiple requires far more than index membership. It requires Bloom’s transformation into a major provider of power for AI data centers to continue at exceptional speed.
AI Demand Has Changed Bloom’s Financial Profile
The underlying business has strengthened dramatically.
Second-quarter revenue reached a record $1.07 billion, up 166% from $401 million a year earlier and above $1 billion for the first time.
Product revenue rose 215% to $935 million.
Profitability improved at the same time.
GAAP gross margin expanded to 33.4% from 26.7%, while operating margin reached 17.1% after being negative 0.9% in the prior-year quarter. Adjusted EBITDA increased to $253 million from $41 million.
Bloom consequently raised full-year revenue guidance to between $3.9 billion and $4.2 billion, representing roughly 100% growth at the midpoint.
That is why the stock has been rerated so aggressively.
AI developers increasingly face a problem that has little to do with chips: obtaining enough electricity quickly enough to turn expensive computing equipment on.
Large data centers can wait years for traditional grid connections and transmission upgrades.
Bloom’s solid-oxide fuel cells can generate electricity directly at a site, allowing customers to build power capacity alongside their data centers rather than waiting entirely on utility infrastructure.
That pitch has moved Bloom from a niche clean-energy company toward the center of the AI infrastructure buildout.
Brookfield Makes the Opportunity Much Larger
The clearest evidence of that shift came in June.
Brookfield expanded a financing framework with Bloom from $5 billion to $25 billion for AI infrastructure power projects, only eight months after the two companies announced the original partnership.
The agreement does not represent $25 billion of guaranteed Bloom revenue.
Brookfield is providing a pool of capital that can finance qualifying projects as customers commit to building them.
Revenue will depend on which projects actually reach construction and how much Bloom equipment each development uses.
Still, the fivefold increase demonstrates how quickly expectations for data-center power demand have changed.
Bloom is now trying to deepen that advantage with an 800-volt direct-current architecture aimed specifically at next-generation AI facilities.
The company estimates that a one-gigawatt data center using Bloom’s native DC system could reduce non-compute capital spending by $3.6 billion, or 27%, and lower five-year total ownership costs by $5.5 billion.
Those figures come from Bloom’s own engineering analysis rather than an independent customer study, so they should be treated as management estimates rather than proven savings.
No new customer contract accompanied the report.
Cash Flow Is Finally Supporting the Growth Story
Bloom’s balance sheet has also improved enough to support expansion.
The company held $2.67 billion of cash at the end of June.
Operating cash flow reached $300 million during the first six months of 2026, compared with a $324 million cash outflow during the same period last year.
Customer deposits rose to about $361 million from $78 million at the end of 2025, reflecting new customer agreements and milestone payments on active projects.
Those numbers are important because Bloom historically consumed substantial amounts of cash while scaling manufacturing.
The current cycle looks different.
Customers are providing more upfront funding while higher product volumes and margins are turning revenue growth into actual cash generation.
That reduces the likelihood that Bloom would need to issue large amounts of stock simply to finance its expansion.
Customer Concentration Still Deserves Attention
Rapid growth has also made Bloom increasingly dependent on a small number of very large projects.
Three customers represented approximately 36%, 34% and 17% of accounts receivable at June 30.
Together, that means the three largest balances represented nearly 90% of receivables.
That concentration does not mean the revenue is impaired.
It does mean project timing matters enormously.
Accounts receivable increased by about $86 million during the first half, while contract assets rose by roughly $187 million, primarily because of billing milestones.
A delayed hyperscale project can therefore have an outsized effect on quarterly revenue, cash collection and investor expectations.
That risk becomes more relevant when a stock trades at a valuation that already assumes years of rapid expansion.
Expectations Are Now Almost as Important as Execution
Wall Street has continued raising estimates as Bloom’s data-center opportunity grows.
Mizuho increased its price target this week to $351 from $242, citing stronger pricing, demand and improving visibility into deliveries expected during the second half of 2026 and 2027.
But the broader analyst range shows how much optimism is already embedded in the shares.
The average target among analysts tracked by Investing.com is about $280, only modestly above Friday’s $265.63 close, despite a wide range stretching from below $100 to nearly $400.
Monday’s S&P 500 entry will complete the near-term technical catalyst.
After that, the stock returns to fundamentals.
Bloom’s next earnings report needs to show that revenue remains on track for at least $3.9 billion this year, gross margins can hold near the 30%-plus level reached in the second quarter and large customer projects continue converting deposits and contract assets into cash.
The company has already proven that AI power demand can transform its revenue growth.
At more than $265 a share, the market is now asking Bloom to prove that transformation can last.