CoreWeave Surges on Upbeat Q2: ETFs in Focus

CoreWeave CRWV shares surged about 15% in extended trading Tuesday after the AI infrastructure provider reported second-quarter results that exceeded Wall Street expectations. Revenues soared 112% year over year to $2.58 billion.Revenues surpassed the Zacks Consensus Estimate by 1.52%.

The company reported a quarterly loss of $1.03 per share versus the Zacks Consensus Estimate of a loss of $1.13. This compares with a loss of $0.27 per share a year ago.

CoreWeave Backlog Hits $104 Billion

CoreWeave ended the quarter with a $104 billion revenue backlog, excluding more than $25 billion in new commitments secured during the third quarter. The company had 1.5 gigawatts of active power at the end of the quarter, underscoring its rapid expansion of AI-focused data center capacity, as quoted on CNBC.

Strong Q3 And Full-Year Outlook

Management expects third-quarter revenue of $3.4 billion to $3.6 billion, with the midpoint implying 158% year-over-year growth. The outlook compares with the Zacks Consensus Estimate of $3.29 billion.

For full-year 2026, CoreWeave now expects revenue in the range of $12.4 billion to $13.2 billion. The Zacks Consensus Estimate for full-year revenue is $12.43 billion.

Adjusted operating income is expected to range from $960 million to $1.15 billion. The new forecast represents an increase from the company’s May outlook of $12 billion to $13 billion in revenue and $900 million to $1.1 billion in adjusted operating income.

Adjusted operating income is expected in the range of $960 million to $1.15 billion. The new forecast represents an increase from the company’s May outlook of $12 billion to $13 billion in revenues and $900 million to $1.1 billion in adjusted operating income.

Higher Capex Highlights AI Infrastructure Demand

CoreWeave expects to have more than 1.85 gigawatts of active power by year-end. However, its capital spending forecast has also increased to $35 billion to $39 billion, up from the previous range of $31 billion to $35 billion, per the same CNBC article.

The elevated spending reflects the enormous cost of building data centers and acquiring the GPUs and other equipment needed to support growing AI workloads.

Strong NVIDIA Demand Supports Pricing

CoreWeave continues to see favorable pricing trends for NVIDIA-based computing capacity. CFO Nitin Agrawal added that CoreWeave is passing higher component costs on to customers, helping protect margins, as quoted on CNBC.

Meta And Anthropic Drive Customer Growth

CoreWeave has secured major commitments from several large customers.

During the quarter, Meta Platforms committed an additional $21 billion to CoreWeave. The company also announced a multiyear agreement with Anthropic and a $6 billion commitment from quantitative trading firm Jane Street.

These deals have helped drive CoreWeave’s massive backlog and reinforce demand for third-party AI computing capacity.

Competition In AI Cloud Intensifies

Competition is also increasing as other companies seek to capitalize on demand for AI computing.Nebius, SpaceX and Meta could pose stiff competition over the medium term.

Why to Tap the Stock With ETFs?

The stock has surged 8.4% over the past month, much higher than the 2.9% return offered by State Street SPDR S&P 500 ETF Trust SPY and the 0.9% gain seen in the Nasdaq-100-based ETF Invesco QQQ Trust, Series 1 QQQ.

The stock currently has a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold). However, it has a downbeat Zacks Value and Growth score of D and a Momentum score of F. The stock has gained 13.9% so far this year, beating the S&P 500’s 12.8% gain.

Against this backdrop, investors can tap into the new-found optimism in CoreWeave with an ETF or basket approach. The basket approach minimizes company-specific risks. The stock has significant exposure in Roundhill Neocloud ETF NCLD and Renaissance IPO ETF IPO and moderate focus on Roundhill Meme Stock ETF MEME, and Themes Cybersecurity ETF SPAM.

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This article originally published on Zacks Investment Research (zacks.com).

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