Options Market Statistics: Snap Options Pop and Shares Plunge in the Wake of Quarterly Loss, Layoffs

Shares of Palantir closed up more than 30% Tuesday, a day after the company released fourth-quarter earnings that surpassed analysts' expectations for revenue and showed strong demand for its artificial intelligence offerings.

Palantir, known for its defense and intelligence work with the U.S. government, reported that revenue in the quarter increased 20% to $608.4 million, up from the $602.4 million expected by Wall Street. Palantir said it expects to report between $612 million and $616 million in revenue during its first quarter, shy of the $617 million analysts were anticipating.

In a letter to shareholders, CEO Alex Karp said demand for large language models in the U.S. "continues to be unrelenting." Palantir has been scaling its Artificial Intelligence Platform, or AIP, and Karp said the company carried out nearly 600 pilots with the technology last year.

Alibaba's quarterly results, due Wednesday, come at a chaotic time, with Chinese markets in the midst of a volatile stretch because of continuing concerns about the health of the world's second-largest economy. Earnings from the e-commerce and cloud-computing company could add to the fear—or help a recent bounce in stock prices to continue.

Shares of Snapchat parent Snap plunged on Tuesday after the company reported a loss in the final three months of 2023.

Snap reported a net loss of $248 million for the December quarter, an improvement from the same period in the prior year and a narrower loss than Wall Street analysts had expected. Still, shares fell around 30% in after-hours trading Tuesday.

The company also said revenue from the quarter grew 5% year-over-year to $1.36 billion, its second consecutive quarter of revenue gains after two earlier quarters of declines last year.

However, in a Tuesday letter to investors, Snap said the conflict in the Middle East posted a "headwind to year-over-year growth of approximately 2 percentage points in Q4."

CEO Evan Spiegel attempted to strike an optimistic tone in the company's earnings release, saying, "2023 was a pivotal year for Snap, as we transformed our advertising business and continued to expand our global community, reaching 414 million daily active users."