Palantir Caps Off Record 2024 With Colorful Shareholder Note About Violence, the Superiority of the West, and the AI Revolution
Palantir CEO Alex Karp is one of the most eccentric characters on Wall Street, a self-professed socialist who ski races in corporate updates and makes excitable monologues on earning calls. But after decades of being called “crazy,” the AI-oriented defense contractor has proved doubters wrong, rallying 340% last year and joining the S&P 500. Despite those lofty gains, Karp and Palantirians have a message to Wall Street — we’re just getting started.
- Karp has hitched his company’s fortunes to creating AI that reinforces the strength of the West, underscoring this view in a bold Q4 shareholder letter, where he says that we are in the “earliest stages” of a “revolution that will play out over years and decades.”
- He elaborates, adding that Palantir has built strength since “adversaries and antagonists will never respond to anything but [that]” and progressive qualities like tolerance and openness won’t necessarily “protect us and win the day.”
But what does that have to do with earnings? Palantir, a product of Karp and college roommate Peter Thiel, among other founders, has exploded since its 2020 IPO by presenting itself as Silicon Valley’s preeminent defense contractor. And with all-new AI tech, the firm’s government revenues rose 45%, a figure only dwarfed by the 64% march in revenues from American enterprises. Its messaging is part of what it’s selling — one of the most expensive stocks in history, with a valuation surpassing four of the next largest defense contractors combined.
