Oklo whipsaws after posting slightly worse-than-anticipated Q1 loss

Nuclear energy company Oklo is whipsawing in postmarket trading after posting Q1 results.

Here are the key first-quarter numbers: 

• Net income of -$33.1 million, or a $0.19 loss per share (compared to analyst estimates of -$29.5 million in income and a $0.19 loss per share).

Shares of America’s most valuable zero-revenue company were down over 2% just after the bell before rebounding to trade 3% higher, and then fell into the red again; its price-to-sales ratio remained unchanged throughout.

Oklo is a longtime retail darling. The reaction to these results can be a good read into traders’ appetite for speculative investments, which is probably more useful information than knowing precisely how much money it lost in a three-month period.

Not content with merely powering the AI boom at some point in the future, Oklo also plans on utilizing the technology to develop its reactors. Ahead of its earnings announcement on Tuesday, management teased new AI-integrated workflows for Oklo’s up-and-coming facilities:

“The project scope includes the development and application of technical guidance on model setup, benchmarking and validation strategies, and AI agents to accelerate existing workflows.” 

Last week, Oklo announced that it had cleared another regulatory hurdle for its Aurora Powerhouse reactor, currently under construction in Idaho. The nuclear reactor would, if completed, could produce up to 75 megawatts of electricity using Oklo’s small, fast-fission technology, enough to power tens of thousands of homes or cater to the high energy demands of AI data centers. 

Oklo and companies like NuScale and TerraPower have benefited from the Trump administration’s streamlined permitting process. And as AI data centers continue to push up demand, Oklo is up over 150% over the past year.