Its growth trajectory is slowing down, with sales increasing by 17% in 2023. This is less than in 2022, when the growth rate reached 24%; significantly less than in 2021, when it reached 41%; and even less than in 2020, when it reached 47%.

This deceleration is accompanied by a still laborious rebalancing of the customer portfolio, since government customers still account for 54% of sales, compared with 58% two years earlier; the share of private companies among customers is therefore hardly changing at all.

The year 2023 marks a turning point, however, with Palantir turning a profit for the first time - albeit a meagre one, but with the accounts in the black nonetheless. This development has been made possible by a significant reduction in stock option remuneration, from $565 million in 2022 to $476 million in 2023.

These are still high levels - 21% of sales after all! - but nowhere near the aberrations of yesteryear, when stock option remuneration reached over 80% of sales. Eighteen months ago, MarketScreener was already expressing strong reservations about these bizarre managerial practices, among other concerns.

Moreover, skeptics who maintain that Palantir is really in the business of consulting rather than software development will no doubt be contradicted by a gross margin level approaching 80%.

That said, it is not certain that we can draw a particularly positive conclusion from this, since at the bottom of the table the net margin remains microscopic...

Fans of the firm headed by Peter Thiel and Alex Karp will also be relieved to learn that their company will not be moving into yellow metal trading. In 2021, Palantir acquired $51 million worth of gold bullion, which was recently resold without gain or loss.

Palantir's financial position remains healthy, with nearly $3 billion in excess cash and cash equivalents. This leaves Palantir with an enterprise value of $33 billion, a multiple of fifteen times sales, which some will find absurd.