Mid-cap SpaceX competitor Firefly beats revenue estimates; shares jumping

Shares of Firefly Aerospace, a mid-cap competitor to Elon Musk’s SpaceX that develops launch vehicles and orbital spacecraft, jumped nearly 9% in premarket trading on Friday as the company’s fourth-quarter revenue beat Wall Street expectations. A week earlier, after several setbacks, Firefly successfully launched its Alpha rocket and delivered it into orbit. It has been public for less than a year.

Firefly shares rose nearly 9% in early trading on Friday to $25 apiece, before paring gains.

A day earlier, the company reported that its fourth-quarter revenue was up 6.4 times year over year at $57.7 million, while Wall Street had expected $52.0 million, Barron’s noted. The loss per share for the same period narrowed 29-fold to $0.26. There analysts had expected a loss of $0.47 per share, Bloomberg wrote.

For the full year, Firefly’s revenue jumped 163% to a record $159.9 million. Firefly guides for 2026 revenue to be in a range of $420-450 million. That implies growth of at least 2.6 times and up to 2.8 times versus the 2025 figure.

Founded in 2017, Firefly develops launch vehicles, lunar landers, and orbital spacecraft, and provides launch services to government and commercial customers. Among its peers, the company stands out for its ability to execute responsive space missions and deliver a satellite to orbit in approximately 24 hours, according to the company.

In the first quarter of 2025, Firefly “accomplished an astoundingly successful landing on the moon” using its Blue Ghost spacecraft for NASA, analyst Rich Smith wrote for the Motley Fool. In August last year, the company completed an IPO that Reuters described as the largest in the space technology sector year to date.

On its first day of trading, Firefly shares jumped 55%, bringing its market capitalization to $9.84 billion. Since then, however, the stock has fallen more than 67%. The decline was driven by weak second-quarter 2025 results and unsuccessful Alpha rocket launches, which either failed outright or delivered satellites to incorrect orbits, Bloomberg wrote.

In March, the company announced it had successfully launched the rocket, which reached orbit and delivered a demonstration payload for Lockheed Martin, the largest U.S. defense contractor.

The following day, Roth Capital reiterated its “buy” rating on Firefly shares at a maintained target price of $30 per share. This is nearly 31% above the stock’s close on Thursday.

Firefly shares have four “buy” ratings and three “hold” ratings from Wall Street analysts. The average target price is $40 per share, implying upside of 74%.