Dell Stock Jumps 10% After Hours on Blowout AI Quarter, Guide Raise
Dell Technologies stock jumped more than 10% in after-hours trading on Tuesday. The company posted adjusted earnings of $7.04 a share, well above the roughly $4.90 analysts expected.
Revenue climbed 58% from a year earlier to $46.97 billion. Shares changed hands near $469.66 shortly after the release, having closed the regular session down 6.98% at $424.20.
Why Dell Stock Sold Off Before the Beat
Sellers controlled the entire session before the numbers landed. Traders had positioned for a violent reaction in either direction.
Options expiring Friday implied an 11% move, a BeInCrypto Dell earnings options preview showed on Monday. The 10.59% after-hours swing landed close to that estimate.
Dell had also set a far lower bar for itself. Management guided in May to revenue of $44 billion to $45 billion and adjusted earnings of $4.80 a share.
Margins, rather than demand, drove the caution. Memory costs have risen this year, and AI servers earn thinner margins than storage or commercial personal computers.
AI Backlog Swells to $95 Billion as Dell Lifts Its Outlook
Sales of AI-optimized servers doubled year over year to $16.4 billion. Orders told a bigger story.
Dell booked $60.9 billion of AI orders during the quarter and closed it with a record $95 billion backlog. The figure stood at $51.3 billion three months earlier, when the company delivered a record first quarter beat.
$DELL delivered a stellar quarter and raised its FY27 guide well above Street estimates.
— Wall St Engine (@wallstengine) September 1, 2026
Dell now sees revenue of $192B vs. $172.7B est., AI server revenue of $74B vs. $65.8B est., and adj. EPS of $25.50 vs. $18.90 est. 🟢🟢🟢
AI backlog ended Q2 at a record $95B. https://t.co/kJlbA2aJx5 pic.twitter.com/wI0QWTiWuB
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Demand, therefore, is still running well ahead of what Dell can physically ship.
Management answered by raising full-year targets for a second consecutive quarter. The company now points to roughly $192 billion in revenue and $25.50 in adjusted earnings. The prior view was $167 billion and $17.90.
AI server revenue is now guided near $74 billion, against $60 billion in May. For the third quarter, Dell flagged roughly $49 billion in revenue and $6.50 in adjusted earnings.
The tape has not fully priced any of that. At $469.66, the stock sits only about 3% above Monday’s $456.01 close. Most of the pop simply undid Tuesday’s slide.
That leaves the burden on the 4:30 p.m. Eastern call. Executives there face questions on memory supply and on how fast the backlog converts into shipments.
Dell’s 2026 stock surge has already carried shares from about $110 to a high of $514. The market now prices the company as an AI compounder that has to keep raising.