Nebius Q3 2026: revenue $981M, ARR $6.4B, 2026 revenue cut to the low end, 2027 guided at $12B to $13B

$NBIS reported third-quarter revenue of $980.8M, up 571% from a year ago and up 68% from the June quarter, with annualized run-rate revenue (ARR) of $6.4B at the end of September, more than double the $3.0B of June. Group adjusted EBITDA reached $465.8M. In the same release, the company moved 2026 revenue to the low end of its $3.0B to $3.4B range, pushed its December ARR target to February, lifted 2026 capex to about $27B, and gave a first 2027 outlook: $12B to $13B of revenue and $40B to $45B of capex. This recap walks the print, the guidance, the cash, the read across the neocloud names and what to watch next, against our /stocks/nbis thesis.

The print

$NBIS reported the quarter ended September 30, 2026.

Q2 2026 figures are from the August letter to shareholders; margins and changes not printed by the company are our arithmetic. ARR is AI cloud revenue of the last month of the quarter times 12.

What moved the numbers:

• The non-recurring part. About $325M of revenue came from the initial phase of an asset-light model, in which partners deploy Nebius architecture and its cloud platform on capacity they fund. The company calls it non-recurring and warns it "can add choppiness to ARR". Without it, revenue would be about $656M, still up 13% on the June quarter (our arithmetic).
• Capacity. Four new sites began generating revenue in the US and Europe, and more tranches went live in New Jersey. The company calls it its largest quarter-on-quarter increase in active capacity.
• Operating leverage. Cost of revenue fell to 22% of revenue from 29% a year ago, and SG&A to 24% from 61%. GAAP operating income turned positive at $50.4M.
• Below the operating line. Interest expense of $112.5M and a $49.5M induced conversion expense on convertible notes took the result back to a $37.5M net loss.

The order book and the build

• New commitments. More than $12B of contract value since the start of Q3, "on our strongest terms to date". AI cloud agreements reached multi-billion-dollar size in early Q4.
• Pricing. Annual contract value per MW above $25M on Q3 deals, from more than $20M in Q2. Prices per GPU-hour rose more than 20% on average.
• Prepayments. More than 90% of contract value signed in Q3 carried a prepayment, and prepayments on Q3 deals covered more than 100% of the related capex, from 50% to 60% in Q2. Payback improved to 1 year and 7 months from 1 year and 10 months.
• Customers named in the letter: Databricks, Datadog, Snowflake and Cognition, among others. The new five-year agreements were all expansions by existing customers.
• The slip. Some third-party colocation capacity moved to the first half of 2027. In New Jersey, Nebius now expects to deliver more than half of the capacity contracted with Microsoft by year-end, with the remaining tranches in the second quarter of 2027.
• Power. More than 4 GW contracted today, 5 GW still expected by year-end, and more than 1 GW of new capacity to come online each year. New sites include a 300 MW expansion in Missouri (1.1 GW under contract there), Alberta, South Carolina and two colocations in India.

The guidance

With $1,962.1M of revenue booked in nine months, the low end of the 2026 range implies about $1.04B for the fourth quarter (our arithmetic). The capex guide implies about $11.6B in the fourth quarter against $15.4B spent in nine months. From 2027 the company will guide on revenue, pre-tax earnings and capacity instead of ARR, which it says "annualizes a single month". All of this is guidance, not results.

The cash

• The quarter's flows. Operating cash flow of -$273.0M and purchases of property, equipment and intangibles of $7.30B, so about $7.6B of negative free cash flow in the quarter (our arithmetic). Over nine months, operating cash flow was +$4.23B, carried by prepayments.
• Prepayments on the balance sheet. $9.41B of deferred revenue against $1.58B at the start of the year: customers are funding a large part of the build in advance.
• Debt. $14.19B, up about $10.1B since December. The company expects prepayments and asset-backed financing on investment-grade contracts to cover 75% to 85% of 2027 capex, and says it will raise external capital "when it is cost-effective".
• Receivables. $4.04B at quarter-end, up from $0.72B in December, larger than the quarter's revenue.

The read across the neoclouds

The standing QA thesis on /stocks/nbis is a vertically integrated AI cloud, with its own data centers and software stack, carrying a large contracted book with Microsoft and Meta, where the open questions are the timing of capacity and the funding of the build.

• Demand. Confirmed and repriced upward: higher price per MW, longer deals, more paid up front.
• Timing. The weak point of this print. Third-party capacity slipped by about two months, and the year's revenue lands at the bottom of the range.
• Funding. Stronger than in Q2 on the prepayment side, heavier on the spending side: $27B of capex this year and $40B to $45B next year.
• Revenue quality. The $325M asset-light line flatters the quarter; the ARR the company reports and the recurring revenue are the cleaner numbers.

Net read: the demand side of the thesis came in ahead; the delivery side slipped by a quarter. Two days earlier, $CRWV printed a raise with a much heavier debt load, see the CoreWeave Q3 2026 recap.

Peer reaction

$NBIS's closest correlated names in the QA universe over 252 days are $CRWV (0.82), $CORZ (0.73) and $APLD (0.67). The NBIS perpetual on Hyperliquid, which trades around the clock, marked $132.57 at 13:17 UTC on November 12, against $151.95 the day before, about 13% lower. $CBRS reports the same day after the close.

What worked

• Revenue of $980.8M and ARR of $6.4B, more than double in a quarter.
• GAAP operating income positive at $50.4M; AI cloud adjusted EBITDA margin of 53.2%.
• More than $12B of new contract value, at higher prices and with prepayments covering the capex.
• A first 2027 outlook: $12B to $13B of revenue, pre-tax breakeven by the fourth quarter.

What broke

• The 2026 range. Revenue now at the low end of $3.0B to $3.4B, the ARR target moved from December to February.
• The asterisk. About a third of the quarter's revenue was non-recurring.
• The spending. 2026 capex above the old range at about $27B, and $40B to $45B in 2027.
• Microsoft capacity. Part of the New Jersey tranches moved to the second quarter of 2027.
• The tape. A $154.69 close on November 11 before the release, down 17% over a month and 44% over three months in the data QA tracks.

What to watch

• The call and the 6-K: the terms of the asset-light partnership, and how much of it repeats.
• Fourth-quarter revenue against the implied $1.04B at the low end, and ARR above $7B in February.
• New Jersey: delivery of more than half of the Microsoft capacity by year-end.
• Prepayments: $10B committed in 2026, and the deferred revenue line in the next balance sheet.
• Levels. The curated key level on NBIS sits at $113, about 15% under the Hyperliquid mark above.

The level map, the peer table and the standing thesis live on /stocks/nbis, where our Nebius teardown video is embedded, with the company primer in Nebius explained. The full $NBIS dossier collects the filings and the numbers. To follow the AI cloud names as a group, see the neoclouds theme.

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Educational research on structural market dynamics. Not investment advice. QuantAbundance positions may change without notice.