Bloom Energy Shares Fall 16% on Day of NTT DATA and Google Announcements

Bloom Energy had a good news day and a terrible trading day, all at once.

On Thursday, Nov. 5, NTT DATA said it will deploy 900 megawatts of Bloom's solid oxide fuel cells as primary onsite power across data center projects worldwide. Shipments are expected to start in 2027. Google, meanwhile, announced a $17 billion data center in Laramie County, Wyoming, near Cheyenne, with a 702-megawatt fuel cell plant built on Bloom units.

Bloom (NYSE: BE) still closed at $167.52, down about 16%.

A selloff bigger than one company

The move followed the Nov. 3 midterms, in which Democrats won Congress. Texas and New Mexico also elected Democratic governors. In Texas, Gina Hinojosa defeated Gov. Greg Abbott after campaigning on a statewide moratorium on new data centers.

The Nasdaq Composite fell 5.52% to 24,315 on Nov. 5, more than 10% below its record close, which meets the definition of a correction. The Dow dropped more than 1,800 points. The S&P 500 fell 4.36% to 7,353. The iShares Semiconductor ETF lost about 12%.

President Trump blamed the election results on Truth Social. "Such a sad thing to watch," he wrote. "Your 401(k)s have, therefore, dropped."

Peter Schiff of Euro Pacific Asset Management said the prior day's rally "made no sense" and that Thursday's selloff "makes perfect sense." Chris Zaccarelli, chief investment officer for Northlight Asset Management, said the narrative had shifted from "AI changes everything" to "Blue wave means data centers will never be built again in this country."

Why Bloom got hit harder

Bloom finished among the 10 worst performers in the S&P 500. It was the stock's worst one-day drop since June 26, when it fell more than 18%, and its lowest close since July 29.

Christopher Dendrinos of RBC Capital said shares sold off on concerns that data center development "could be stalled as new state leadership pursues campaign promises to push back on data-center development." He said Bloom is the most heavily exposed to data center end markets and that investors are likely most concerned with the changing politics in Texas.

There is a wrinkle. Dendrinos noted Bloom is only just shipping its first fuel cells to Texas, where developers favor natural-gas combustion. He also flagged growing concern in New Mexico that one of Bloom's largest developments could face more delays.

Tikr, a stock research platform, put Bloom's U.S. share of third-quarter revenue at 97%. That is the exposure the NTT DATA deal could eventually dilute, though those shipments do not start until 2027.

Less new business than the headlines suggested

The two announcements are not equal. Google will not buy the fuel cells itself. American Electric Power plans to invest around $4 billion in the 702-megawatt plant and sell its output to Google under a 20-year power purchase agreement. AEP expects the plant to be fully running by late 2028.

The fuel cell order itself came earlier. In January, an AEP subsidiary agreed to buy Bloom's fuel cells for around $2.65 billion for the Cheyenne site, using most of an option for 900 extra megawatts under a 2024 supply deal. That single order is worth more than half of Bloom's 2026 revenue forecast of $4.4 billion to $4.6 billion.

So the Google announcement named a customer. It did not add to Bloom's order book. The NTT DATA agreement is the new business.

Google also said in a company blog post that it will pay for 100% of the power used at the Wyoming site. Its named sources are gas-fired generation from Tallgrass Energy and Black Hills Energy, plus the AEP fuel cell plant. Carbon capture at Tallgrass's Eastern Wyoming Sequestration Hub is slated to store most of the fuel cell project's emissions. Adding capture to Tallgrass's gas turbines is still only under engineering study.

The case that the pipeline is safe

Not every analyst reads the drop as a verdict on Bloom's business. Alessio Mastrandrea of Bloomberg Intelligence said Bloom's demand pipeline over the next couple of years is likely still protected because so much of it is tied to projects already underway. He said its efficiency and emissions profile should help it get through tighter scrutiny better than natural-gas-fired alternatives.

Mastrandrea also described a whiplash. On Wednesday, investors bought the idea that onsite fuel cells let data centers sidestep a slower, more politicized grid. On Thursday, "the worry has flipped to whether fewer data centers get built at all."

What the numbers show

Bloom is still up more than 90% this year. It now sits about 52% below its record close of $345.85 on June 22.

Tikr put Bloom at about 40 times forward earnings before the drop and about 34 times after, near the low end of its range since late 2023. Analyst estimates of normalized earnings per share rising from $0.76 in 2025 to $8.24 in 2028 date from Oct. 29, before the election. Tikr noted that if new rules slow data center approvals, analysts would be expected to cut 2027 and 2028 numbers first.

GE Vernova fell 7% and Oklo 13% in the same selloff, per Tikr. The Nvidia and Broadcom drops were roughly 9% each, and Oracle lost 7%, according to CNBC figures.

Hinojosa is the incoming Texas governor, and what she can do on data center approvals once in office remains to be seen. Bloom's fourth-quarter report in early 2027, with its backlog and 2027 guidance, is the next hard data on whether the order book survives the politics.