Sumit Roy
3 min read
In This Article:
Two leveraged ETFs tied to Palantir Technologies Inc. (PLTR) have soared to the top of the leaderboard this year, riding a wave of retail enthusiasm and explosive gains in the stock. The GraniteShares 2x Long PLTR Daily ETF (PTIR) and the Direxion Daily PLTR Bull 2x Shares (PLTU) are now the two best-performing U.S.-listed ETFs of 2025, with year-to-date gains of just over 110%.
Shares of Palantir themselves are up 71% on the year, buoyed by surging demand for the company’s AI-driven analytics software. That growth has helped push PTIR’s assets under management to $556 million and PLTU’s to $399 million.
Despite the rally, investor flows have diverged. PTIR has seen outflows of $90 million this year, while PLTU has pulled in $195 million in new money.
Palantir has long been one of the most polarizing stocks in the market. Originally known for developing counterterrorism software for the U.S. intelligence community, the company has expanded into the commercial space, offering a suite of products—Gotham, Foundry, Apollo and AIP—designed to help customers integrate, analyze and act on massive amounts of data.
The bull case for Palantir hinges on growing demand for these powerful tools that make sense of complex data, particularly in an era of rising geopolitical risk and the proliferation of artificial intelligence. Management is targeting 36% revenue growth this year, underscoring the optimism.
But the company’s valuation is a major sticking point. Shares currently trade at 68 times forward sales and 197 times forward earnings, levels that dwarf nearly every other large-cap software firm.
For comparison, Cloudflare Inc. (NET), the next-priciest peer, trades at 24 times forward sales. Much like Tesla Inc. (TSLA), Palantir has cultivated a fiercely loyal base of individual investors who continue to back the stock regardless of valuation.
That disconnect is visible in Wall Street ratings. Of the 29 analysts covering Palantir, only eight rate it a Buy, according to Bloomberg. The average 12-month price target is $103, well below the current share price of $126.
For investors looking to amplify their Palantir exposure, PTIR and PLTU offer tempting but risky ways to do so. Both are 2x leveraged ETFs that aim to deliver twice the daily return of Palantir stock.
Over short periods, they can deliver eye-popping returns. But over longer time frames, especially in volatile markets, performance can diverge from the expected 2x multiple due to the effects of daily rebalancing and compounding.
