Bloom Energy slides 20% as fuel cell peers offer cheaper bets

Bloom Energy shares slid 20.9% in a month to about $233, still up 169% this year, as investors weigh rotating into cheaper fuel cell peers.

Chief Executive Officer KR Sridhar said "chips without power are just inventory," framing the company's push into AI data-center power as hyperscalers and more than a dozen neoclouds validate its platform.

Plug Power traded at $2.05, down 23% over the month, while FuelCell Energy fell 31% to $20.50, the deepest drop of the three. The Global X Hydrogen ETF, which holds all three names, declined 16% to $43.43.

The gap in valuation is the crux. Bloom trades at 303 times trailing earnings, the only profitable operator in the group, while Plug Power and FuelCell Energy carry no trailing P/E after years of dilution and operating losses. Rotating out of Bloom swaps one speculative hydrogen bet for another rather than buying a cheaper business.

The Valuation Gap Defines the Trade

Bloom Energy's 303.11x trailing P/E prices in years of flawless execution, and the one-month drawdown after a 169% year-to-date run looks more like a valuation reset than a break in fundamentals. The stock remains up 494.55% over the past year, closing at $218.32 on Aug. 3, about 22% below its $351.28 52-week high.

The company's Q2 report on July 28 delivered a fourth straight earnings beat, with revenue of $1.065 billion, up 165.5% year over year and beating consensus by 28.82%. Non-GAAP EPS of 78 cents nearly doubled the 41-cent estimate, and management raised full-year 2026 revenue guidance to $3.9 billion to $4.2 billion. Product revenue jumped 215% to $935.4 million, and a $5 billion Brookfield partnership anchors a $20 billion total backlog.

Plug Power and FuelCell Energy: Cheaper Tickers, Similar Risk

Plug Power posts a trailing EPS of negative $1.39, an operating margin of negative 63.6%, and a market cap of $2.87 billion. FuelCell Energy remains unprofitable, posting a fiscal 2025 net loss of $191.4 million and negative adjusted EBITDA of $74.4 million, with gross margins still below zero.

FuelCell Energy's path to break-even hinges on manufacturing scale. Its Torrington, Connecticut facility runs at a 41-megawatt annualized rate, and management says positive adjusted EBITDA becomes achievable near 100 megawatts, about 40 percent of the way there. The site can expand to 350 megawatts with added capital. The company exited fiscal 2025 with $278.1 million in unrestricted cash, reducing near-term solvency risk, though it sold 16.4 million shares in the fourth quarter for $136.9 million in gross proceeds, a trade-off that dilutes existing holders.

The Diversified Middle Path

The Global X Hydrogen ETF offers a shallower drawdown than any single name, spreading exposure across dozens of global hydrogen and fuel cell companies including Doosan Fuel Cell and Ballard Power Systems. Its concentration in the sector means a sustained rerating across the group would drag the fund lower even as diversification softens the blow.

For investors sitting on large Bloom Energy gains, trimming an oversized position and redeploying part of the proceeds into the ETF could preserve sector exposure without doubling down on the highest-multiple name. All three stocks moved double digits in a month, and position sizing should reflect that volatility. The next test comes with Plug Power's second-quarter results on Aug. 10, which will show whether the weakest name in the group can narrow its losses.

This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute investment advice.